From the original Analog Industries archive. Some links and images from that era no longer resolve.
34 comments
Chris Randall
I gotta say this one's hitting me hard. No other words.
-CR
dj empirical
i loved PAUL'S BOUTIQUE so much that nothing else after it measured up, to me.
i like it much better now, though.
TZ
"Check your head" is one of my fav. albums of all time. To this day still getting played on a regular basis. RIP
dj empirical
OH SHIT i had not gotten the news yet.
fuck.
Chris Randall
I know a lot of musicians cite "Paul's Boutique" as a pivotal album, and I agree that it is the event horizon of the sampling era of hip-hop, but for me "Check Yo Head" is the album. Period. That album has so heavily informed the music I make, throughout my entire career, that I can't honestly say I would have had a career without hearing it.
I also think it's the first album they found their sound on. "Paul's Boutique" is amazing and all, but it stands apart from their ouvre, for the most part. "Check Yo Head" is where they found the groove that they stayed with to this day.
I'm really quite amazed at how crushed I am by this. I feel like I lost a band member. There are very few shows that Sister Machine Gun performed where we didn't cover a Beastie Boys song (usually "Gratitude" or "Paul Revere," but there were a few others...) and each time we did it it only showed to highlight how much better they are at capturing what it's like to live in the 90s than I was.
-CR
wgparham
This is why I don't like to wake up some days. This just bums me out. He was way too young. Those guys still had a ton of music in them. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: FUCK CANCER.
As far as musical inspiration, I have to go with Chris on this one. "Check Your Head" was a phenomenal moment for me. And really, "Paul's Boutique" is mostly a Dust Brothers record with the Beasties rhyming over it. Check was the moment that they really became craftsmen. To me that was the album where they grew up and became something truly unique and great. Everything on that album was like a crystallization of everything that came before (the punk rock intensity, the creative wordplay and puns, the densely layered samples, etc) into a machine that to an extent seemed to sum up the zeitgeist of the time. A lot of the musical hybridization of the 90s comes from right there.
-William
R.A.W.
RIP
I don't know what else to say right now.
Jinsai
47. Not so much older than me.
Thank you for the music, Mr. Yauch.
Chris Randall
I was thinking about it, and he was a Buddhist. Assuming (and it's a big assumption, I'll grant) that he's right, he'll be coming back again. One could make the argument that he has earned the right to come back as a supremely talented black dude, but I'd be okay with a do-over.
But it's nice to think that somewhere right now a child is being conceived that has Adam Yauch's soul. That's a fine picture to finish this day out with.
-CR
wgparham
He's got 49 days in the Bardo before he comes back around. Let's check back in a month and a half to see if any superbad babies were born. Start the search with the ones who came out bobbing their heads.
-William
boobs
fucking cancer sucks.
MCA was the dopest. a legend. I bought paul's boutique on cassette and still have it. it was a mind blower for me and check your head just blew the the fucking doors off after that and to me is the record that defines an era in so many ways. it was simultaneously ahead of its time and the record that everyone loved and recognized as a defining moment. that ship still floats.
and hell yes CR - i hope 'they' don't wait too long to reincarnate him. dude was a searcher and i hope he found some of what he was looking for in this life.
ps - he could shred on a snowboard. helicopter drop ins on fresh powder out of bounds alaska type shit. solo.
edit - @wgparham - well said.
Mr. B
I'm with boobs.
noisegeek
Gutted.
DGillespie
Fuck cancer indeed.
My buddy in college had an '84 caddy with a Paul's Boutique cassette suck in the player so it wouldn't ever play anything else. No one ever complained.
bongo_x
I'm internet repeating myself, but I feel like I have to right now. I freakin hated License to Ill, hated them, and as a hip hop fan felt they were an insult to hip hop, music, and living things. Then Paul's Boutique came out. My mind was blown. I've changed my mind before and learned to like things, but never have I changed my mind about an artist in such a profound way. I was practically an evangelist at that point.
