Beastie Boys - Ill Communication (May 31, 1994)

1994’s Ill Communication, the fourth full-length album from New York City-based, Carvel-loving “rap” group the Beastie Boys, pushed the act further down the path that its predecessor, Check Your Head, began traversing two years prior. Famously known as a punk band before switching genres and signing a deal with Def Jam Records in the late 1980’s, the trio, made up of Adam “Ad-Rock” Horowitz, Michael “Mike D” Diamond, and the late Adam Yauch (also known as MCA, among other pseudonyms he hid behind for various creative tasks), began their careers within our chosen culture as an outfit that leaned very heavily on samples (see: 1986’s Licensed to Ill and 1989’s masterpiece and I will not be accepting any questions at this time Paul’s Boutique) before drifting away from sonic collages, challenging themselves to play more of their own instruments, although obviously sampling is a huge part of hip hop they’d never be able to leave behind permanently.

Beastie Boys - Check Your Head (April 21, 1992)

In honor of the new book from Michael “Mike D” Diamond and Adam “Ad-Rock” Horowitz, Beastie Boys Book, today’s post will get back to the discography of the third rap group to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, New York City's very own Beastie Boys. I haven’t had a chance to read the book as of yet, but based on the group’s videos, musical output, and all of the general bullshit they managed to do during their tenure prior to disbanding in 2012 after band member Adam “MCA” Yauch passed away, it has to be well worth reading.

For The Max-Approved Mixtape: Beastie Boys - "Rhymin & Stealin"

Artist: Beastie Boys

Title: "Rhymin & Stealin"

Producer: Rick Rubin, Beastie Boys

Album: Licensed To Ill (1986)

After their punk band of the same name shifted sensibilities but before the trio achieved a rare state of consciousness regarding all of the antiquated and misogynistic attitudes not just in hip hop, but also the world, the Beastie Boys (Ad-Rock, Mike D., and the late MCA) released the only full-length they would ever make for Def Jam Records, Licensed To Ill.  The label still has its meaty hooks all over this project, which is why that Criterion Collection DVD compilation of the group's videos skips over the Licensed To Ill years.  But the album just recently sold its ten-millionth copy, so obviously people are still hunting it down.

"Rhymin & Stealin" is the opening track on Licensed To Ill, and the very first thing you hear is a DJ's scratching, as though this song is a part of your regularly scheduled program already in progress.  Then the hard-as-fuck drums, lifted from Led Zeppelin's "When The Levee Breaks", kick in, followed closely by a guitar riff borrowed from Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf": once the Boys start passing the microphone back and forth at hyperspeed, sometimes finishing each other's words, let alone sentences, your neck already feels stiff from all of the nodding.  Sampling from good old-fashioned rock music wasn't anything new back in 1986, but for the Beasties, it helped bridge the gap between their old sound and their new shit, signifying the first real evolution in their own style, but not the last. 

"Rhymin & Stealin" serves as a warning shot for the audience: even though the Beasties were seen as frat-bro assholes thanks to their public image and their general fucking around, this song shows that they took their music seriously from the get-go, even though the only people who could ever come up with chanting "Ali Baba and the forty thieves" in the middle of their own goddamn song obviously saw through to the inherent silliness of what was going on around them.  Licensed To Ill isn't the best Beastie Boys album (*cough* Paul's Boutique *cough*), but it's still damn entertaining, and spinning this track makes you want to hear the rest of the album, which is what the first song on any project is supposed to do, right?

I include the following clip below because, even though "Rhymin & Stealin" was never officially released as a single, the Beasties still shot a performance-based official video for it, and, well, no fucking wonder a lot of hip hop heads wrote off these guys in 1986.

Do you agree or disagree with this selection?  Discuss below.

-Max

RELATED POST:

Beastie Boys - Licensed To Ill (Review)

Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique (July 25, 1989)

On this, the final day of the stunt month, I've decided to abandon my own rules and write about the second album from the Beastie Boys, the monumental Paul's Boutique.  A lot of you two have been waiting around for this write-up ever since Licensed To Ill hit the site.  Why, you could even go so far as to say that this entire stunt month was manufactured as an excuse for me to finally get around to writing about the fucking album. Now if only I would do the same for some of the other artists who have been ignored on this blog, right?

