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Next entry: CSA Week #11 “Apparently, I Was Really Busy and Distracted” Edition Previous entry: Sadistic snack waffles on parade

Friday Genius Ten “Ur 30s OMG” Edition

So, yesterday was my 33rd birthday.  In the proper form, it was celebrated with much vinyl.  I bought some records at a very nice little local store in Brooklyn, and Marc bought me some more, along with some books.  It was an excellent haul: She, REM, Wire, the 45s, PIL, the Rezillos, and, much to my great delight, the Beastie Boys.  Specifically, their first grown-up album, and what many of us deem their best album, Paul’s Boutique. It was the perfect gift for a newly minted Brooklyn-dwelling New Yorker, and I even know what intersection the cover is at!  In honor of me being so old and this being Labor Day weekend, I’m taking the rest of the day off from blogging.  Until then, enjoy this mix made off the Beastie Boys.  Leave your own mixes in comments.  Or comment about whatever you like.  Open thread.

Original song: “Hey Ladies” by the Beastie Boys

I was sad that the original video, which is hilarious, was not embeddable.  But you can still play the song from this webpage.

1) “Award Tour” by A Tribe Called Quest
2) “Let Me Ride” by Dr. Dre, feat. Snoop Dogg & RBX
3) “Who Am I?” by Snoop Dogg
4) “Fight The Power” by Public Enemy
5) “Express Yourself” by NWA
6) “Me Myself & I” by De La Soul
7) “Ready Or Not” by the Fugees
8) “C.R.E.A.M.” by Wu-Tang
9) “I Get Around” by 2-Pac
10) “Sure Shot” by the Beastie Boys

Videos behind the fold.  Dance your asses off! It’s a long weekend.  I know I plan to.  (Even though it’s New York.)

And in honor of dancing in New York City:

 

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Posted by Amanda Marcotte on 09:38 AM • (35) Comments

Linkable yes, embeddable no.

Comment #1: 3letterjon  on  09/03  at  10:16 AM

Amanda, happy birthday… 

The Big Apple is a great place to find somewhere to dance.  You could dance in the middle of Times Square and no one would think it unusual…

Comment #2: James  on  09/03  at  10:24 AM

Happy Birthday! I remember the first time I was randomly driving around lower Manhattan and seeing Paul’s Boutique. I felt so cool, except I was in the car with my mom and she had no idea what the big deal was. I’m turning 30 next Wednesday…

Comment #3: JonE  on  09/03  at  10:27 AM

Happy Birthday!  If I were anywhere near the city, I’d take you for a drink!

Comment #4: syfr  on  09/03  at  10:35 AM

Happy birthday Amanda. I turn 30 on Sept. 12th.

Comment #5: Lee  on  09/03  at  11:09 AM

Happy birthday!  Mine was last Sunday.

Comment #6: bomberE  on  09/03  at  11:13 AM

Happy birthday, Amanda, from someone who just turned 50.  I’m having more fun than I was 20 years ago, so all you young whippersnappers can just eat your hearts out (and get off my lawn!).  :-D

Comment #7: NobleExperiments  on  09/03  at  11:26 AM

Well happy birthday Amanda. It was my birthday too smile

Comment #8: Guav  on  09/03  at  11:28 AM

Happy Birthday! I think I remember being 33…

All 80’s on today’s list:

Camping On Acid - Government Cheese
Bedbugs and Ballyhoo - Echo and the Bunnymen
So What - Ministry
Panic - Smiths
Happy When It Rains - Jesus and mary Chain
It’s Tricky - Run DMC
Song To The Siren - This Mortal Coil
Rain - Tones On Tail
Freak Scene - Dinosaur Jr.
One World (Not Three) - The Police

Comment #9: Mark  on  09/03  at  11:41 AM

That is one nice list, Mark!  Here’s another 80’s-tastic Genius list:

Based on House of Love—Christine

Jesus & Mary Chain—April Skies
Chapterhouse—Falling Down
My Bloody Valentine—Feed Me With Your Kiss
Lush—Sweetness and Light
Slowdive—When the Sun Hits
Echo & The Bunnymen—Ocean Rain
Gary Numan—We Are Glass
Love & Rockets—Haunted When the Minutes Drag
The Cure—The Funeral Party
Cocteau Twins—Ivo

Comment #10: Dr. Locrian  on  09/03  at  11:51 AM

“Cocteau Twins—Ivo”

Nice one, Doc! Now I’m gonn be listening to the Twins all day!

Comment #11: Mark  on  09/03  at  12:24 PM

Wow!  Isn’t Rezillos vinyl pricey?  Some PiL is.  Were these reissues?

Happy birthday, Amanda.  Shellac may be extremely rare when you turn 78.

