Disco de Beastie Boys: “Paul's Boutique”

They just don't make albums like this anymore. This would be IMPOSSIBLE to make today, what with all this controversy over sampling and whatnot. THIS is what sampling should sound like: Artists taking bits of found sound from various sources and incorporating them into their own unique creations. The problem with today's sampling is that rappers will take one catchy melody and loop it over the course of the song so that it never changes texture (e.g. "Will2K", "I'll Be Missing You", "Role Model"). Well there are at least 400 samples on this entire album (no hyperbole! ) and most of the time like three or four at once. During "EggMan", the themes from "Psycho" and "Jaws" are played... simultaneously! I've heard this album at least forty times since I "discovered" it like a year ago and I STILL hear something new with each listen. This is the ultimate "Oh! That part came from ____ by ____!" The Beastie Boys have basically sampled from every album they can get their hands on: the Beatles, The Ramones, Curtis Mayfield, Sly and the Family Stone, Johnny Cash (!), a Bob Marley interview, about 50 billion different Sugar Hill records, AND the "KICK IT!" scream from the Beasties' own "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)". Once during "Car Thief", Ad Rock screams the words "I'm the wretched old bum/A Hurdy Gurdy Man", and then right as he's saying that, they sample the John Bonham drum fill from the actual song "Hurdy Gurdy Man"! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW COOL THAT IS!

And the lyrics? Best they ever did. Snotty rap doesn't get any better than this, folks. Here's my favorites:

- "A lot of parents seem to think I'm a villain, but I'm just chillin'. Like Bob Dylan."

- "Tom Thumb, Tom Bushman, or Tom Foolery, I'm datin' women on TV with the help of Chuck Woolery."

- "Sometimes hard-boiled, sometimes runny. It comes from a chicken, not a bunny, dummy!" (as in the Cadbury creme egg)

- "Long distance from my girl and I'm talking on the cellular/She said that she was sorry and I said yeah the hell you were"

- "People always asking what's the phenomenon. Yo what's up know what's going on?"

- "Walking high and mighty like she's #1 and She thinks she's the passionate one." ("She thinks she's the passionate one." is, of course, a sample from "Ballroom Blitz".)

And the all time champ:

- "I'm a writer, a poet, a genius, I know it, I don't buy cheeba, I grow it! "

Ha!

Being a huge fan of Liscensed To Ill, I was about 14, July 25th 1989 was a big day for me. I had been waiting for years for the Beasties follow up record. I had managed to track down the Cookie Puss EP on tape and couldn't believe how different it was from L. To Ill. When I finally got Paul's Boutique, the first CD I ever bought, I couldn't understand what I was listening to. There were no anthems, no poppy top 40s. This was very different and very new. Little did I know that 12 years later, it would still be in my top five list of records. And I don't listen to other Beasties stuff at all anymore. But this...

I think there is very little question that this is the best album by far the Beastie Boys have ever done. The incidences of coincidences - all the variables - that were at play when this puppy got tracked would be very hard to duplicate. A bunch of superstar, super-rich genre breaking Jewish rappers move from New York City to Los Angeles, get a briefcase full of cash from from Capitol Records, hook up with the brilliant Dust Brother and do drugs. Lots of drugs.

This is a perfectly conceived and executed album. It is a rollercoaster, covering all the bases. With an appeal unlike any other record. I remember Charlie Benante, the drumer for Anthrax, saying that it was his favorite album. That was from an interview about ten years ago. If you like music, you will love this album. I am sure anyone reading this, already knows. Tell your friends that Paul's Boutique is one of the greatest pieces of work ever to be put on record.