Anyway, Paul's Boutique.  After the success of their debut (rap) album Licensed To Ill, MCA, Ad Rock, and Mike D. grew restless in their Def Jam Records label home, as Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons were trying to force them to record a quickie Licensed To Ill 2 follow-up, which the Beasties had zero interest in doing.  Instead, they found a way out of their record deal, signing up instead with Capitol Records (the home of Miilkbone), who promised them endless creative freedom as long as they actually managed to move units.  In response, the Beastie Boys immediately moved out West and started doing as many drugs as humanly possible.  (They were obviously aware that they pissed off their former Def Jam gods, who immediately sicced their other (mostly) white rap group 3rd Bass on them; however, I believe they were too stoned to care all that much at the time.)

Paul's Boutique grew out of a chance meeting with production team The Dust Brothers, named as such not because of how untidy they kept their studio.  The team had produced several instrumentals that they intended to morph into club-ready dance tracks, but the Beasties convinced them to give up the beats (and help create a few more) in favor of their new album.  Aside from their rampant drug abuse, the Dust Brothers were also known at the time for their method of using eighty thousand motherfucking samples in their songs, stitching everything together to create Frankentracks that actually sounded like original compositions.  (Part of the reason why it took me so long to get to this write-up is because of my delusional attempt to piece this review together out of sentences taken from other HHID write-ups, which proved both impossible and really fucking stupid, although it sounds funny.)

Paul's Boutique was released in 1989, three years after Licensed To Ill, and it immediately sold zero copies.  Although it earned a bit of critical acclaim, the use of multiple samples (I've joked in the past that Paul's Boutique samples every single song ever recorded, both before and since 1989, and I'm only half-wrong) proved to be too challenging for listeners, so the Beastie Boys found their second album (as a rap group; this was their third full-length project overall) collecting dust (no pun intended) on store shelves.  However, a funny thing happened on the way to their next project: people finally caught the fuck on.  Today, Paul's Boutique is praised as an experimental masterpiece that doesn't alienate the hip hop audience who grew up on Licensed To Ill: in fact, it was ultimately successful in expanding their fanbase beyond the rap world, which helps explain why they remain one of the most beloved hip hop groups in the genre today.

Paul's Boutique is one of my wife's favorite albums of all time; she's also been wondering why it's taken me forever to write about it, just for your information.  When we first met, she loaned me her copy and insisted I listen to it from start to finish.  (At the time, I hadn't ever listened to it before: my experience with the Beastie Boys started with Hello Nasty for some weird reason, and I worked my way both backward and forward from there.)  After absorbing the project in full (many many times), I figured out one thing: that girl had amazing fucking taste in music.  It would be ridiculous for me to claim that I married her just because of her musical taste, but...

1.  TO ALL THE GIRLS

Seems to take forever to pop up in your speakers, so by the time you realize that this is just a corny trifle of a rap album intro (unofficially, anyway), it's already fucking over.

2.  SHAKE YOUR RUMP

I've always believed that this song would have made a better intro to Paul's Boutique, but maybe I'm the only one who feels that way.  This track could still rock a house party at the drop of a hat, which is just a testament to both the playful rhymes from all three Beasties and to how the Dust Brothers managed to translate a shitload of samples into a timeless sound.  There's a Madlib remix of this song that I first heard on The Criterion Collection's Beastie Boys Video Anthology that rocks even fucking harder in an entirely different way, for those of you two who are into that sort of thing.

3.  JOHNNY RYALL

The Boys dedicate an entire track to Johnny Ryall, the "king of the homeless", and their otherwise playful and contagious tendency to pass the mic back and forth, sometimes mid-word, makes for an interesting juxtaposition to what should be depressing-as-fuck subject matter.  The Dust Brothers provide an instrumental that sounds as though it's going to pass out at any moment, with the drum hits acting as the paddles that shock its heart into pumping for just a little bit longer.  It is odd that a rap song written about a homeless guy would inadvertently portray the same dude as an alcoholic superhero, but this is a Beastie Boys song, after all, and an entertaining one at that.  So there you go.

4.  EGG MAN

This was the song my wife was most excited for me to hear when she found out that I hadn't yet listened to Paul's Boutique.  The overall vibe is playful, but kind of bleak, what with the overall violent theme and the Curtis Mayfield "Superfly" sample laid throughout, making everything sound funkier by default.  Proof positive that the Beasties had fun in the studio: why else would they devote an entire song to throwing eggs at motherfuckers, son?

5.  HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER

I've never cared for this track.  The outlaw-esque tale the Boys weave (without resorting to cliches borrowed from Westerns: in fact, the film Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry is name-dropped at one point) is okay, but the instrumental has always sounded incomplete to me.  Everyone involved with this track has done much better work.  Spoiler alert: "High Plains Drifter" is the only real misstep on Paul's Boutique.  So you have that to look forward to.

