dee_bee_76
06-11-2004, 05:52 PM
June 11, 2004
Rappers' delight
By Lisa Verrico
BEASTIE BOYS
To the 5 Boroughs
(Capitol)
FOR ALMOST two decades, the Beastie Boys from New York have been breaking down hip-hop barriers. They were the first white rappers to make credible records, the first rap act to top the Billboard charts — with their debut album, Licence to Ill (1986) — and the first to win Grammy awards in both rock and rap categories.
Their last album, Hello Nasty (1998), sold more than five million copies. But will the teenagers who make up most of hip hop’s audience now buy a record by a band whose members are touching 40 and old enough to be their dads? Despite their age, the Beastie Boys have returned to their raw, hip-hop roots, self-producing an album that lays their witty, tag-team word play over booming beats, samples and DJ scratching. On To the 5 Boroughs, the Beastie Boys aren’t out to experiment, they’re just having fun.
They are well-educated, middle-class men with a social conscience, sense of humour and an encyclopaedic interest in global pop culture. They can’t match 50 Cent for bullet wounds, but when it comes to writing rhymes they are so much smarter than their younger, hipper rivals.
The lyrics dazzle on the 15 songs on To the 5 Boroughs. Whether they’re bragging about their own rapping skills or badgering George W. Bush about the Kyoto Protocol, the band mixes cheeky banter and intelligent, rapid-fire poetry.
On The Hard Way, one of a number of tracks dedicated to New York, they rap in five languages to reflect the city’s cultural mix, rhyme FedEx with Tyrannosaurus rex and have a pop at the street vendors who sell their CDs before they are even out. On the current single Ch-Check It Out they reference Einstein, Miss Piggy, Bonanza, Battlestar Galactica and the film The Cable Guy.
In the superb Rhyme the Rhyme Well, the trio take each other on in a rap match. On Hey F*** You, they take a swipe at rappers who suggest that they are past their peak. On We Got The they make a plea for world peace.
The Beastie Boys squash more into their sixth album than most bands manage in an entire career. They rifle through hip-hop history with snippets of the Sugarhill Gang, L. L . Cool J and Run-DMC and sample the voices of 50 Cent and Chuck D. They even find space for a nod to Don Costa’s The Devil Rides in Jericho and snatches of Kool and the Gang, the Frank Joe Show and a Broadway musical.
It’s clever but it doesn’t always work. The problem lies in the sparseness of the backing tracks. There aren’t tunes as such, just sounds to back the raps. When the songs are strong enough — the first five stand out — it doesn’t matter.
When it’s all about boxing clever and ignoring the beats — the following five tracks — it’s too easy for your attention to wander. There are techno noises that make the lyrics hard to hear and while To the 5 Boroughs may be a trip back to the old school, some new ideas would have been nice.
The album picks up again towards the end. The Brouhaha in particular is classic Beastie Boys inter-band baiting: “Who’s the illest?/ You know my name is Adam, stop calling me Phyllis.”
If the kids laugh, it will be for all the right reasons.
Rappers' delight
By Lisa Verrico
BEASTIE BOYS
To the 5 Boroughs
(Capitol)
FOR ALMOST two decades, the Beastie Boys from New York have been breaking down hip-hop barriers. They were the first white rappers to make credible records, the first rap act to top the Billboard charts — with their debut album, Licence to Ill (1986) — and the first to win Grammy awards in both rock and rap categories.
Their last album, Hello Nasty (1998), sold more than five million copies. But will the teenagers who make up most of hip hop’s audience now buy a record by a band whose members are touching 40 and old enough to be their dads? Despite their age, the Beastie Boys have returned to their raw, hip-hop roots, self-producing an album that lays their witty, tag-team word play over booming beats, samples and DJ scratching. On To the 5 Boroughs, the Beastie Boys aren’t out to experiment, they’re just having fun.
They are well-educated, middle-class men with a social conscience, sense of humour and an encyclopaedic interest in global pop culture. They can’t match 50 Cent for bullet wounds, but when it comes to writing rhymes they are so much smarter than their younger, hipper rivals.
The lyrics dazzle on the 15 songs on To the 5 Boroughs. Whether they’re bragging about their own rapping skills or badgering George W. Bush about the Kyoto Protocol, the band mixes cheeky banter and intelligent, rapid-fire poetry.
On The Hard Way, one of a number of tracks dedicated to New York, they rap in five languages to reflect the city’s cultural mix, rhyme FedEx with Tyrannosaurus rex and have a pop at the street vendors who sell their CDs before they are even out. On the current single Ch-Check It Out they reference Einstein, Miss Piggy, Bonanza, Battlestar Galactica and the film The Cable Guy.
In the superb Rhyme the Rhyme Well, the trio take each other on in a rap match. On Hey F*** You, they take a swipe at rappers who suggest that they are past their peak. On We Got The they make a plea for world peace.
The Beastie Boys squash more into their sixth album than most bands manage in an entire career. They rifle through hip-hop history with snippets of the Sugarhill Gang, L. L . Cool J and Run-DMC and sample the voices of 50 Cent and Chuck D. They even find space for a nod to Don Costa’s The Devil Rides in Jericho and snatches of Kool and the Gang, the Frank Joe Show and a Broadway musical.
It’s clever but it doesn’t always work. The problem lies in the sparseness of the backing tracks. There aren’t tunes as such, just sounds to back the raps. When the songs are strong enough — the first five stand out — it doesn’t matter.
When it’s all about boxing clever and ignoring the beats — the following five tracks — it’s too easy for your attention to wander. There are techno noises that make the lyrics hard to hear and while To the 5 Boroughs may be a trip back to the old school, some new ideas would have been nice.
The album picks up again towards the end. The Brouhaha in particular is classic Beastie Boys inter-band baiting: “Who’s the illest?/ You know my name is Adam, stop calling me Phyllis.”
If the kids laugh, it will be for all the right reasons.