For nearly 50 years, Kate Pierson has been best-known as the mellifluous voice, mega-bouffant and keyboard player of the B-52s, as well as popping up on REM’s Shiny Happy People and Ramones’ Chop Suey or singing with Iggy Pop on Candy. She’s always sounded as if she’s enjoyed every minute, and says this second solo album is so bouncily upbeat because she “wanted to put out something positive in these dark times”. At 76, Pierson’s voice is still recognisably that of Love Shack; these dozen tracks, recorded with some of David Bowie’s later-period musicians, giddily skip between electro pop, Bangles-y rock, dance and disco. There’s even, on the hugely catchy Pillow Queen, a light sprinkling of lovers rock.
Positivity slogans abound but Radios & Rainbows does have grit and darker shadows. As its title suggests, behind Evil Love’s brassy groove lurks a tale of possessiveness and revenge. Her activism fires empowerment anthem Higher Place (“Battles that incite a riot in us / Taking the truth denied to us”) and Dream On quotes from Patti Smith’s People Have the Power. The B-52s-ish Take Me Back to the Party finds Pierson as a funky dancefloor Cinderella yearning for the ball. The deepest undercurrents are on The Beauty of It All, a very personal song about how meeting her wife Monica saved Pierson from a bad relationship that sums up the album’s purpose: “When you’re feeling down, I’ll be there.”
