Tag: Beastie Boys (1-10 of 31)

Dec 5 2012 06:35 PM ET

Tony Hawk teams with Metallica, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan for 'Boards + Bands' charity project

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Image Credit: Tony Hawk Foundation

Tony Hawk has spent a lifetime shredding, and now he’s hoping to give that gift back through his work in the Tony Hawk Foundation.

His charitable organization’s latest project is called Boards + Bands, which is the brainchild of Hawk and his friend (and Grammy-winning musician) Ben Harper. The idea is simple: A bunch of the biggest skateboarders in the world have donated actual boards that they’ve ridden, and those boards were then sent to a bunch of legendary musicians for some turned-to-11 customization.

The boards are currently up for auction, with the proceeds going to building public skateparks for at-risk kids in low-income communities. The decks feature hand-written lyrics by the likes of Harper, Paul McCartney, Metallica’s James Hetfield, Bob Dylan, the late Adam Yauch, Jimmy Cliff, and Tom Petty.

McCartney’s board features some lines from “Blackbird,” while Yauch spread the lyrics to the appropriately zen Beastie Boys track “Bodhisattva Vow” across three different boards. The decks are also currently on display at the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles.

Check out the video about the project below.

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Aug 10 2012 06:08 PM ET

Adam Yauch's will bars use of his work in ads

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Image Credit: Scott Gries/Getty Images

The Beastie Boys’ Adam Yauch rapped that he wouldn’t “sell my songs for no TV ad.” His will shows he wanted to make sure that held true after his death, too.

“In no event may my image or name or any music or any artistic property created by me be used for advertising purposes,” says the will, filed this week in a Manhattan court. Yauch, known for his good nature as well as his raspy voice in one of hip-hop’s groundbreaking acts, died of cancer in May. He was 47.

Also known as MCA, Yauch was a founding member of the Beastie Boys, a group that helped hip-hop gain mainstream attention in the 1980s. As white guys from Brooklyn in a genre with few credible white performers at the time, they emerged as prankster pioneers and scored such hits as “Brass Monkey,” “No Sleep Till Brooklyn” and “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!)” They had four No. 1 albums and sold more than 40 million records.

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May 23 2012 03:17 PM ET

Beastie Boy Adam 'Ad-Rock' Horovitz shares memories of the late Adam Yauch: 'He wasn't afraid'

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Image Credit: Phil Andelman

Family, friends, and fans of the Beastie Boys are dealing with founding member Adam “MCA” Yauch’s death in all sorts of ways. Many have gone out to buy (or re-buy) their favorite Beasties albums; some New Yorkers are even petitioning to rename a Brooklyn park in Yauch’s honor.

But Yauch’s comrade Adam “Ad Rock” Horovitz is still only coping with the loss. “I’m walking the dog and I’ll start crying on the street,” he told Rolling Stone. “It’s pretty f—ing crazy.”

Horovitz opened up in his first interview since his friend and bandmate’s May 4 death, fondly remembering him as both an artist and as a person.

“Yauch was in charge,” he says of MCA’s position in the Beastie Boys. “He was smarter, more organized.”

“He had that extra drive to see things through,” he continued. “ We each had our roles. One of his was the make-it-happen person.”

Horovitz also outlined the give-and-take process that made the group the enduring collaborative effort it became.

“Everything was split three ways,” he explained. “Except we had veto power. If you really hated something, you could be [like], ‘That can’t happen.’”

One example he offers is was when Yauch wanted the cover of their hit album Ill Communication to be a painting of a tree, an idea swiftly vetoed by Horovitz and Mike D. “I said, ‘Anything is better than that tree.’” The painting, Alex Grey’s “Gaia,” wound up finding a home in the album’s liner notes instead; see it below: READ FULL STORY »

May 21 2012 05:27 AM ET

2012 Billboard Music Awards: 20 essential takeaways from the show

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Image Credit: Ethan Miller/Getty Images

Like most music awards shows, the Billboard Music Awards are so not about the statuettes that are doled out. The show — which aired live last night on ABC from the MGM Grand Hotel, with hosts, Modern Family stars Julie Bowen and Ty Burrell — is typically more about everything but the awards: performances, tributes, collaborations, and other sundry craziness.

Hell, even the fashion — hello to Miley Cyrus’ barely-there suit jacket — is more important than the prizes! And that was no different this year. Just a handful of the 46 awards were actually given out during the show (LMFAO dominated), which was jolted to life with performances from Katy Perry, Cee Lo Green, and Linkin Park; tributes to Robin Gibb, Donna Summer, Whitney Houston, the Beastie Boys’ Adam Yauch, and Stevie Wonder; a collaboration between Stevie Wonder and Alicia Keys; and a heartfelt speech by Houston’s daughter Bobbi Kristina Brown.

Here are 20 essential takeaways from the evening:

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May 8 2012 02:32 PM ET

Beastie Boys sued over allegedly illegal 'Paul's Boutique' and 'Licensed to Ill' samples

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Image Credit: Phil Andelman

It’s been a bad week in the Beastie Boys’ corner of the universe.

A day before founding member Adam Yauch’s death, the band was hit with a lawsuit over the use of samples on two of their best-regarded albums, Paul’s Boutique and Licensed to Ill.

The suit, filed by the label Tuf America, alleges that the two albums illegally sample the band Trouble Funk’s 1982 songs “Drop the Bomb” and “Say What.” Both the Beasties and Capitol Records were named in the suit, some of which is available on All Hip-Hop for your viewing displeasure.

So what are the offending Beastie songs? The suit name checks Licensed to Ill‘s “Hold It Now Hit It” and “The New Style” and Paul’s Boutique‘s “Car Thief” for cribbing from “Drop the Bomb,” as well as that album’s “Shadrach” for stealing elements from “Say What.”

