Hot Sauce Committee Part 2: THE REVIEW

intro

There are times when I feel like I'm the biggest Beastie Boys fan on the island and this fact is confirmed every time they launch a new album. Now of course because I wasn't even born when their 2nd album was launched [Paul's Boutique] I can only remember the launch of two of their albums, To The 5 Boroughs and The Mix-Up.

Now despite seeing these I have never, ever, ever seen an album launched in such a manner. As you may have noticed there is no Hot Sauce Committee Part 1 [at least not yet] The album was shelved as one of their members, MCA, had to undergo cancer treatment. Fast forward 3 year later, MCA is better and the Beastie Boys have the album almost done but the tracks are kinda stale. They hire some French dude to spice it up and add some pizazz, the result is such a reshaped album that the Beastie Boys decided to name it Hot Sauce Committee Part 2. Upon launching the album the Beastie Boys underwent various launch methods, first they previewed every track, then they released one song, then they released a short film based on the first song, then they played the entire album on a boombox in the middle of Madison Square Garden and streamed it, then they made the whole album available to listen on their website [which u can listen to hear] So without further ado, the album.

1) make some noise

The first song of the album and by far my favorite. The track is unique to any other Beastie Boy song I've heard before, the closest I could think of was a cleaner, more updated version of Super Disco Breaking. The opening synthesizers just wow you and the only word to describe it is dope. The rapping is typical Beastie Boys with each member taking about 4 bars and then swapping with another member, this method ensures the rhymes are not story like but more entertaining almost like a freestyle. The best part of the whole song however is the 8 second cowbell solo. Confused, here's the video:

2) nonstop disco powerpack

This song is even more freestyling than make some noise. The track makes it sound as if the Beastie Boys were in an alley just spitting some rhymes. It really is a cool song that reminds me a lot of 3 MC's and 1 DJ in terms of rawness. Even down to the instruments being played by the Beasties on the track shows how organic this is. Really lovely rap record.

3) ok

This is the only [wait for it] ok track on the whole album. The beat is kinda catchy but not as addictive as other tracks. I really don't have much else to say about it other than it's listenable.

4) too many rappers [new reactionaries version] ft nas

This was the first track to be released from the album unofficially and pretty much started the hype surrounding the first hot sauce committee. When part 2 came along this was one of the few songs that were remixed and re-released. The remixing on the track gives it some more bass and a slight dubstep background to the track to accompany the blaring drum background. This track is evidence as to how fine tuning and extra time has helped this album for the better. Nas' position on the track blends him in easily with the other Beasties almost making you have to stop and wondering if that really is him on it.

5) say it

"to the heart of the matter, the mic i shatter, so cold on the mic i make your teeth chatter" these lines throw deep rooted dope rap lines in a sort of punk rock styled beat. This track seems to be one of the fan favorites primarily because I feel it attracts the fans who like the "Sabotage" style of things. The outro is dope btw

6) the bill harper collection

its a filler track

7) dont play no game that i cant win ft santigold

Quite possibly the track I anticipated the most, I was kinda disappointed though [i guess cause i was expecting something along the lines of "My Drive Thru" but instead this track [a very indie sound with a dub/reggae like start] actually should be titled as santigold ft the beastie boys not only due to her voice covering most of the album but also due to the fact that it would fit better on her albums. However I really do love the dub references.

8) long burn the fire

Similar in sound to say it but a bit lesser on the finesse side. The rhymes are however more entertaining and less serious. The beat is quite dope but spoiled heavily the intro. It has potential to be a better track but it is a good attempt so for.

9) funky donkey

As the name suggests, this is one of their more goofier tracks. "go shave a sheep and itch yourself a sweater" you cant help but laugh at rhymes like that. The purpose of this track is to raise spirits and give the Beastie's space to goof off.

10) the larry routine

Coninuing aalong the lines of funky donkey, the larry routine would be best suited as its outro to help match it funkiness.

11) taldock's glasses

The name used is actually the original title of the album but was changed later. The song features a very opium den type feel that would feel right at home on their To the 5 Boroughs album

12) lee major's come again

Another punk rock track that has quickly overtaken Sabotage as my favorite rock style song from the Beasties. The high pace is matched with well timed lyrics as a opposed to shouting. When Run DMC had to rap on an Aerosmith to walk this way they complained of how difficult it was, I'm sure the task the Beastie's set upon themselves for this track was even harder and could have possibly been a big flop. But it worked well.