6.  THE SOUNDS OF SCIENCE

The Beastie Boys drop science and "k-nowledge" over a subdued Dust Brothers groove...at least at first, before everything switches up in favor of a dope-as-fuck beat that the trio absolutely murder.  Approximately nine thousand and two samples are thrown into every second of this song, including several Beatles songs that they probably just now found out about while reading this, so whoops!  You're welcome, lawyers for the Fab Four!  Anyway, this song is the fucking tits.

7.  3-MINUTE RULE

The song as a whole is longer than what the title would suggest, but Mike D., MCA, and Ad Rock rhyme for roughly three minutes combined, so I suppose it isn't an outright lie.  Production-wise, the brothers Dust lend our hosts a simplistic drum loop with some subtle scratching thrown in for good measure, while each Boy performs their own verse (without assistance from the other group members!  Shocker!), which has absolutely no connection to the last.  There's no chorus, no overall theme, and no real structure to speak of, just three hot verses that turn "3-Minute Rule" into one of the most obvious actual "hip hop" songs on Paul's Boutique.  "Simplistic" isn't always a criticism, folks: this track still chugs away just fine, twenty-two years removed from its release date.

8.  HEY LADIES

Probably the song most people marginally familiar with Paul's Boutique will remember, as "Hey Ladies" was the first single from the project.  It exhibited a sound that was worlds away from the rock-tinged loops prevalent on Licensed To Ill, and yet shares its sensibilities with that earlier album thanks to the Beasties and their juvenile (and catchy) rhymes.  Hardly what you would call radio-friendly, and yet you wouldn't ever want to kick it out of bed.

9.  5-PIECE CHICKEN DINNER

A short, goofy, banjo-driven interlude.  Which makes the transition into the next track much more jarring than it needed to be.

10.  LOOKING DOWN THE BARREL OF A GUN

Easily my favorite song on Paul's Boutique.  I fucking love this song.  Everything about it, from the violent lyrics, the guitar-driven beat, and even the video, which features a scene where the Boys pass around a bong in the backseat of a limo (I may be remembering this incorrectly), is fucking perfect.  References to A Clockwork Orange abound, which make complete sense when you listen to this track, unlike hearing the entirety of Cage's Movies For The Blind.  This is one of the very best tracks the Beasties have ever made.  Luckily for the trio, this wasn't the last good song they ever recorded.  It sounds much darker than the rest of the project, but it's still awesome in its own way.  Nice!

11.  CAR THIEF

This track is all over the place, thanks to the Beasties and their undoubtedly-recorded-under-the-influence verses,  The Dust Brothers come through in the clutch, though, lacing the instrumental (pun probably intended) with a nice fucking melody that helps move you along to the next track.  Kind of slower-paced, a bit too slow for my liking, but it acts as a reprieve after getting your shit kicked in by "Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun", so.

12.  WHAT COMES AROUND

Aside from the use of the phrase hinted at in the title, which ranks among the most overused ideas in music history, this track is funky-as-hell diversion from the darkness prevalent on the previous two tracks.  Most of the lines make very little sense ("You're all messed up like pasta primavera!"), but the playful way in which they are delivered is fucking contagious.  But again, that hook hurts the track more than it helps: I'm just waiting to hear several rap songs interpret the saying "you get what you pay for" in their own respective special ways.

13.  SHADRACH

I had written earlier that "High Plains Drifter" is the only real misstep on Paul's Boutique.  That's still true, but "Shadrach", also released as a single for some ungodly reason, never grew on me.  There isn't anything technically wrong with the song itself, but I never really cared for the beat, which throws a lot of shit at the wall and uses everything that didn't stick, including an annoying-as-shit female vocal sample during what counts as the hook.  I'm sure that I'll hear a lot of shit for this in the comments, but I personally don't like this track.  But it does fit into the overall sound Paul's Boutique is going for, so that was nice.

14.  ASK FOR JANICE

A brief interlude.

The final track on Paul's Boutique consists of nine separate compositions which serve as a ridiculous, pretentious, and entertaining-as-shit outro.

15.  B-BOY BOUILLABAISSE

(A) 59 CHRYSTIE STREET

Given our hosts's penchant to pass off the mic after spitting a single bar, this quick mockery of a song, which sounds like a leftover from Licensed To Ill, ends up literally sounding like the three Beasties are getting ready to fuck the same girl.  Which is the problem with that type of format.  Let that be a lesson to all you new crews out there.  Anyway, this shit was bland as shit, so let's move on.