From a metal/punk guitar player who also listened to other stuff, in the space of a year or so It Takes a Nation of Millions..., Paul's Boutique, 3 Feet High and Rising, This is the Day...This is the Hour, and RSW-In Dub changed my whole musical outlook and moved me, into not hip hop, but electronic music and production.
I never listened to the later Beastie Boys albums much, because I'm weird like that (like nothing could top PB), but now I'm rethinking that. It's strange how upset this has made me, it's not like I lived my life as the world's biggest fan.
bb
beauty pill
"Paul's Boutique" is not even close to the zenith. Can't relate to people who say that. Feels like they're not listening at all.
The whole catalogue's amazing. Full of color and life and energy and innovation.
I am devastated. Smart and soulful guy. All about style, all about content. It is depressing to know he is gone.
I'm having trouble dealing with it, frankly.
- c
Duke Fame
I wore out my Licensed To Ill cassette. Maybe it was my age, but that was a fun record. White guys that rapped and actually played instruments like a typical band. At the time, they were unique in the mainstream music world.
Still love that jazzish bassline from Pass The Mic. Not a lot of notes, just the right ones.
boobs
i think that everyone has a different "classic" beastie's record depending on when they were introduced to them and their age or whatever one they heard on acid or super stoned or whatever.
licensed to ill is the frat boy party record that was sing along party record for such parties.. but a lot of non-meathead people liked it and it seemed right for the time i guess. i can't imagine them not having written that record. and it sounds great in a car with subs.
i think Paul's Boutique is very special and it (has and) will age well as an album regardless of how much or little the dust brothers loom over the production. it sounds like a beastie boys record to me. i love it and have strong memories associated with it and hold it in high regard.
check your head.. as said.. was kind of the nail on the head, bulls eye etc record for when it came out.. it was a focal point, a flash point, a muster station etc.. and it coincided with what was a high point in that era's wave of psychedelic drug use and dawn of rave music and skating and punk and other things kind of breaking through or starting to. it was when the underground things started to surface in more places and supplant the classic rock radio stations and all that crap. that record became a sound track for a lot of people and was a high point in everything that came out around then imo. they really bring it in places on that record and i like all the variation. it opened a lot of people up to getting over their own little genre fascism too.
and, Professor Booty.. don't need to say anything else.
but i agree their whole catalogue is full of great stuff and as a group of 3 they really bounced off each other well.
boobs
@beauty pill - you aren't the only one. i've had to mentally step away a couple times today and fill some time with distraction.
i've listened to a bunch of their music today and that helped. so many memories. really.. just so many memories tied to their music... and listening to the words and taking them in.. was good. and i was tempted to call up some friends and buy some beers and move the furniture towards the walls to clear a space and just have a "smokin and drinkin on a tuesday night" type of get together but alas, i don't have the energy of a beastie. i did have a beer and pour some out though. even that simple ritual helped.
i've always found them to be inspiring in many ways. normally some band or other lets people down eventually in some way or another but they always stayed true to that punk ethos and lived their words etc.. i neer worried that one day i'd think "oh those guys totally have their heads up their asses". they never seemed to get even remotely jaded.
with people like him and bands like the beastie's we're lucky to have them for the time we have them. i'm happy some part of the universe saw fit to have my time on earth intersect with his/theirs
and of course the music lives on.
edit - i guess i did need to say more than "Professor Booty"
ash
I'm with boobs.
ash
fuzz bass, leslie, analogue industries..hmmm
krell
The B boys will always be playing poker with my kid brother enjoying some beers, their music was always like that to me, kind of fun and social, intriguing but also known, fun. Sad.
beauty pill
I'm with boobs.
inteliko
I'm a Queens kid... the earlier stuff I identified with the most. Breakdancing on cardboard... friday nights on the boulevard every corner had cardboard. Run DMC and Beasties were a part of that soundtrack. Heres a solo joint he did back in 85 alot dont know about. MCA rhyming about his love for drum machines... properly titled "Drum Machine" ... click play..its time to get ill ...