Man, there sure are a lot of 5 star reviews here labeling this album a classic. Look, here's another one! Without question "Paul's Boutique" is a classic, why there is debate about it I don't know. From beginning to end this album is a blur of strange samples, funky beats, and of course the off the wall Beasties bustin out lyrics with obscure references like only they know how. The Beastie Boys are one of the most creative and adventurous in the genre and they, like Russell Simmons (co creator of the Def Jam label and Run's brother) said were "groundbreaking". Anyone with a sense of hip hip history knew this already. One of the coolest things I saw recently on VH1 was the Beastie Boys paying tribute to Run DMC. I thought it was ideal. Back to Boutique, I would say it's the "It Takes A Nation of Millions..." of their catalog. Referring to Public Enemy's breakthrough record. Using P.E. as another comparative, I would say "Licensed to Ill" is the "Yo Bum Rush The Show" of their catalog as well. Musically, there isn't really a weak Beastie Boys album, but their first two are stone cold classics. These two are the ones I come back to the most. I can still remember seeing videos for "Shake Your Rump" and "Hey Ladies" on Yo MTV Raps (Those were the days, seriously!) back when MTV played rap (ha ha!). I had Boutique on a cassette first. I remember the tape came in different colors (mine was red), but I know someone that had a blue one. Obviously I replaced it on CD as soon as possible. The album is no filler starting with the slow tribute to the ladies "To all the girls", which blasts into "Shake your rump" (Rum-pah!). I could comment on all the tracks, but obviously there are stand outs: "Egg Man", "Hey Ladies", "Car Thief", "Shadrach", and the medley finale "B-Boy Bouillabaise" I also have to mention the hillbilly hoedown "5 Piece Chicken Dinner" that goes hilariously into the funky beat of "Looking down the barrel of a gun". It's hard to describe this album, it's an aural experience. If the conclusion is the "bouillabaisse" then the album as a whole is the full meal deal, homes. I can only tell you that as an old school hip hop fan (the B-Boy fans already own it!) you must have this.

"Mike on the mic, don't be so selfish, get on the mic cause you know you eat shellfish..."

Other old school albums in my collection I recommend you get(for starters):

Run DMC: Run DMC, King of Rock, Raising Hell, & Tougher Than

Public Enemy: Yo Bum Rush, It takes a nation, & Fear

Boogie Down Productions: Criminal Minded & By Any Means

De La Soul: 3 Feet High & De La Soul is Dead

3rd Bass: The Cactus Album

Big Daddy Kane: Long Live the Kane

LL Cool J: Radio, BAD, Panther, & Mama said

Rob Base & DJ EZ Rock: It Takes Two

Eric B & Rakim: Paid in Full & Follow the Leader

Tribe Called Quest: People's instinctive & Low End

MC Lyte: Lyte as a Rock

Stetsasonic: On Fire & In Full Gear

EPMD: Strictly Business & Unfinished Business

Kool Moe Dee: How Ya Like Me Now

Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince: Rock the House & He's the DJ

and many many more...

Real Old School Artist Recommendations (the founders):

Kurtis Blow

Grandmaster Flash & the Furious 5

The Sugar Hill Gang

The Treacherous Three (featuring Kool Moe Dee)

Afrika Bambaataa & Soul Sonic Force

and much more...

For a great intro into the real old school check out collections of the "Sugar Hill" label that include not only "Sugar Hill Gang", but also several outstanding artists that are very difficult to track down such as Treacherous 3, Funky 4 Plus 1, Spoonie Gee, and Busy Bee, among others.

Such was the power of Licensed to Ill that everybody, from fans to critics, thought that not only could the Beastie Boys not top the record, but that they were destined to be a one-shot wonder. These feelings were only amplified by their messy, litigious departure from Def Jam and their flight from their beloved New York to Los Angeles, since it appeared that the Beasties had completely lost the plot.

Many critics in fact thought that Paul's Boutique was a muddled mess upon its summer release in 1989, but that's the nature of the record - it's so dense, it's bewildering at first, revealing its considerable charms with each play. To put it mildly, it's a considerable change from the hard rock of Licensed to Ill, shifting to layers of samples and beats so intertwined they move beyond psychedelic; it's a painting with sound. Paul's Boutique is a record that only could have been made in a specific time and place. Like the Rolling Stones in 1972, the Beastie Boys were in exile and pining for their home, so they made a love letter to downtown New York - which they could not have done without the Dust Brothers, a Los Angeles-based production duo who helped redefine what sampling could be with this record. Sadly, after Paul's Boutique sampling on the level of what's heard here would disappear; due to a series of lawsuits, most notably Gilbert O'Sullivan's suit against Biz Markie, the entire enterprise too cost-prohibitive and risky to perform on such a grand scale. Which is really a shame, because if ever a record could be used as incontrovertible proof that sampling is its own art form, it's Paul's Boutique.

