I was thinking about this recently - next to LL Cool J, the Beastie Boys are probably the longest-standing rap artists out there, having sustained a now 20-year career while remaining relevant and authentic.
But what do black people think of the Beastie Boys? I’m sure that there’s been stigma because they’re white, and a bit experimental within the confines of mainstream hip hop (incorporating bossa nova, dub, expressing their roots with hardcore freakouts and meandering rare groove workouts at times), and frankly a bit goofy, jokey, and corny at times.
Yet, the Beasties are about as authentic as it gets in hip hop; they were a part of the culture before most current rap artists were even fans, and they’ve retained the spirit of hip hop, relying on analogue beat boxes, crusty breakbeats, and their record collections while the industry has moved on to souless keyboards. If anything, they should get the most respect.
I would venture that some would like it and some not.
Speaking as a white person, I think they are extremely over-rated.
Every cd has maybe one or two songs which are listenable.
But I am white, so you don’t want to know, right? :wally
This is purely anecdotal, but a couple of friends of mine thought they were funny, had some decent beats, etc., but didn’t have much opinion other than that. So I asked them straight up if they thought they were ripping off black artists. One of them laughed and said “…and that makes them different from other white artists HOW?”…
Not only do they not have a hive mind, they don’t own the concept of “hiphop.”
Which is more racist: allowing a musical development to spread and generate new followers, regardless of their race? Or white people refusing to perform “black music,” and a segregation of styles? That concept is far scarier than the eternal logrolling of musical influences.
Also, Ill Communication is in my lifetime top ten or fifteen albums; it’s singularly brilliant from beginning to end.
Who were they ripping off? As Freejooky correctly notes, they’ve been around longer than almost anybody going today. They didn’t invent the genre, but that doesn’t mean they ripped their style off from anybody.
Doesn’t all modern music orginate someway down the line from black artists???
The Beatles started off with Rock’n’Roll - - but that doesn’t mean that something like “Help!” or “Elenor Rigby” was a rip-off of black music…
I’ve never been a fan of the Beasty Boys - and I’m white… (so yeah you didn’t want my opinion) - - but I also make hip-hop music - - I have respect for the Beasty boys because they do what they do… which I think is what Hip-Hop is about… and anyone can do that I think…
He was laughing when he said it, and I believe he was referring to the traditional influence of “black” music on “white” music, not making a direct accusation of specific thievery.
Eh, I guess you could argue that country and the blues are both folk music, so… I don’t know. It’s not like any black leaders are going to try and claim credit for country anyway.
I can assure you that many (if not most) urban hiphop fans know Beastie Boys for what that are and always have been: a parody of hiphop. Sometimes the parody is good and people enjoy it, sometimes it is bad and that really reeks. But certainly not generally considered to be a “straight” hiphop group.
Every culture on the planet has its own folk music. Blacks can’t have started all of them.
Maybe not, but you can draw a direct evolutionary line from death metal back through heavy metal, through rock, and straight back to the blues. (Yeah, I’m sure I’m leaving out a couple steps.)
That’s completely true. There is a real connection between the blues and country, but it might be European music rather than African. I’m not saying country IS descended from black music so much as I’m wondering if you could make the argument.
To veer totally off-topic, I always was of the opinion that metal actually is far more similar to classical music than to blues. Both use lots of scales and are quite patterned and kind of mathematical, wouldn’t you agree? And BTW, to say that black people invented all forms of music is just silly.
It has always kind of irked me that whenever the Beastie Boys come out with a new rap record it gets played all over the “new rock” stations and isn’t even mentioned on the hip-hop stations.
Same as how Eminem (never realized how weird that name was until I tried to type it and then said it outloud a few times) will occasionally get played on a new rock station but you will never hear, say, Lenny Kravitz on a hip-hop station.
I’ve noticed that a lot of the super-heavy death metal types (Six Feet Under, Dimu Borgir, Cradle of Filth maybe?) will try to “legitimize” themselves by associating themselves with classical music. That way when people say that their music is just a bunch of noise they can come back saying that they took X number of years of classical guitar lessons and their favorite musician is Mozart, and then proceed to play a bunch of noise ;).
Once upon a time (early 90’s or so) some friends and I were hanging out, skateboarding in a friends apartment complex parking lot. The car doors were open and we were blasting Ill Communication, which was brand new about this time. A man came out of his building (I’ll mention he was darker skinned only in relevance to the OP) and came over to ask us what we were jamming to.
“Oh, it’s the new Beastie Boys”
He didn’t say anything for the duration of the track that was playing. Then,
“Are they white?” Not with any negative inflections, just out of honest curiosity.
“Ahhhh…Yeah…They are”
Again, no reply for the rest of the next track. A smile crept across his face…slowly…