13) multilateral nuclear disarmament

Pretty much a funk/jazz instrumental track typically found on most Beastie Boys albums. I think an accurate term for this is lounge music. Loved it, brought back memories of The Mix-Up and would be a perfect candidate if there was a re-issue of The In Sound of Way Out

14) here's a little something for ya'

I first heard this track as a remix used in the DJ Hero video game. I must admit, DJ Shadow's remix of it [which you can hear here]. There is a beat break in the middle with a very funky beat that I feel would have fit the rest of the track better. It in essence is a track that feels lacking but swap at least there's a remix which fixes it.

15) crazy ass shit

A short little vibing hit with a cool head bobbing beat. The mixing of the song brings back memories of Paul's Boutique in terms of the random samples which occur every now and then [especially in the hook] I would have loved to hear a longer version

16) the lisa lisa / full force routine

THIS SONG SHOULD BE LONGER IT IS SO DOPE. Just like Flute Loop , the Beasties have created a song which I love to be longer. I MEAN IT IS SO COOL. In fact the name is longer than the whole song -_-

bonus tracks

17) pop your balloon

Another song I heard with the early release group, never too fancied it from the beginning, still don't like it now. Its not that its bad or anything is just that whole Indian feel to it, I don't feel it. [you can listen to this one here]

18) b-boys in the cut

Another one of those pre album tracks that I only recently found out made it [wait for it] in the cut. This track is up there as one of my favorites on the album. Between the lyrics, the beat and addition 0f the Larry Routine as an outro makes this just plain awesome. By far the best set of lyrics on the entire album with every bar filled with cool stories. [you can listen to this one here]

the video

x) fight for your right-revisited

[watch it here] and make your own comments, really lovely. [you might want to watch the original fight for your right here]

assuming you've watched it already, the references are awesome with an insanely packed star studded cast playing the beastie boys and just everyday average citizens all set to the instrumentals of Make Some Noise. Around the 6:19 mark you'll see a random dude get out of the back of a cab, that random dude is a reference to a random dude seen in the Ch-Check It Out video. Around the 8:00 mark it gets all star studded and crazy when they enter a restaurant run by Ted Danson [a reference is made in the song about him and Mike D opening a restaurant] a random dude outside this restaurant at one point accompanied the other random dude mentioned earlier in the video in the same Ch-Check It Out video. Afterwards around the 10:40 mark a long cowbell loop is played in the back of the limo while Ad -Rock gets stabbed. A minute later, Will Ferrel plays the most epic cowbell solo EVAR.

The song continues with the beasties high as hell and eventually ending up having a break dancing contest with the beaties from the future and in the end they get arrested by the real Beastie Boys. In these closing parts, clips from Too Many Rappers and Say It can be heard.

Result: pure lols

Conclusion

Without saying anymore, it is already my second favorite Beastie album right behind Paul's Boutique. I've already said all that has to be said about this album track by track and I really can't wait for the release of part 1

The BEEeeeeeaaaaasssstiiiieeeeee BOOOOoooooyyyzzzz

^You're supposed to sound like this when you read the title

I think somewhere around the time of 2004 right around the release of their 6th album, To The 5 Boroughs, I remember there being countless Beastie Boys marathons on MTV2. These marathons were aimed at promoting them as well as giving people insight as to where they are coming from, this marathon opened up my ears to a new sound, "The Sounds of Science."

L-R Mike D, King Ad-Rock, MCA

Like most people the first song that hit me was "Intergalactic" [which is still my favorite]. The song featured something I never knew I liked before, sampling. Despite being a hip hop track, Intergalactic used samples from jazz and classical music to produce a very complex beat that just seemed to flow on forever. The song Intergalactic won them a grammy while the video won them a VMA, apparently, I had good taste in music. Even though by now Intergalactic was old, the impact stuck and I found myself searching for more Beastie Boys music.

