Most people, when discussing/remembering the beach party movies, don't take Jody McCrea into account. There was a nerd in the surf. This relates to The B-52's. Somehow.

To backtrack. It was late winter, or maybe early spring. One of those Ozu seasons, at any rate. The year was the same as it is now.

I'd just rolled out of my basement apartment on the upper west side and moseyed on down to Hurrah, a rock disco, because a

smart person told me I should show up on this particular Saturday night, when I could have been watching Lauren Tewes' teeth.

What is this, then? A line, no—a hoard, four deep around 62nd Street, down Broadway, and at the door a burly brute

keeping this hoard at bay. "No room!" What is this? Was the word leaked that Springsteen was going to jam with Francis

Coppola and Harold Brodkey? Squirming my way to the front, shouting my credentials as rock scribe and employee of a

metropolitan record company, I made it in. The heat was tropical. The crowd was dancing. The band was The B-52's. Something was happening.