And just an observation... all the rappers with gruff or raspy voices are passing on... MCA, Guru, Biggie...
neB
I'm with boobs.
DGillespie
I'm with Professor Booty.
boobs
@inteliko - not all of them are "passing on". some of them get shot.
huggie
I have only visited New York once... absolutely loved it. The Beasties personified the energy I got from that place.
As with many I have been hugely influenced by their existence.
He died far too young. What more can you say....
- Hugo
huggie
The video Chris posted was shot in my home town of Rotorua in New Zealand.
- Hugo
pepezabala
I don't know how his take on dying was, but I had just learned that when it comes to Rock against Cancer - Rock wins. I had read this a couple of days ago: http://www.electricalaudio.com/johngrabski.html
I have seen the Beastie Boys paly on Sonar Festival two or three years ago. They definetly were on the win.
javahut
Yeah, "Check Your Head" AND "Ill Communication" were seminal. Loved 'em forever. Highly inspirational.
So sad. Time marches on. Existence... then not. For everything. So glad Adam was around to create the great sounds he did. Appreciate all you love while you can. Nothing's forever.
beauty pill
I'm with Hugo.
This is incredibly sad.
- c
puffer
I'm with all y'all.
For me, I didn't really dig Licensed... -- a white liberal kid from New Hampshire, loved LL and Run DMC and PE and didn't really get they were part of that scene. Plus didn't get that the sexism was mostly disingenuous. But when a friend in college had the Paul's cassette (remember that packaging? A sleeve that was like 25" long and a multi-colored shell?) in her car I listened mostly as a lark convinced I'd hate it. I didn't. But it was until I moved to Brooklyn in 91 that I really "got" it. I listened to the CD constantly. When Check came out I was primed. More than that, it completely expanded my perception of the Beasties as musicians. Their best? I don't know that they have any real duds in their catalogue but that one kills from start to finish.
If you don't already have it, get the 2 disk Criterion Collection DVD. Not only does it have all their great hits, many with alt mixes, but the commentary is excellent, both with the band and with the directors who, as we all know, is often Yauch. He's funny, humble, smart and a fascinating guy to listen to.
34 comments
I gotta say this one's hitting me hard. No other words.
-CR
i loved PAUL'S BOUTIQUE so much that nothing else after it measured up, to me.
i like it much better now, though.
"Check your head" is one of my fav. albums of all time. To this day still getting played on a regular basis. RIP
OH SHIT i had not gotten the news yet.
fuck.
I know a lot of musicians cite "Paul's Boutique" as a pivotal album, and I agree that it is the event horizon of the sampling era of hip-hop, but for me "Check Yo Head" is the album. Period. That album has so heavily informed the music I make, throughout my entire career, that I can't honestly say I would have had a career without hearing it.
I also think it's the first album they found their sound on. "Paul's Boutique" is amazing and all, but it stands apart from their ouvre, for the most part. "Check Yo Head" is where they found the groove that they stayed with to this day.
I'm really quite amazed at how crushed I am by this. I feel like I lost a band member. There are very few shows that Sister Machine Gun performed where we didn't cover a Beastie Boys song (usually "Gratitude" or "Paul Revere," but there were a few others...) and each time we did it it only showed to highlight how much better they are at capturing what it's like to live in the 90s than I was.
-CR
This is why I don't like to wake up some days. This just bums me out. He was way too young. Those guys still had a ton of music in them. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: FUCK CANCER.
As far as musical inspiration, I have to go with Chris on this one. "Check Your Head" was a phenomenal moment for me. And really, "Paul's Boutique" is mostly a Dust Brothers record with the Beasties rhyming over it. Check was the moment that they really became craftsmen. To me that was the album where they grew up and became something truly unique and great. Everything on that album was like a crystallization of everything that came before (the punk rock intensity, the creative wordplay and puns, the densely layered samples, etc) into a machine that to an extent seemed to sum up the zeitgeist of the time. A lot of the musical hybridization of the 90s comes from right there.