As mentioned before, this was during the release of the album To The 5 Boroughs and it seemed only natural to look for songs from this album. "Ch-Check it Out" was the most popular track off that album and the video for it played regularly. This song was a bit less interesting than Intergalactic but the video was pure lolwut and I couldn't stop watching. The next video to debut was "Triple Trouble" which sampled the Sugar Hill Gang's 'Rapper's Delight'. Yet again this video was pure lolwut but this in particular put more focus on the fourth member of the group Mix Master Mike. Mix Master Mike was the newest member of the group who came on right before the release of the 'Hello Nasty' album, of course looking for more stuff from him lead me to this song "3 MCs and 1 DJ" OMG that was the most epic piece of DJing I have ever seen in my life.

L-R MCA, Mix Master Mike, Ad-Rock and Mike D

After discovering Mix Master Mike, I went off on a tangent looking for other DJs which is where I discovered people like Fatboy Slim, DJ Qbert and DJ Shadow. He also released some albums for himself most recently the two available for download on him website 'Napalm Rockets' and 'Live Beatdown Vol 1' opened my ears into world of dubstep, which brought me into discovering grime, house and other electronic based genres that now populate most of my music. Anyways to read up more on Mix Master Mike click here.

Back to the Beastie Boys, another song that pulled up was their track, "Fight for Your Right To Party" I didn't fancy that song but the rest of the album, Licensed To Ill [their 1st album btw] was soooo awesome. That album was produced by Rick Rubin [he also produced both Run-DMC's and LL Cool J's first album] the beats were simple and in some cases only had a simple drum beat. By far my favorite song on that album was "Paul Revere" followed by "Hold It Now Hit It"

The Beastie Boys and Run-DMC

If you were paying attention to the video's you would have noticed the huge gap between how they looked then and now. Licensed To Ill was released in 1986 and between then and Hello Nasty they had 3 other albums 'Paul's Boutique', 'Check Your Head' and 'Ill Communication'. These 3 albums grew on me slowly as there was such a large genre gap between these 3 albums and the previous 3 albums I was listening to.

'Check Your Head' was their 3rd album and featured songs composed entirely by them with their own instruments. I like the numerous instrumental tracks on this album but failed to really grasp the other songs until I listened to them one at a time slowly taking in more and more songs. "Gratitude" was my favorite song for a while and eventually songs like "So What'cha Want" and "Skills to Pay the Bills" [dope beat btw] followed.

'Ill Communication' was just as hard to like but featured two of my all time favorite songs [Sabotage and Flute Loop] as well as some more instrumentals [who doesn't like instrumentals]

'Paul's Boutique' is by far my favorite Beastie album. It featured samples from almost every single song and for me describe its awesomeness will not do it justice, so I suggest you listen to the entire album yourself [with an open mind] and take note of how complex the beats are. I leave you with, what I think is the greatest music video ever, "Shadrach".

After 'To The 5 Boroughs' I was delighted to hear that the Beastie Boys were still making albums, 'The Mix-Up' [they won a grammy for that as well] and 'The Hot Sauce Committee Parts 1&2'. The Mix-Up is purely instrumental and it takes another departure from their typical hip hop genre by venturing into the world of jazz. The song "Off the Grid" is just a sample of what to expect from the album. As for the 'Hot Sauce Committee' both parts 1&2 have been put on hold primarily due to the recent illness of MCA. This album however looks promising and is definately worth the wait. "B-Boys in the Cut", "Too Many Rappers" ft Nas and "Lee Majors Come Again" have all met my Beastie Boys approval standards. Definately looking forward to hearing both albums in full, but until then, get better soon MCA.

Music Highlight: what's left of it

So, its the holidays and the racing season is over, so I shall talk about my second love, music. Because I'm still in an electro-house phase I might as well dish out the rest of my favorite artists from that genre.

Swedish House Mafia

The Swedes are cool, they gave us Ikea, Saab, Koenigsegg and Stig Blomqvist, so why haven't I heard of their music? I dunno but anyways, the Swedish House Mafia [cool name I must add] have pretty much defined what I think Swedish music should sound like; cool, steady, good typography and interesting in a weird way.

