Beastie Boys -- Check Your Head

(Grand Royal / Capitol 7989382)

Those nagging rumors that the Beasties were musically defunct are now dispelled. By the time you read this, Check Your Head -- a new, full-length album by the boys -- will be sitting on record store shelves all over.

Industry talk about the band giving up music in order to pursue acting careers (or whatever) wasn’t hard to believe. If you put three years of hard work and a big part of yourself into making a masterpiece like 1989’s Paul’s Boutique just to have the masses ignore it (while they ask why you didn’t make a partu album like your zillion-selling debut), you might want to give it up too and go Hollywood.

No, the Beasties did not give up in spite of all that, but they have come back in a different form. Irritated by the new, stricter, sampling laws, the trio went out and got a collection of used instruments, set up their own home recording studio and started jamming out like a proper combo. MCA took the bass, Mike D. grabbed the drum kit and King Ad-Rock seized the electric guitar, while their friend -- and current 4th Beastie -- Mark "Money Mark" Nishita took his stand behind an electric organ. Check You Head is a collection of 20 of the songs the group came up with in over a year’s worth of garage workouts.

They can’t really be labeled a rap band anymore. Not that they’ve completely abandoned the style -- there are occasional samples, scratches and rhymes, but these techniques have become more like auxiliary tools used for timely effect than a permanent course.

For now, they are a garage band; a group of people who are still mastering their instruments but who have an obvious knack for rhythms and hooks, as well as a clear open-mindedness about music of all stripes. The outcome? Imagine, although you might find it hard, the attitude, heaviness and wisdom of Paul’s Boutique pushed three years ahead.

Along with the fat psychedelic funk the Beasties have already so openly declared their love for, they branch off into other styles on this new disc: reggae, hardcore, Indian ragas, even jazz fusion. The best thing about all this diversity is that the band manages to impress their own distinctive stamp. "So Whatcha Want," a thumping headbanger, may be the best Beastie Boys recording yet, and the rollicking "Finger Licking Good," the consciousness-expanding "Something’s Got to Give" and the fiesty "Jimmy James" aren’t far behind. This is music born of enthusiasm for life, commitment to individuality and a potentially-dangerous amount of unadulterated indulgence. It’s a band making songs the way they want to, hoping listeners will appreciate it for its aesthetic quality but not being willing to compromise next time if they don’t.

The only real test left for Check Your Head is one of endurance. These new cuts sound great coming out of the gate, but whether they’ll still sound good in 1995 the way "Egg Man" or "Car Thief" still sound now is something only time can tell.

If that means the only way to administer that test is by listening to Check Your Head as many times as we Beasties fans have spun Paul’s Boutique, that’s just the cross we have to bear. Here’s to audience testing!

--- Brian Greene /Catharsis #25 - May 1992