Comment #12: haydn60  on  09/03  at  12:36 PM

Paul’s Boutique is, perhaps, the finest rap album ever made. In my opinion its only real competitor features this week’s base song:

“Bring Tha Noise” - Public Enemy

1. “The Sounds Of Science” - Beastie Boys
2. “Run’s House” - Run DMC
3. “Batman And Robin” - Snoop Dog
4. “Fette’s Vette (Imperial Mix)” - mc chris
5. “Hip Hop Quotables” - Ludacris
6. “Awnaw” - Nappy Roots
7. “My Name” - Xzbit
8. “Satisfaction” - Eve
9. “Radio Edit” - Sweatshop Union
10. “Colors” - Ice T

Comment #13: Sarcastro  on  09/03  at  12:44 PM

Hm… I’m not sure what to contribute… most of my 80s stuff is synthpop and really doesn’t fit the theme here…

Comment #14: BrianX  on  09/03  at  12:47 PM

“That’s a reckitt!” 

In the summer of 2007, I traveled east and got to see the B-Boyz play at McCarren Park Pool in Brooklyn, NYC.  It was easily one of the greatest rock and roll shows I have ever seen. McCarren is a gigantic public pool—so large in fact that it can be clearly located on Google Earth. The pool was drained of water and all the fans watched the show from down inside the pool.  McCarren Pool is so big there are 20-some-odd lifeguard stands, some of them sitting like little islands out in the middle expanses of the pool itself.  Possibly the oddest place for a rock show I’ve ever seen.

Naturally, the Boys opened with “Hello Brooklyn” and closed with “No Sleep ‘til Brooklyn.”  In between, they regaled the crowd with stories from their high school daze and revealed that it was the first time they’d ever actually played a B-Boyz show in Brooklyn proper.

Mixmaster Mike was absolutely on FIRE.  To this day I swear he’s the most talented of the bunch.

A week later I was home in Santa Barbara and they played the SB Bowl there. Just as awesome of a show but the contrast between a hometown show in the NYC and a sun-splashed concert in Cali made for one incredible week.

Love me some Beastie Boys!!

Comment #15: Hornet  on  09/03  at  01:28 PM

BrianX…

No particular theme need be followed here. Put up some tunes. I’m always looking for new stuff.

Comment #16: Mark  on  09/03  at  01:36 PM

Randomized my entire mp3 collection, and here are the first ten in the list:

1. Spandau Ballet - Chant No. 1 (I Don’t Need This Pressure On)
2. Lil Wayne - Hit Em Up
3. Cannibal Ox - Pigeon
4. The Specials - Do the Dog
5. David Bowie - Lady Stardust (Original Demo)
6. Faithless - Sunday 8pm
7. Psalm One - Get Throwed
8. X - Sugarlight
9. Soundgarden - Spoonman
10. 7 Year Bitch - Kiss My Ass Goodbye

Dang, haven’t listened to 7 Year Bitch in ages - gonna have to put that one on!

Comment #17: Rumblelizard  on  09/03  at  02:20 PM

Happy birthday!

Not to be a pill, but am I the only one who thinks that LICENSED TO ILL is vastly superior to any of the BB’s subsequent output?  That record was the soundtrack to my early-90s teen-hood of driving up and down the main drag of my little town and committing (fairly mild) acts of boy-mischief; when called to the tape deck to accompany such adventures (usually after everyone got sick of listening to LTI), PAUL’S BOUTIQUE never seemed able to sustain the mood.  I guess calling it a “grown-up” album pretty much nails it, actually - it’s a hard-working, tax-paying, responsible bike helmet of a record, at least to my ears.  I admit that my musical taste is pretty puerile in a lot of ways, but it always surprises me that the general opinion among people who care about such things is so overwhelmingly pro-PAUL.  Tomayto-tomahto, I guess.

To make up for my crabbing, here’s my ten (like #17, randomized mp3s, bleh) for Friday: 

1. “Somethin’ Else” - Sex Pistols (really just Sid)
2. “Solitary Confinement” - The Weirdos
3. “Makin’ Deals” - The Satans
4. “The Discovery of Electricity” - Stan Freberg
5. “Terminal Rock” - The Diodes
6. Chipmunk Fun” - The Chipmunks
7. “Charlie Parker” - Jack Kerouac & Steve Allen
8. “Dedication” - Bay City Rollers
9. “Back 2 the Base” - X
10. “Party Out of Bounds” - B-52s

Comment #18: Microwave Bacon  on  09/03  at  03:26 PM

I saw the beastie boys at the old 9:30 club before their first album.  I was up front and they were spraying beer on everybody.  It was pretty great.

Comment #19: lemmy caution  on  09/03  at  03:31 PM

X shows up on two randomized playlists!?! That’s why this place is so awesome.

