Awesome Music / Beastie Boys

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• Even though the Boys later distanced themselves, Licensed to Ill is still one of the biggest party records of The '80s. It's all Hip-Hop with heavy metal riffs, drinking, partying and getting laid.
  • "Fight for Your Right (to Party)" is a three-chord Rap Rock monster satirizing dopey bro mentalities, and it won over the very people they were taking shots at.
  • "Paul Revere", made up of a backmasked drum machine and some of the most iconic rhymes in their catalog.
  • "Rhymin' and Stealin'" combines the drum intro to "When The Levee Breaks" with the Epic Riff from "Sweet Leaf" to awesome effect.
  • "No Sleep Till Brooklyn" goes even harder in the heavy rock direction with a riff AC/DC would be proud of. For the record, that's Kerry King from Slayer playing that riff and the killer solo.
• Paul's Boutique is probably the most frequently lauded Beasties album; a dense, sample-heavy masterpiece of multiple genres all finding a comfortable axis through Hip-Hop. If you want a testament to the chimera that is this album, look no further than "B-Boy Bouillabaisse", the closer track. The entire track is a multi-segment storm of samples and rhymes that fill the ambient in many different ways. Epic Rapping indeed.
• Check Your Head saw the Beasties pick up their instruments again, and what came out was a sick fusion of hip hop, funk, jazz, punk and whatever else they conjured up on a whim.
  • "So What'Cha Want" hits so damn hard it's like being bludgeoned, being a massive banger that makes people shake their heads like it's a Heavy Metal song.
  • "Time for Livin'" was the first of four tracks with Hardcore Punk leaning to make it into the trio's main albums, and the energy put into it shows.
  • This is the first album where the group started putting out their famed instrumentals. "Something's Got to Give" and "Groove Holmes" in particular are highlights - a couple of cool jazz/soul/funk fusions that help give the album extra flavor.
• Ill Communication is obviously a follow-up to Check Your Head but in some ways it equals, and even surpasses that album:
  • "Sabotage" is an awesome song and an awesome video.
  • "Root Down" melds samples from jazz legend Jimmy Smith with liquidic Beasties rhymes. It's like peanut butter and jelly.
  • "Sure Shot" and "Flute Loop" have the group rapping to a flute.
  • "Shambala" is a foreboding instrumental song that quickly dominates the environment within the first seconds of the track, being the lead-up to "Bodhisattva Vow".
• Hello Nasty. Yet another shake-up in the Beasties' constant Genre Roulette.
  • "Intergalactic", a retro-futuristic old school track.
  • "Super Disco Breakin'" is just straight-up fire, setting an absolutely frenetic tone for the record.
  • "The Negotiation Limerick File" is great but the clincher is that the lyrics are all in the form of actual limericks.
  • The album's closer, "Instant Death", is unlike anything they ever did, being a haunting but gentle folk/emo/indie guitar track with detached and broken lyrics about suicide and parental loss. It's so jarring and out of place yet incredibly emotional and affective.

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