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And You Don't Stop
Beastie Boys still rad after all these years
If it's an objective view of the Beastie Boys you seek, no need to look here. I love them. Not just like ... love. The same way I love Black Sabbath or Desmond Dekker — and that's saying something.
It's important to note this fact, as my assessment of the band's (and, we can call them that with no asterisks this time out, since they are playing instruments about 70 percent of the time) performance at the Fillmore in Detroit last night could be somewhat tainted by this love. In fact, I suspect that someone who didn't share my affection for the Beasties may have had a very different experience than I did Monday.
Never mind that the bass was so compressed that it sounded like someone taking a two-hour-long piss, or that the sold-out hell-barn, formerly known as the State Theatre, was so hot you could fry an egg on your crotch — it was heaven. Just to breath the same foul air as Ad-Rock, MCA, and, in particular, Mike D was thrilling.
Performing under a fabulous digital light display housed in an enormous metal interpretation of a Calder mobile, the fellas, accompanied by the mind-bending Mixmaster Mike on the turntables, Money Mark on keyboards, and Alfredo "Fredo" Ortiz on percussion (now that's a band), rocked some old school stuff ("Rhymin' and Stealin,'" "No Sleep Till Brooklyn," "Shake Your Rump") along with latter era Beastie tracks like "Intergalactic," "Root Down," and "Body Movin.'"
But oddly enough, it was the instrumental selections from their latest disc, The Mix-Up, that stole the show. It's hard to say whether that's because they rehearsed them more in anticipation of the spate of "instrumental only" shows they played this tour, or if the tracks are more fun for the band because they're new. But the most genuinely inspired moments seemed to come during the extended funk jams (with MCA on bass, Ad-Rock on guitar, and Mike D on drums) that peppered the set.
It's important to note this fact, as my assessment of the band's (and, we can call them that with no asterisks this time out, since they are playing instruments about 70 percent of the time) performance at the Fillmore in Detroit last night could be somewhat tainted by this love. In fact, I suspect that someone who didn't share my affection for the Beasties may have had a very different experience than I did Monday.
Never mind that the bass was so compressed that it sounded like someone taking a two-hour-long piss, or that the sold-out hell-barn, formerly known as the State Theatre, was so hot you could fry an egg on your crotch — it was heaven. Just to breath the same foul air as Ad-Rock, MCA, and, in particular, Mike D was thrilling.
Performing under a fabulous digital light display housed in an enormous metal interpretation of a Calder mobile, the fellas, accompanied by the mind-bending Mixmaster Mike on the turntables, Money Mark on keyboards, and Alfredo "Fredo" Ortiz on percussion (now that's a band), rocked some old school stuff ("Rhymin' and Stealin,'" "No Sleep Till Brooklyn," "Shake Your Rump") along with latter era Beastie tracks like "Intergalactic," "Root Down," and "Body Movin.'"
But oddly enough, it was the instrumental selections from their latest disc, The Mix-Up, that stole the show. It's hard to say whether that's because they rehearsed them more in anticipation of the spate of "instrumental only" shows they played this tour, or if the tracks are more fun for the band because they're new. But the most genuinely inspired moments seemed to come during the extended funk jams (with MCA on bass, Ad-Rock on guitar, and Mike D on drums) that peppered the set.
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13:22 EDT, 25.Sep.07