Comment #20: Hornet  on  09/03  at  04:09 PM

Paul’s Boutique came out in 1989.

Eric B & Rakim’s Let the Rhythm Hit ’Em came out in 1990.

Rhymes with no omega, and the subway tracks have that subway beat to them.

Pure New York.

Comment #21: stryx  on  09/03  at  04:25 PM

Happy birthday, Amanda, from someone who just turned 50.  I’m having more fun than I was 20 years ago, so all you young whippersnappers can just eat your hearts out (and get off my lawn!).  :-D

Indeed.  I’m a decade older than Amanda, and I’m planning a naughty Saturday night with the new gf after enjoying this beautiful sunny spring morning.  Life doesn’t end after your mid-thirties.

Happy birthday, <strike>Mandy</strike>-Amanda.  Amanda.  I meant Amanda pleasedontkillme.

Comment #22: Phoenician in a time of Romans  on  09/03  at  06:25 PM

PiaToR: LOL

Nonetheless, while life does go on, I imagine enjoying one’s early/mid thirties in NYC is pretty awesome.

Happy Birthday, Amanda.

Comment #23: NY Expat  on  09/03  at  07:04 PM

Happy birthday, Amanda. 

Have License to Ill and Paul’s Boutique and listened to Intergalactic when it came out in the summer of ‘98.  Of the three….License to Ill has the most energy, Paul’s Boutique maintained it and went off in a different direction, and Intergalactic was almost like different group inspired by the Beastie Boys. 

The Beastie Boys were part of my ‘80’s childhood soundtrack alongside Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam, MJ, Madonna, etc.

Comment #24: exholt  on  09/03  at  07:50 PM

Happy 33rd and a day!

Comment #25: Dana  on  09/03  at  08:06 PM

What about Check Your Head and Ill Communication, exholt?  They seriously had a great 3 album run.

Comment #26: Amanda Marcotte  on  09/03  at  09:08 PM

Happy (belated) Birthday Ms. Marcotte.  Enjoy!

Comment #27: Smartpatrol  on  09/03  at  11:04 PM

What about Check Your Head and Ill Communication, exholt?  They seriously had a great 3 album run.

Can’t really say as I never heard them beyond the Sabotage track.  Moreover, the only reasons why I heard License to Ill and Paul’s Boutique was that they were both popular among my elementary/junior high school classmates and/or their older siblings.  Also, I didn’t have any musical playback device at home back then so all music was heard at my classmates’ apartments, boomboxes carried by older kids, and passing cars. 

By the time Check Your Head and Ill Communication came out, I was already in the midst of trying to survive my high school experience located away from my neighborhood so I missed out on them for the most part.  It also didn’t help that most classmates didn’t really discuss much about music beyond classical/jazz….the favored genres of the school’s residential musical snobs.  This was the reason why I didn’t know that a classmate from both my junior high and high school also liked the Beastie Boys until we were both in the middle of our college years.

Comment #28: exholt  on  09/03  at  11:47 PM

They’re both great albums.  I recommend checking them out.

Comment #29: Amanda Marcotte  on  09/04  at  12:45 PM

Licensed to Ill came out when I was 18.  It connected with me in a way it wouldn’t have possibly done had I been a couple of years older or younger.

I know the phrase “soundtrack of your life” is a cliche, but ... literally every memory I have of my freshman year of college has “Fight For Your Right” or “Brass Monkey” or “She’s Crafty” playing in the background.

Comment #30: Thlayli  on  09/04  at  04:48 PM

Hey Happy Birthday

Comment #31: pharmakos  on  09/05  at  12:09 AM

Pauls Boutique is slightly overrated. It was just so different from their previous album and so different from anything else in ‘89 (other than perhaps De La Soul) that it’s always seen as their best album. In my opinion, Check Your Head is much better than PB. It’s basically PB with better production values.

Comment #32: StarkyLuv  on  09/06  at  09:33 AM

And to be clear what I mean by “overrated”. I’m not saying PB is bad, just not as good as other Beastie Boys album and PB is rated more through nostalgia. From a scale of 1-10:

Licensed to Ill: 10
Paul’s Boutique: 9.5
Check Your Head: 10
Ill Communication: 9
Hello Nasty: 8
To the 5 Boroughs: 8

Comment #33: StarkyLuv  on  09/06  at  09:36 AM

Gotta disagree with you there, Starky.  I’d rate Paul’s Boutique B a 10 and Check Your Head a 9. 

Regardless of nostalgia, which can be certainly be a confounding factor, the sampling on PB is more interesting to me than the standard instrumentation on their next album.  Just a little too much aimless noodling around on Check Yr Head for my tastes—I never feel the urge to skip tracks on PB.

Comment #34: Dr. Locrian  on  09/06  at  11:32 AM
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