Erik Visits an American Grave, Part 2,187

This is the grave of Ricky Wilson.

Born in 1953 in Athens, Georgia, Wilson stated playing the guitar as a kid. As he grew up, well, it was the late 60s and early 70s and he started bands in high school like everyone else. He went to the University of Georgia, graduating in 1976. He’d play with this friends, occasionally even going to Europe to try his hand there. He didn’t make any money of course, but he got a job at a bus station, where his friend and frequent bandmate Keith Strickland’s father was the manager.

In late 1976, Wilson, Strickland, Wilson’s younger sister Cindy, Kate Pierson, and Fred Schneider all jammed together one night. They decided, hey this was pretty good. So they formed a band. That was the B-52s. Well, we hardly have to talk about what a great band this was and how unusual in the context of the late 70s. On one level they clearly fit into the New Wave era. On the other, the extreme embrace of kitsch was, if not unique exactly, pretty unusual. Songs such as “Rock Lobster” were not like anything else heard on the radio, but which, like Devo, entered into the world at a time when there was interest in bands dripping with irony and weirdness. Wilson did a lot of the writing. He co-wrote “Rock Lobster” with Schneider. The band tended to give all members songwriting credit, which is fine, they all contributed, but a lot of it really was Wilson.

Now, in one sense Wilson was not the centerpiece of the band. Cindy and Pierson and Schneider were. Schneider’s vocals were so weird and then the beehive hair of the women (given that this was happening at the same time that Happy Days was on TV and there was a general 50s revival in American culture, the band clearly filled a niche in this sense) got most of the attention, along with the odd songs. Wilson was in the background, not dressing weird, not singing, but playing some great guitar. He wasn’t some amazing technical guitarist, but he had a sound that he knew and in his position in the band, he was really perfect.

Wilson was also gay. In the early 1980s, that could be a death sentence. So it was for Wilson. He discovered he was HIV positive in 1982. The only band member he told was Strickland, which meant he hid it from his sister as well. He kept playing as long as he could. But by the time the band was recording Bouncing Off the Satellites, it was harder to hide. They were wondering what was up with him, but he refused to admit he was dying or had what was then full blown AIDS.

In October 1985, Wilson died of AIDS. He was 32 years old. The rest of the band was as shocked as anyone, except for Strickland of course. To remember back to the level of homophobia in the 1980s, the only straight member of this band is Cindy Wilson. Schneider and Strickland are also gay and Pierson is bisexual and presently married to a woman. The extent to which each band member even knew all of this about each other in 1985 is not something I know. In any case, Wilson’s death nearly killed the band. They didn’t really tour off the new album. They just couldn’t, it was too much for them to handle. When the band finally did come back, it was with Strickland doing most of the writing. That was Cosmic Thing, which included “Love Shack” and vaulted the band into the stratosphere.

Let’s listen to a little Ricky Wilson-era B-52s.

Ricky Wilson is buried in Oconee Hill Cemetery, Athens, Georgia.

If you would like this series to visit other musicians killed by AIDS, you can donate to cover the required expenses here. Eazy-E is in Whittier, California and Liberace is in Hollywood, California. Previous posts in this series are archived here and here.