LUKE
Album number three and the cover image is notable for the guitar cases at the feet of the band. This is where they return to their hardcore punk roots and pick up the instruments. Where the previous two albums were so synonymous with the production styles firstly of Rick Rubin and then the Dust Brothers, Check Your Head is where the Beastie Boys start coming into their own.
Another prominent feature of the album cover is the fact that the Beasties are giving their own take on the three wise monkeys – MCA covers his mouth, Mike D covers his ears, Ad-Rock covers his eyes. This says a lot for the music within: the band are truly front and centre now, but there are still things missing that prevent it from being an effective whole in its own right.
The album starts with the sound of fans screaming, as if recreating the sound of a live gig. After the glossy, layered production of Paul’s Boutique, it seems that the Boys are looking for a more organic sound. Gratitude and Time For Living are the most obvious examples of this, with the fuzzy bass of the former and energetic screaming of the latter.
The band gave an amazing performance of So Whatcha Want on The Arsenio Hall Show around the time Check Your Head was released. Ad-Rock begins by running straight towards the camera to yelp out the opening bars, and maintains a similar manic energy throughout. The three of them are just effortless performers, as comfortable as you could possibly imagine. That clip is the Beastie Boys in microcosm, with a cameo from Cypress Hill providing a nice bonus too. Keep watching for a brief interview with Mike D from the Seattle End-Fest, where Ad-Rock is quite obviously baked within an inch of his life.
It’s interesting to witness tracks like Pow and Groove Holmes, which can be taken as precursors to The Mix Up, 2007’s instrumental-only album. They are further suggestions that the band wanted to demonstrate their musical abilities, along with other touches such as Yauch DJing on Jimmy James, and Ad-Rock taking to the decks on Finger Lickin’ Good (a song which he hates, incidentally). It’s the most diverse album, with straight-up punk/rock songs and jazzy slow-burners sitting alongside orthodox hip-hop beats.
As such, it’s a little too ambitious, and would have benefited from a more focused approach. The album generally dips a little towards the second half. I could live without Professor Booty altogether, not because it sounds particularly bad, but for the dubious content that the title implies. Indeed, it ends on a bit of a whimper with In 3’s then Namaste, both of which make for a very mellow end that betrays the vibe of the rest of the album.
One of the joys of discovering new music through this blog is in piecing everything together and realising where certain influences come to play and trying to see what was trying to be achieved on particular records. So far it seems that Licensed To Ill was the brash, ill-advised debut, while Paul’s Boutique was the startling reinvention of its genre. Check Your Head was the moment when the Beastie Boys started to show who they really were.
CHRIS
For many, time is something that merely exists to ensure that everything doesn’t happen at once. A philosophical idea that ensures the kettle doesn’t boil at the same time an annoying pamphleteer rings the door bell. Something that possibly exists to ensure those annoying moments of ‘unfortunate’ aren’t constantly happening. For others, it is something to progress through. Something in which you try, learn, make mistakes and develop your way of thinking about the world. This might be about trying a new cuisine, disliking it and moving forward, never to return.
Judging by ‘Check Your Head’, the Beastie Boys adhere to neither of these. For them, time is something in which you try something, do it wrong, pretend to forget about it, and then ill fatedly return to.
I was very hopeful after ‘Pauls Boutique’. WhiLst, as previously mentioned, some of the lyrical content was a bit dodgy in parts, the beats were awesome. These were thoughtful, clever, and, most of all, danceable beats. These were beats for a summer day; in fact, these were beats for any day. Gone were the snotty punks that had been at the heart of my apprehension at the beginning of this month.
There was a point on this album – I think it might have been ‘So Whatcha Want’ – when it all sounded a bit too much like Apollo 440. As much of a blast from the past as this was, I almost didn’t recover from that moment. There were also moments that felt like they had been lifted from a CKY album (the band that would come out of Jackass). Maybe I am being harsh; unable to remove myself from the original perception I had of the band?
I did find it quite hard to get through all the album, but I did manage it. And I am glad I did. Something brilliant is really lying under all of this, but they just need to let them fight their way out. There are moments of greatness in here; some great beats, some much better rhymes. Gratitude is a bit of a fist pumper. But overall there is something a bit uninspiring about it.
I don’t dislike this band – far from it – but I am yet to see any of the ‘greatness’. The band that could endure and become part of the music scene. But, the fact that I keep going, and that I am also strangely looking forward to the next one – possibly because I know it has Sabotage on it – shows they are a band that has ‘something’. I am just waiting for them to become the band that they can be.
At points listening to this album, I felt the concept of measuring time slipping away. Seconds felt like minutes, and minutes like hours, to the point that I was pretty sure the album had been going on all day. So, I don’t know what camp I sit in regarding the purpose or structure of time. All I know is that at points during this album it felt like time was something that would never end.
MARTIN
I was hopeful this album would be a step in the right direction towards the band turning into a Beastie Boys that I could get behind. Thankfully that turned out to be true. If this album had been rubbish, I would’ve had to accept the fact that it was likely that none of their albums were gonna be for me, and they just happened to be an average band with some great singles.
Let’s not get too carried away though. It is much better than the previous two and it’s the first Beastie Boys album that I’ve liked more than half of, but that percentage could have been much higher if a) this album was shorter and b) it wasn’t so much like listening to two albums that had been dissected and shuffled together.
