I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Last year I wrote about The White House unreleased Beastie Boys album, and an unreleased Grand Royal / Mo' Wax compilation. Today I'm publishing a new article on another unreleased Beastie Boys album (which probably doesn't really exist): The Aquatic Sessions.

You can read it here on Medium.

I remember when Sir Dan used to claim on this board that he bought a DAT from the Beasties which he called The Aquatic Sessions. It was apparently from the Hello Nasty sessions, and I think he said it was just them goofing around with underwater effects applied to their voices. But he refused to release it and most people assumed he was making it all up.

Anyway it was a hotly debated topic back in the day so I wanted to try and research it. I didn't go in to the Sir Dan stuff in detail since those posts don't exist here anymore.

Let me know if you remember anything else :)

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

great article i had fun reading it. i haven’t read that Q&A Yauch did in a while either. he answered one of my questions. good stuff.

i always thought the Aquatic Sessions was just a inside joke with the band.

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Sir Dan's museum open up yet?

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

I came along a bit later so never knew Sir Dan. Can anyone fill me in on who he was/is? (Not like his personal information or anything, just what his deal was?)

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

He was a Beastie Boys collector and he worked on the official Beastie Boys website managing the Discography section for a while. He annoyed a lot of people on this board, and I think at least one person hated him, which kind of spread around.

Apart from apparently owning The Aquatic Sessions, I also read recently he may have been the person responsible for releasing the bootleg records with the instrumental versions of all the Beastie albums.

He used to talk about opening a museum dedicated to Beastie Boys, and I thought he did 'open' it, but it wasn't open to the public or something. He lived in the Netherlands I think so I never would have seen it anyway.

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

fun read. i dig your articles, thanks for sharing

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

i always thought the bootleg of "Honkey Rink"** with its garbled, underwater-sounding vocals would've been from the "Aquatic Sessions".


Thanks for writing and sharing that article - - it's now part of the lore!


EDIT: Went back and listenened - this is not it. There was another track that I got along with "Honkey Rink" that I'm thinking of. Can't remember what it was called... "Round Revelation" ?

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Also, re: the stoner jams.. I thought I heard Adam more recently warm up to the idea of finding some good shit in their archives to release?

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Awesome - thanks for the info! I recently acquired something that used to belong to him, so I was just curious what he was all about. I love all the backstory to this whole community.

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

drunken praying mantis style?

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Great write up!

The only thing I would add is the lyrics "Well, I was swimming in the water of the ocean
Like Dr. Jekyll with the magic potion". There are some crazy underwater bubbling effects going on. Possibly an in-joke to the aquatic sessions, possibly a coincidence.

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

This is it - I had to dig it up. It was labeled "Beastie Boys - Spooky Nintendo", a synthesizer instrumental with Aqua effects on the voice

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

oh damn, I forgot about this cut. "Hail Sagan (Special K)" from the intergalactic single. blast from the past for sure!

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

Oh cool, I'd forgotten about that one too. Well this kind of lines up with Sir Dan's description of the sessions. Hopefully one day he drops back and reveals whether it was real or not.

Re: I wrote an article about The Aquatic Sessions
 

haha everything is online:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkTu96-N8uA


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