(B) GET ON THE MIC

Ad Rock and MCA spend all of their allotted time trying to convince Mike D. to get on the microphone, but their ploy doesn't really work, since Diamond doesn't actually appear on here (as a rapper, anyway).  The simplistic beat, combining drum hits with beatboxing, gives this brief song an old-school flavor that sounded like everything else back in 1989 but comes across as downright fucking refreshing today.  Not bad.

(C) STOP THAT TRAIN

This final track on Paul's Boutique is filled with half-thought out ideas that could never be stretched into full-on songs.  "Stop That Train" is an ideal example of this, as the Beasties give the listener two verses based around riding the train around New York City.  I liked this, but I wasn't in like with it.

(D) A YEAR AND A DAY

Somehow the guys fit three full verses into "A Year And A Day", which features distorted vocals that don't really add to the listening experience.  That Isley Brothers sample sure does get a fucking workout, though: I'm left wondering why nobody has ever used "That Lady, Pt. 1 & 2" in a similar fashion since.  It's been twenty-two years, people!  It's okay to adopt that idea!

(E) HELLO BROOKLYN

Jay-Z fans will recognize this shit right away, as "Hello Brooklyn" laid the foundation for American Gangster's "Hello Brooklyn 2.0".  This bass-heavy affair actually fits these guys much better than Hova and (shudder) Lil Wayne: even though you will at no point buy that the Beastie Boys are thugs, the very end, which segues into a Johnny Cash vocal sample, is chilling nonetheless.

(F) DROPPING NAMES

There's really not all that much to this, unless you're a fan of the Chemical Brothers song "Block Rockin' Beats" and you're interested in hearing that Crusaders "The Well's Gone Dry" sample being used in a slightly different manner.

(G) LAY IT ON ME

A quick trifle that doesn't exactly have "more flavor than Fruit Stripe Gum", but still sounds pretty goofy today.  I actually liked a lot of the individual lines on here, especially MCA's dismissal of the girl that spilled her wine "on my lyrics as you wasted my time".  He actually comes off as a bit harsh, which is commendable in and of itself.

(H) MIKE ON THE MIC

Mike D. finally takes the bait laid for him on "Get On The Mic", tackling this quickie one-verse wonder for dolo, sounding pretty damn good in the process.  It's enough to make you wish that the trio would occasionally let each other handle their own verses during the songs, but that wouldn't be the Beastie way.  I don't think I would want to hear Mike Diamond for sixty-plus minutes rapping all by his lonesome, but this?  This was nice.

(I) A.W.O.L.

DJ Hurricane helps the Beasties end Paul's Boutique with this simulation of a live show, on which their lone "verse" consists of the same rhetorical question ("What'cha gonna do?") repeated ad nauseum, all while the fake crowd screams their heads off.  A nice way to go out, I suppose.

"A.W.O.L." then leads into an unlabeled reprise of "To All The Girls", thereby ending our evening.  (Side note: the twenty-year anniversary reissue of Paul's Boutique inexplicably separates each "song" onto its own audio track, making it appear as though the re-release contains twenty-three tracks to the original's fifteen.  Don't be fooled.)

FINAL THOUGHTS:  Paul's Boutique is a masterpiece that somehow sounds even better now than it did when I first listened to it.  The Beastie Boys reinvented themselves for a second time on this project, and the end result not only stands up to the test of time, it's also one of the finest hip hop music releases in motherfucking history.  The production by the Dust Brothers precludes their work with Beck and (the hell?) Hanson, with their sample-heavy techniques bringing out the best of MCA, Ad Rock, and Mike D.  Lyrically, these guys will never win any awards, but their nerdy, reference-heavy bars and their knack for making everything sound playful is contagious, even when they dive into some of the more violent tracks on Paul's Boutique.  I don't believe that there's much more to be said, and not just because this means the stunt month is finally over: Paul's Boutique is just really.  Fucking.  Good.  So there. 

BUY OR BURN?  Buy.  Buy.  Buy.  Now.