Tuf America wants the matter to go to trial, but in the meantime, let’s give the songs in question a listen to see (slash hear) what all the hubbub’s about:

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May 7 2012 05:33 PM ET

Beastie Boys album sales surge in wake of Adam Yauch's death as fans and famous friends pay tribute

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Since the sad news broke last Friday, people have spent their weekends (and Mondays) mourning Adam “MCA” Yauch in their own ways.

Unsurprisingly, most people are remembering the fallen Beastie Boy by going back to the group’s music: Licensed to Ill, the Beasties’ breakthrough 1986 debut, shot up to No. 3 on the iTunes albums chart. Of course, it wasn’t the only piece of the band’s catalog to rise on the chart, but it did place the highest. While the album contains some of the band’s best-known work, including “No Sleep Till Brooklyn,” “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!),” “Girls,” “Brass Monkey,” and “Paul Revere” (whew!), it’s also the only Beasties studio album not available on Spotify, which may partly explain its ascendance.

Needless to say, the rest of the Beastie catalog also saw a spike: 1989′s Paul’s Boutique rose to No. 13; 1994′s Ill Communication went to No. 27; 1992′s Check Your Head placed at No. 38; and their most recent, last year’s Hot Sauce Committee Part Two, took No. 42.

And the outpouring of love from fans (famous and not) continued over the weekend: On Friday, Coldplay covered “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!)” during their performance at the Hollywood Bowl. Watch the video below:

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May 7 2012 10:00 AM ET

Beastie Boy Ad-Rock remembers Adam Yauch on Tumblr

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Beastie Boys founding member Adam “MCA” Yauch is gone but not forgotten. Soon after his death on Friday, dozens of celebrities mourned their fallen comrade on Twitter. And last night, Yauch’s bandmate Adam Horovitz — a.k.a. Ad-Rock — posted his own MCA remembrance on the hip-hop group’s official Tumblr page.

“as you can imagine, sh-t is just fkd up right now,” the post begins. “but i wanna say thank you to all our friends and family (which are kinda one in the same) for all the love and support.

“i’m glad to know that all the love that Yauch has put out into the world is coming right back at him,” it continues. Horovitz’s words are accompanied by a photo of a fist that bears a Sharpie-drawn tribute to Yauch. READ FULL STORY »

May 4 2012 04:53 PM ET

Beastie Boys' Adam Yauch's musical legacy: Changing all games, all the time

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Image Credit: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

Adam “MCA” Yauch’s death today leaves a Beastie-size hole in pop music. Though the trio were not the most prolific legends on the landscape (over the course of 25 years, they released only seven proper albums), their impact has been gigantic. Starting with 1986′s Licensed to Ill, the Beastie Boys rewrote the rules for commercial hip-hop, the mainstreaming of hardcore punk, the state of sampling, and the treatment of the old school.

Licensed to Ill, one of the early full-lengths released by influential hip-hop label Def Jam Records, is often referred to as the first rap album to hit No. 1 on the Billboard albums chart. That title is a little unfair, as those sales were powered by the wildfire success of “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party)” — a track that many at the time considered more rock than rap.

The remainder of Licensed to Ill is pure mid-’80s hip-hop: grimy, tricky, and funny. The rhyme trading on “Fight for Your Right” was child’s play compared to the exchanges on “Hold It, Now Hit It,” “She’s Crafty,” and “Paul Revere.”  Though it is hard to believe now, the Beastie Boys’ race rarely came up — in part because hip-hop was a new genre, but also because they had the legitimate skills to counter criticism.

It helped that they kept pushing the form forward on subsequent releases. READ FULL STORY »

May 4 2012 01:15 PM ET

Adam Yauch, founding member of the Beastie Boys, has died

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Image Credit: Scott Gries/Getty Images

Adam Yauch, a member of the seminal hip-hop trio the Beastie Boys, has died. He was 47 years old.

The Brooklyn-born musician known to fans as MCA was first treated for cancerous growths in his parotid gland and a lymph node in 2009 and subsequently underwent surgery and radiation therapy, which forced the delay of the Beastie Boys’ most recent album Hot Sauce Committee Part Two. His illness has also kept the group off the road, and Yauch missed the group’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two weeks ago.

Yauch first met his musical comrade-in-arms Michael Diamond (a.k.a. Mike D) when he was still in high school; inspired by the manic punk energy of bands like Black Flag, the pair conceived the Beastie Boys as a noisy hardcore band. The group originally featured friends John Berry and Kate Schellenbach (the latter of whom later formed Luscious Jackson). The Polly Wog Stew EP gained them some attention, as did gigs opening for the likes of Bad Brains and the Misfits.

Berry departed the band and was replaced by Adam Horovitz (Ad-Rock). Around the same time, the crew put together a song called “Cookie Puss,” which was based around a recorded prank phone call to Carvel. The song became an accidental sensation in New York’s underground dance scene, and the Beastie Boys began to build a reputation for blending humor and hip-hop in their sound. READ FULL STORY »

Apr 15 2012 10:11 AM ET

Guns N' Roses, Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers inducted to Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

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On their way into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Guns N’ Roses got together for one more gig.

Axl Rose missed it.

The hedonistic hard rockers, who became the world’s top music act amid endless dysfunction, members of Guns N’ Roses reunited for three songs on Saturday night before 6,000 fans, many of whom were thrilled to see at least most of the band’s original lineup jam on classic hits like “Sweet Child O’ Mine” and “Paradise City.”

Rose, the band’s frontman and ringmaster of the G N’ R traveling sex, drugs and rock and roll circus, declined to attend the induction, saying he didn’t want to be part of the ceremony because it “doesn’t appear to be somewhere I’m actually wanted or respected.”

He was hardly missed. READ FULL STORY »

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