The instrumentals (or near instrumentals) are a bit hit and miss. Lighten Up and In 3’s are good but most of the others just seem to suck the life out of the album and kill momentum due to an ill advised placement in the running order. It starts to feel a bit flabby in the last quarter with each track being a slow train to dullsville.
Oh and another thing. Every track on this album that is less than two minutes long is pointless. Not because it’s under 2 minutes, but because it’s either rubbish or unnecessary. Get rid of em and you’ve got a 15 track album with a much higher good to bad ratio. They seem to overuse the “y’all “lines too. You know the ones where there’s a triplet that goes: End a line with y’all,then again y’all, and then another slightly longer at the end y’all. It’s on about four songs! Come on guys, you’re better than that.
Now the positives. There’s none of the dodgy lyrical content that was a bit of a sticking point of the previous two albums and also, the songs that are good are great. There’s plenty of them too. Pass The Mic and So What’cha Want, I already knew, but So What’cha Want was one of my favourite Beastie Boys songs before we embarked on this month’s blogging. It lodges itself in my brain after one listen and I have to try to stop myself inadvertently singing it all day. I’ve watched a load of live clips from this album’s era and they are awesome, particularly the aforementioned Arsenio Hall appearance. Luke’s right. Ad-Rock is like a man possessed.
Gratitude is like a slow precursor to Sabotage. The fans they had before Check Your Head was released must’ve wondered what the hell was going on with some of these songs. My favourite song apart from So What’cha Want is Finger Lickin’ Good. It’s got a bounce and a flow that’s so catchy. It turns out that Ad-Rock hates this song now. Typical. My favourites are always the ones the bands hate. Is it because he’s not on it vocally and was just mucking about on a turntable? Well it’s great. He needn’t worry.
So yeah I’m getting on board now. This album is good just with a few niggles and padding. If the next album is as much an improvement on this one as this was on Paul’s Boutique, then I’ll be firmly in the fan camp.
ROB
After the largely brilliant (dubious lyrics aside) Paul’s Boutique, Check Your Head is quite an interesting proposition. Gone, to a large extent, are the myriad samples and snippets, but instead, the Beasties come armed with instruments. It feels like they’re trying to find their own identity, and as a result Check Your Head feels wildly unfocused, and to coin a phrase more associated with a finger-lickin’ good chicken – free range.
That said, there’s a lot to enjoy on it. Finger Lickin’ Good, So What’cha Want and Gratitude are all great, while the soul-funk Namaste is entirely unexpected and works a treat.
On the flipside, Check Your Head is a ridiculous 20 songs long – at least 5 too many. That there’s a lot of nonsense and the interludes don’t really help. In fact, it all feels like it’s trying to be a bit cleverer than it actually is.
Even though it means Check Your Head doesn’t really work all of the time for me, it’s the first time I’ve not thought of the Beastie Boys as kitsch or a novelty act in any way. There’s a real slickness and craft throughout Check Your Head and it genuinely feels that we’re on the cusp of a breakthrough. So yeah, I’m not yet fully won over, but we’re getting there…
MICKEY
I’m starting to realise that the most respected musical acts are the ones who take risks and don’t try to replicate their previous material in order to replicate their previous successes. What I loved with this album is that you never knew what to expect next.
I don’t know too much about hip hop, but generally I find the beats to be repetitive. However, you can tell a lot of time and effort has gone into the production. Although some of the bassline samples remain consistent throughout the track, most the songs on this album are anything but repetitive. I love the breakbeats, something not often heard in modern hip hop that makes the charts.
I am in absolute awe of the production. I know people turn their noses up at people who use samples. But to be able to lift samples from seven completely different records, from completely different genres and to be able to fit them all together perfectly is undoubtedly a real skill. It’s also noted that there is a lot more live instrumentation on this album which gives some of it a nice live feel.
It’s probably just me, but I find myself not really listening to the lyrics. The vocals almost act as another instrument or element of the song. However, I’ve heard their new stuff and this is not the case. So I’ll wait and see what happens with the next album.
There are a few tracks which could have been dropped. These were mainly towards the end of the album. People might think they are a novelty act because they have fun and don’t take everything so seriously. But this is a serious musical accomplishment. Good work, Beasties.
JAMIE
This album sounds altogether different from its predecessor. It is still sample heavy in parts but from having a swatch at the Wikipedia page I can see that the band play a lot of the instruments this time around.
I think this is a brilliant album. It’s so diverse. There are straight out hardcore punk songs (Time for Livin’), trippy jazzy numbers (Something’s Got To Give) and fuck-off funkathons (Pow).
Gratitude is one of my favourites. The Superfuzz bass hook is incredible, as is the staccato Hammond organ bit that comes in just after two minutes.
One of my only grievances is that it’s quite annoying that they keep introducing each other constantly. I fucking get it lads, I know your names now. How about packing it in eh?
So What’cha Want is simply a complete banger, even these guys agree.
Groove Holmes is another highlight. It sounds like a 2 and a half minute section of Derek Small’s epic jazz odyssey.
So yeah, that’s me finally aboard the Beastie Boys bus, next stop, Ill Communication.
artistinresidence 