BEST TRACKS:  "Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun"; "Hey Ladies"; "Shake Your Rump"; "3-Minute Rule"; "Egg Man"; "Johnny Ryall"; "B-Boy Bouillabaisse"; "The Sounds Of Science"...oh, fuck it, the majority of the album

-Max

RELATED POSTS:

Beastie Boys - Licensed To Ill

Beastie Boys - Licensed To Ill (November 15, 1986)

I'm entirely aware that the album that I'm about to write about already has millions of fans, so it doesn't really need my help. I'm also aware that the majority of the two readers of this blog probably don't fall into that category. They probably think that this space would be better filled with more write-ups about Wu-Tang z-teamers or, heaven forbid, some actual hip hop. 

Well, that's just what this is. Seriously. However, it didn't start out that way. 

The Beastie Boys, originally made up of Adam Yauch (MCA), Mike Diamond (Mike D), Adam Horowitz (Ad-Rock), and Kate Schellenbach (who went on to join Luscious Jackson after essentially being forced out - more on that later), were a New York underground punk outfit that got by performing as opening acts for such infinitely better bands like Bad Brains and The Misfits, but earned a following of their own anyway. They released two EPs, Pollywog Stew and Cooky Puss; the title track of the latter is considered to be their first recorded actual rap song, and true to the band's identity at the time, it's based around a prank call that one of the members made to a Carvel ice cream shop. The rap style of the early Beastie Boys can be best visualized if you picture three of the whitest guys at your last frat party, the ones that aren't afraid to do some of the most ridiculous shit to get laughs, including pretending to "rap", as the kids call it, but inevitably hang out in the corner by themselves. Somehow, superproducer Rick Rubin figured that this would sell records, and off of the strength of "Cooky Puss", they were signed to the then-fledgling Def Jam Records, which at the time was run out of a dorm room (oddly, Rick Rubin and the other Def Jam co-founder, Russell Simmons, were apparently introduced to each other by the pretentious ass Vincent Gallo, of the "I made a movie just so I could record a blow job from my ex-girlfriend Chloe Sevigny" Gallos.) 

Shortly after tripping over someone's chemistry textbook, the Beastie Boys lost the lone female in the group, who cited creative differences with Rick Rubin, who apparently didn't get the joke that a punk rock group called the "Beastie Boys" could also include a female within their ranks. (Her group, Luscious Jackson, later found themselves signed to the Beastie's own label, Grand Royal; glad to see they look out for their own.) Rubin felt that the inclusion of a woman would kill the joke altogether, that the Beasties were a trio of hard-partying jackasses who chased women when they weren't too drunk to sit properly. The Beasties found themselves on the manufacturing end of the second Def Jam record ever released, an EP titled Rock Hard, which is notable for two reasons: it is the first Def Jam single to actually feature what would later become their logo on its sleeve, and its title track was assassinated in the sample wars by AC/DC, whose "Back In Black" was utilized illegally. (This song, while relatively easy to find online, is damn near impossible to find in its physical form. It's considered such a large part of the Beastie history that the group attempted to include it on their anthology, The Sounds of Science, and even tried to do it the legal way, contacting AC/DC personally, but they were still denied the sample, since AC/DC is essentially a group of dinosaurs who would rather hoard all of the food than share even a pittance with everyone else.) The Beasties soon found themselves touring again, this time opening for musical acts as diverse as Public Image Ltd, Madonna, and, obviously, the Rick Rubin Super Tour, otherwise known as labelmates Run DMC and LL Cool J. It was while on the hip hop tour that their first actual single, "Hold It Now, Hit It", took off and cemented their place on the label (because whenever you make a label money, you get to keep your slot - just ask Soulja Boy). They also scored a cameo in the film Krush Groove, and their own "She's On It" was one of the hit singles from its soundtrack. 

Their official hip hop debut, Licensed To Ill, was released in 1986, which makes this album older than some of my readers. (It's original title, Don't be A Faggot, was quickly nixed by Russell Simmons, who preferred to not piss off a good chunk of the population in one shot: the group later apologized for their apparent arrogance and stupidity.) It quickly became the highest selling hip hop album of its era, remaining at the top of Billboard's album charts for no less than five weeks. It would eventually sell over five million copies, more than essentially everyone else on the label, at least until Run DMC jacked that Aerosmith song. The album is still universally beloved today, primarily for the group's biggest hit, "Fight For Your Right", which is still played at frat parties nationwide on a regular basis (along with Young MC's "Bust A Move" and Curtis Jackson's "I'll Still Kill"). Just because most everyone that picked up this album back them still owns it to this day, doesn't mean it's any good, though. 

Or does it? 

1. RHYMIN' & STEALIN' 

I love how the unsubtle scratching makes it seem like you're joining Licensed To Ill, already in progress. The chemistry between MCA, Ad-Rock, and Mike D is apparent right from the jump. This song pretty much rocks. 