Snatches of familiar music are scattered throughout the record - anything from Curtis Mayfield's "Superfly" and Sly Stone's "Loose Booty" to Loggins & Messina's "Your Mama Don't Dance" and the Ramones' "Suzy Is a Headbanger" - but never once are they presented in lazy, predictable ways. The Dust Brothers and Beasties weave a crazy-quilt of samples, beats, loops, and tricks, which creates a hyper-surreal alternate reality - a romanticized, funhouse reflection of New York where all pop music and culture exist on the same strata, feeding off each other, mocking each other, evolving into a wholly unique record, unlike anything that came before or after. It very well could be that its density is what alienated listeners and critics at the time; there is so much information in the music and words that it can seem impenetrable at first, but upon repeated spins it opens up slowly, assuredly, revealing more every listen.

Musically, few hip-hop records have ever been so rich; it's not just the recontextulations of familiar music via samples, it's the flow of each song and the album as a whole, culminating in the widescreen suite that closes the record. Lyrically, the Beasties have never been better - not just because their jokes are razor-sharp, but because they construct full-bodied narratives and evocative portraits of characters and places. Few pop records offer this much to savor, and if Paul's Boutique only made a modest impact upon its initial release, over time its influence could be heard through pop and rap, yet no matter how its influence was felt, it stands alone as a record of stunning vision, maturity, and accomplishment. Plus, it's a hell of a lot of fun, no matter how many times you've heard it.

A few years prior to the release of Paul's Boutique, the Beastie Boys made an album called License to Ill, whom according to who you ask, is either a landmark album or a sell-out. Whatever it was, it put the Beastie Boys on the map. The problem was, it wasn't their natural sound. They worked with producer Rick Rubin (AC/DC) and hence what came out was a rock album. Paul's Boutique is pure hip-hop. This is what the B-Boys had always wanted to do. Forget the fact that they're white guys, right? Also, it should be noted that this came long before the Beastie Boys' recent transformation into the saviors of Tibet, which has them raping about Tibetans' oppression by the Chinese and sampling Buddhist monks. No, around the time of Paul's Boutique the Beastie Boys were still foul-mouthed young boys with 6 foot purple penises on their stage. Ah, the wonderful in-between.

"To All The Girls" is a smooth jazz intro which has MCA making sure you all know this record is dedicated to all women: Puerto Ricans, strippers, and air stewardesses included. All of a sudden out of nowhere comes a break beat and "Shake Your Rump" starts, simply one of the greatest hip-hop songs ever crafted. The sample of a funk guitar could not be better. The song's beat keeps changing up, the Boys put a line out there and leave a sample of some guy talking to complete the rhyme. As far as music goes, this is the tightest song on the record.

While today you'd expect nothing but compassion on Beastie Boys, here on "Johnny Ryall" you basically get the Boys insulting a former rockabilly star turned crazy homeless man. "Sleepin on the street in a cardboard box / Better off drinking than smoking the rock." Of course, maybe it's all sarcastic, but it's pretty thick. The Boys show off their tongue-in-cheek humor in "The Sounds of Science." "Cause I been droppin the new science / And I been kickin' the new k-nowledge." About halfway through this quirky blippy music, this fast tempo rocking hip-hop comes in right up to your face and dissed you! "Droppin' science like Galileo dropped an orange!"

There's a few more hip-hop numbers until the last song, and probably the best, the 12-minute "Boullabaise." This is an amazing song. It's actually about 10 different songs tied together, aborted song ideas reminicent of They Might Be Giants' "Fingertips." For the first minute we get the boys telling this story of taking this girl home to have sex to this totally seazy music, but it cuts off right after the line "Took off her pants / You know what I saw" and the next song starts, leaving what he really saw up to your imagination. The next section is a beatboxing rap. The next part sounds funky and is a pretty observant look at riding a subway train. After that is some crazy smooth guitar and record-scratching. The image I get is just some dead party suddenly springing to life. The next part features little more than a throbbing bass synth and a drum kit beat with lyrics about New York City. The next short interlude has some sampled ragtime and lyrics about seeing ghosts. Then the boys go on about how people make fun of their Irish names. There's almost too much to talk about. The final part sounds like it was recorded live when it obviously wasn't. Thousands of screaming fans surround the reverberated voices of the Beastie Boys rapping "Ad Rock's in the house, what'cha gonna do? / Go AWOL! / Mike D's in the house, what'cha gonna do? / Go AWOL!"