-William
RIP
I don't know what else to say right now.
47. Not so much older than me.
Thank you for the music, Mr. Yauch.
I was thinking about it, and he was a Buddhist. Assuming (and it's a big assumption, I'll grant) that he's right, he'll be coming back again. One could make the argument that he has earned the right to come back as a supremely talented black dude, but I'd be okay with a do-over.
But it's nice to think that somewhere right now a child is being conceived that has Adam Yauch's soul. That's a fine picture to finish this day out with.
-CR
He's got 49 days in the Bardo before he comes back around. Let's check back in a month and a half to see if any superbad babies were born. Start the search with the ones who came out bobbing their heads.
-William
fucking cancer sucks.
MCA was the dopest. a legend. I bought paul's boutique on cassette and still have it. it was a mind blower for me and check your head just blew the the fucking doors off after that and to me is the record that defines an era in so many ways. it was simultaneously ahead of its time and the record that everyone loved and recognized as a defining moment. that ship still floats.
and hell yes CR - i hope 'they' don't wait too long to reincarnate him. dude was a searcher and i hope he found some of what he was looking for in this life.
ps - he could shred on a snowboard. helicopter drop ins on fresh powder out of bounds alaska type shit. solo.
edit - @wgparham - well said.
I'm with boobs.
Gutted.
Fuck cancer indeed.
My buddy in college had an '84 caddy with a Paul's Boutique cassette suck in the player so it wouldn't ever play anything else. No one ever complained.
I'm internet repeating myself, but I feel like I have to right now. I freakin hated License to Ill, hated them, and as a hip hop fan felt they were an insult to hip hop, music, and living things. Then Paul's Boutique came out. My mind was blown. I've changed my mind before and learned to like things, but never have I changed my mind about an artist in such a profound way. I was practically an evangelist at that point.
From a metal/punk guitar player who also listened to other stuff, in the space of a year or so It Takes a Nation of Millions..., Paul's Boutique, 3 Feet High and Rising, This is the Day...This is the Hour, and RSW-In Dub changed my whole musical outlook and moved me, into not hip hop, but electronic music and production.
I never listened to the later Beastie Boys albums much, because I'm weird like that (like nothing could top PB), but now I'm rethinking that. It's strange how upset this has made me, it's not like I lived my life as the world's biggest fan.
bb
"Paul's Boutique" is not even close to the zenith. Can't relate to people who say that. Feels like they're not listening at all.
The whole catalogue's amazing. Full of color and life and energy and innovation.
I am devastated. Smart and soulful guy. All about style, all about content. It is depressing to know he is gone.
I'm having trouble dealing with it, frankly.
- c
I wore out my Licensed To Ill cassette. Maybe it was my age, but that was a fun record. White guys that rapped and actually played instruments like a typical band. At the time, they were unique in the mainstream music world.
Still love that jazzish bassline from Pass The Mic. Not a lot of notes, just the right ones.
i think that everyone has a different "classic" beastie's record depending on when they were introduced to them and their age or whatever one they heard on acid or super stoned or whatever.
licensed to ill is the frat boy party record that was sing along party record for such parties.. but a lot of non-meathead people liked it and it seemed right for the time i guess. i can't imagine them not having written that record. and it sounds great in a car with subs.
i think Paul's Boutique is very special and it (has and) will age well as an album regardless of how much or little the dust brothers loom over the production. it sounds like a beastie boys record to me. i love it and have strong memories associated with it and hold it in high regard.
check your head.. as said.. was kind of the nail on the head, bulls eye etc record for when it came out.. it was a focal point, a flash point, a muster station etc.. and it coincided with what was a high point in that era's wave of psychedelic drug use and dawn of rave music and skating and punk and other things kind of breaking through or starting to. it was when the underground things started to surface in more places and supplant the classic rock radio stations and all that crap. that record became a sound track for a lot of people and was a high point in everything that came out around then imo. they really bring it in places on that record and i like all the variation. it opened a lot of people up to getting over their own little genre fascism too.
and, Professor Booty.. don't need to say anything else.
but i agree their whole catalogue is full of great stuff and as a group of 3 they really bounced off each other well.
