When I first heard The Beastie Boys in 1986 or 1987, Licensed To Ill was hitting, I was in high school. The song, of course, was "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)." I got the Ill album (on cassette). I liked it. I didn't love it, and I wasn't sure this band would be around for long. I thought they were kind of a novelty.
By 1989, I was in college. When they released Paul's Boutique, I was surprised they were still around. I remember thinking it was a lot funkier than the Ill stuff. I picked up the album (on CD!), it kind of blew my mind. I hadn't heard anything like it before. It was so dense and thick, but fun, and funny, and clever. Songs like "Johnny Ryall" and even "Egg Man" had maturity, depth and empathy. I listened to the CD over and over and eventually had to replace it, more than once. I wasn't around when Dylan went electric, but this felt like almost as drastic of a progression. The album tanked (at the time), they didn't tour, and again, I kind of thought that this time, the band really was over. Still, it was the first time in my experience that a band I really liked made such a dramatic change.
1992's Check Your Head came out just as I was finishing college. I saw the video for "Gratitude," and was kind of shocked. Wow! It was like "Fight For Your Right" or "Brooklyn," except they were playing their own instruments, and it was a lot cooler. Check Your Head really captured the time: punk-influenced alternative rock and hip-hop were moving ever closer, but The Beastie Boys seemed like the only group who could actually play both sides of the line. They added in hardcore punk on "Time For Livin'" (although the lyrics were taken from a Sly & The Family Stone song), and the funky instrumental jam "Pow." And it ends with "Namaste," the first time I'd ever seen or heard that word. The lyrics were a bit deeper than what you'd expect. It's Adam Yauch doing a kind of spoken word thing over a mellow, funky groove. "A voice spoke in my head, and she said, 'Dark is not the opposite of light, it's the absence of light.'" I didn't know if Yauch was just smoking too much pot or getting into a more spiritual area. Looking back, probably both.
