Love shack

Paul Butchart answers the door at the modest house on Milledge Avenue wearing a white shirt and a skinny black tie. Except for the gray in his beard, he looks about the same as he did when he played drums for early Athens new wave band the Side Effects. As he welcomes his visitors through the house — occupied at various times throughout the years by a colorful assortment of musicians and art students — he points out where the B-52's played their first show exactly 25 years ago, on Valentine's night 1977.

In the kitchen, familiar faces from Athens' music history are laughing, drinking and remembering that fateful night — among them, Cindy Wilson of the B-52's and her husband, Keith Bennett. Not only did Wilson make her musical debut at the house a quarter century ago, she also met Bennett here the same night.

Butchart's collection of Athens memorabilia — which he graciously granted Creative Loafing access to for last week's Athens-themed issue — is neatly displayed throughout the house. Concert posters and flyers encased in protective sleeves, and sections of newspapers heralding the "new sound" of the city depict many of tonight's revelers in their younger days. A CD player blasts a selection of period tunes as guests chat and head out back to the keg. Vanessa Briscoe-Hay of Pylon, Kurt Wood of the Woggles and Barrie Buck of the 40 Watt Club exchange memories.

"A lot of things started here," laughs Wilson, sitting at the kitchen table while human rights activist and journalist Ed Tant holds court on the back porch. "There wasn't much to do around here back then. Parties were what it was all about. Parties in cow fields, parties on the street — everywhere."

Wilson recalls that it was B-52's singer Fred Schneider's idea to perform at the Valentine's Day party. But the musicians who soon would put Athens on the musical map had no intention of doing anything more than a one-off show. "That was it," Wilson says. "That was as big as we'd planned ahead — three or four songs just to have fun."

Wilson's recollection of the band's first set list, though admittedly foggy, includes "Killer B's," "Planet Claire" and what would become their breakthrough single, "Rock Lobster." Then, due to crowd demand, they performed the same set all over again.

Their audience that night was mostly friends and a few party hoppers, including Wilson's eventual husband. "I saw Barbie dolls hanging up in here and a band set up with a gong, and I thought, 'This is a party I should check out,'" Bennett says.

Bennett also checked out Wilson, then 19 years old, all done up in a cartoonish beehive wig and outlandish clothes. He liked what he saw. "I guess the planets were in line that night," Wilson smiles. Now living in Atlanta, the couple has two children.

Of the Athens music scene that was unpretentiously birthed that night, Wilson shrugs and says, "We were just a bunch of free-spirit artists and never really planned anything. Whatever happened happened."

Tant, who also was at the original party, wanders by on the way to another beer. "I remember it was a time when people said 'new wave' with a straight face," he says. "Even though it was for fun, people took it seriously."

"This whole area was a center for creativity," adds Butchart, pointing out that a nursing home nicknamed the Zoo once resided next door. "Michael Stipe played there with a band called Gangster, and Lynda Stipe's band Oh-OK practiced there, too. It was a sort of haven for arty activities."

The melting pot of artists that frequented the area brought a healthy dose of variety to the scene, says Wilson. "Back then, everybody mixed. It wasn't like: All gays go to this party, all art students go to that party. There was a real mixing of people at the parties, and you met people who were different than you but still shared the same twisted view."

Looking around at the crowd and artifacts, Tant says, "This place is like a museum of Athens roots. It always was sort of the headquarters for free thinking." After the B's debut, the house hosted many memorable evenings. "[Longtime Creative Loafing scribe and music scene veteran] Gregory Nicoll debuted his films here," recalls Butchart. "And this was years before MTV or music videos were going on." Partiers would sit and watch Nicoll's Super 8 films in rapt silence as the rickety images of their friends flickered on the walls.

"The one thing we all shared in those days was a real sense of the absurd," says Wilson. "And when we were together — not just the B's but everybody in the party scene — it was magic."

Tant echoes what partiers have long embraced about the strobe-light pulse of original ideas and the psychedelic swirl of substances permeating Athens' social gatherings.

"The thing about parties here is like what Timothy Leary said about the '60s: If you can remember much of it, you probably weren't there."??