2. THE NEW STYLE 

This track is decent enough, but I'm more fond of the final verse, when the beat switches completely. The end part is what Reggie Noble paid homage to on his own "Beet Drop". Ironically, for a punk group, the part where the guitars disappear happens to be my favorite part on the song. 

3. SHE'S CRAFTY 

You may wonder if the sound of guitars dominate this disc. The answer is, not really, but should you expect anything less from a punk group making the genre switch to hip hop? Rick Rubin probably felt that his production would help ease the Beasties into their new musical choice, but that doesn't explain his production work on Run DMC's first album, as well as LL Cool J's, since all three of the Def Jam debuts sound like one overlong Rick Rubin jam session, with a drum machine on standby. 

4. POSSE IN EFFECT 

Sorry, I just listened to this song twice, and I still can't remember anything from it. 

5. SLOW RIDE 

War's "Low Rider" sample is overused, especially since now it reminds me of The George Lopez Show, but the song itself is pretty good. 6. GIRLS This track is representative of the type of song the Beastie Boys would denounce today. Other than the sexist element, I can appreciate the Boys's honesty: they were horny. They wanted sex. From girls. I get it. That doesn't make this particular song any good, though. 

7. FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT 

You already know this song, and you either love it or hate it. No matter how many charitable causes the Beasties give to, no matter how many times they chant "Free Tibet" or how many whales they keep from crossing America's borders, everyone will remember the group for This. One. Song. 

8. NO SLEEP TILL BROOKLYN 

Features guitar playing from Kerry King of Slayer, who, hilariously enough, were also signed to Def Jam by Rick Rubin (he apparently had big plans for the label: Slayer thought otherwise of a deal that would pair them on mall tours with Run DMC), This song also fucking rocks, and I love the fact that this heavy-metal skewering track was later covered by M.O.P. That reminds me, where the fuck are my M.O.P. CDs? 

9. PAUL REVERE 

A violent (and obviously fictional) retelling of how the Beastie Boys originally formed. A lot of your favorite rappers love this song and can recite it from memory; when you hear it, you'll understand why. 

10. HOLD IT NOW, HIT IT 

For being one of their first singles, this song is only okay, but at least I now know where Just Blaze found the "Chilly-chill" vocal sample used in Memphis Bleek's "Murda Murda" (also known as Jay-Z's "Murda Marcyville"). Boy, those guys sure do love their White Castle, don't they? They mention it for seemingly the ninety-seventh time on this track. 

11. BRASS MONKEY 

Come on, you already know this song. And you love it. You know you do. Eazy-E loved this song, too (see: N.W.A.'s "8-Ball (Remix)"). 

12. SLOW & LOW 

Originally written and performed by Run DMC (a demo version appears on the re-release of their Kings of Rock). The Beasties do very well rapping a song that they would be the first to admit they had nothing to do with (all they did was update a couple of the Run DMC-specific lines to Beastie sayings). 

13. TIME TO GET ILL

A good enough song, but a weak way to end your debut album. 

FINAL THOUGHTS: Yes, the rhymes are simplistic as fuck, and the lyrical content is of a singular focus (when they're not talking shit, they rhyme about chicks). But do you even remember what rappers were talking about back in 1986? Other than the skin color thing (damn, almost went the entire write-up without mentioning that), the Beastie Boys fit right in to the scene, promoting Def Jam to heights that would be later eclipsed by artists such as Shawn Carter and Warren G. Licensed To Ill is still the only hip hop album to consistently hit Billboard's specialty catalog album charts, placing it right next to Michael Jackson's Thriller and random Pink Floyd albums on a regular basis; it also always seems to be on sale at Best Buy for whatever reason. Licensed To Ill sounds like a boozy night in the studio committed to wax, and their obvious talent is only seen in short bursts, which is why their sophomore effort Paul's Boutique shocked the music industry. (More on that one at a later date.) 

BUY OR BURN? Beastie Boys albums are always more fun to listen to than, say, Eminem's, or any other random white rapper you can name (unless you count To The 5 Boroughs, which was a chore at times), so if you're up for some old school shit, you could do worse than picking up Licensed To Ill. Like I wrote above, it's always on sale for some reason, so you have no excuse. 

BEST TRACKS: "Rhymin' & Stealin'"; "No Sleep Till Brooklyn"; "Paul Revere"; "Slow & Low"; "The New Style" 

-Max