@beauty pill - you aren't the only one. i've had to mentally step away a couple times today and fill some time with distraction.
i've listened to a bunch of their music today and that helped. so many memories. really.. just so many memories tied to their music... and listening to the words and taking them in.. was good. and i was tempted to call up some friends and buy some beers and move the furniture towards the walls to clear a space and just have a "smokin and drinkin on a tuesday night" type of get together but alas, i don't have the energy of a beastie. i did have a beer and pour some out though. even that simple ritual helped.
i've always found them to be inspiring in many ways. normally some band or other lets people down eventually in some way or another but they always stayed true to that punk ethos and lived their words etc.. i neer worried that one day i'd think "oh those guys totally have their heads up their asses". they never seemed to get even remotely jaded.
with people like him and bands like the beastie's we're lucky to have them for the time we have them. i'm happy some part of the universe saw fit to have my time on earth intersect with his/theirs
and of course the music lives on.
edit - i guess i did need to say more than "Professor Booty"
I'm with boobs.
fuzz bass, leslie, analogue industries..hmmm
The B boys will always be playing poker with my kid brother enjoying some beers, their music was always like that to me, kind of fun and social, intriguing but also known, fun. Sad.
I'm with boobs.
I'm a Queens kid... the earlier stuff I identified with the most. Breakdancing on cardboard... friday nights on the boulevard every corner had cardboard. Run DMC and Beasties were a part of that soundtrack. Heres a solo joint he did back in 85 alot dont know about. MCA rhyming about his love for drum machines... properly titled "Drum Machine" ... click play..its time to get ill ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KuakHn47cU
And just an observation... all the rappers with gruff or raspy voices are passing on... MCA, Guru, Biggie...
I'm with boobs.
I'm with Professor Booty.
@inteliko - not all of them are "passing on". some of them get shot.
I have only visited New York once... absolutely loved it. The Beasties personified the energy I got from that place.
As with many I have been hugely influenced by their existence.
He died far too young. What more can you say....
- Hugo
The video Chris posted was shot in my home town of Rotorua in New Zealand.
- Hugo
I don't know how his take on dying was, but I had just learned that when it comes to Rock against Cancer - Rock wins. I had read this a couple of days ago: http://www.electricalaudio.com/johngrabski.html
I have seen the Beastie Boys paly on Sonar Festival two or three years ago. They definetly were on the win.
Yeah, "Check Your Head" AND "Ill Communication" were seminal. Loved 'em forever. Highly inspirational.
So sad. Time marches on. Existence... then not. For everything. So glad Adam was around to create the great sounds he did. Appreciate all you love while you can. Nothing's forever.
I'm with Hugo.
This is incredibly sad.
- c
I'm with all y'all.
For me, I didn't really dig Licensed... -- a white liberal kid from New Hampshire, loved LL and Run DMC and PE and didn't really get they were part of that scene. Plus didn't get that the sexism was mostly disingenuous. But when a friend in college had the Paul's cassette (remember that packaging? A sleeve that was like 25" long and a multi-colored shell?) in her car I listened mostly as a lark convinced I'd hate it. I didn't. But it was until I moved to Brooklyn in 91 that I really "got" it. I listened to the CD constantly. When Check came out I was primed. More than that, it completely expanded my perception of the Beasties as musicians. Their best? I don't know that they have any real duds in their catalogue but that one kills from start to finish.
If you don't already have it, get the 2 disk Criterion Collection DVD. Not only does it have all their great hits, many with alt mixes, but the commentary is excellent, both with the band and with the directors who, as we all know, is often Yauch. He's funny, humble, smart and a fascinating guy to listen to.
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