One feat. Pharrell

Miami 2 Ibiza feat Tinie Tempah

MSTRKRFT

I've mentioned in my previous post that deadmau5 was my favorite Canadian musician, so here's #2 MSTRKRFT [pronounced master craft] They sound alot like Justice primarily because they both have a similar deformed bastardized set of strings that I can never identify but if you listen, you may be able to hear what I'm talking about.

Bounce ft Nore & Isis

D.A.N.C.E. [MSTRKRFT rmx] - Justice

Vuvuvu [i promise vuvuzelas are not involved]

Neon Knights [personal favorite]

Street Justice

Paris

Mark Ronson

Back when Amy Winehouse was not in rehab and she had talent I paid attention to her songs and found her cover for Valerie, it was amazing but I couldn't help noticing the producer, Mark Ronson. Eventually I forgot about him until my official music advisor reminded me of him. The advisor notified me of his new album, Record Collection. His music is all clean and happy and stuff, but listen to him for yourself.

Valerie ft Amy Winehouse

Bang Bang Bang ft MNDR & Q-Tip

Ooh Wee ft Ghost Face Killah & Nate Dogg

Oh My God ft Lily Allen

Lose It ft Ghostface Killah & Alex Greenwald

Lycantropii

Lycantropii is a group [with no information] that specialize in mash-ups. It is the greatest collection of mash-ups that I have ever heard. You can get the entire album here. The music is a mix of mellow grooves and hard beats hit against some popular tracks.

Tiesto

The Dutch, the most interesting group of people in the world; Spyker, Rembrandt, Piet Mondrian, Gerrit Rietveld and Van Gogh are perfect examples. So now music! Tiesto is one of the greatest DJs in the world but I'm now tired so here are the videos.

Elements of Life

Speed Rail

Bad Behaviour ft Dizzee Rascal

Bright Morningstar

Carpe Noctum

Music Highlight: deadmau5

Joel Zimmerman [aka deadmau5] is quite possibly now my favorite Canadian musician [tied between him and MSTRKRFT but i'll give deadmau5 the advantage due to the cool mask/helmet]

Like most people, the first song I heard was Ghosts N' Stuff and up to this day, was the only song I really enjoyed from his first two albums [For Lack of a Better Name & Random Album Title] there are other albums but I really haven't gotten around to listening, primarily because I'm hung up on his most recent one 4x4=12

no better way to describe an artist than for you to listen to him yourself

personal favorites from the album 4x4=12

Some Chords

Bad Selection

Animal Rights [this song is good but the good part starts really late]

Cthulhu Sleeps [btw his live performances are kinda awesome]

despite this listing I suggest you look up for more songs [especially from the other 2 albums cause they're still good]

The new sound from way out: NEW MUZAK!

For the past week or two, I've been stuffing my hard drive with new music from no specific genre. Here is a short listing of awesome I found:

Justice

Genre: French House

First Heard: A clip of Genesis in a Need for Speed Undercover and on Top Gear

Songs added to HDD: D.A.N.C.E., Genesis, Stress and Let There Be Light

Description: really cool, random house beatz, very electronica with a hint of disco

Lily Allen

Genre: Pop

First Heard: Oh My God listening to Mark Ronson's album Version

Songs added to HDD: Oh My God, LDN, Alfie, The Fear, Littlest Things and Guess What Batman [aka Fuck You]

Descritpion: blunt, sarcastic and vulgar lyrics that just sound weird coming from a pop singer of her talent [note yes she does own an awesome Ford Focus RS]

Thomas Bangalter

Genre: French House

First Heard: Extra Dry

Songs added to HDD: Extra Dry, Outrun and Turbo

Decription: half of the great group Daft Punk, Bangalter did these projects for the Midnight Club 2 soundtrack

Wiley

Genre: Grime

First Heard: Grime Kid on the NaPalm Rockets album

Songs added to HDD: Wot Do You Call It, Never Be Your Woman, Electric Boogaloo, Summertime, Wearing My Rolex and Grime Kid.

Description: Like heavy bass, fast rhyming and interesting beats?

The Serial Wax Killer: Mix Master Mike

What is a band without their DJ? Think of Run DMC's Jam Master Jay, Public Enemy's Terminator X and Linkin Park's Mr. Hahn; sometimes behind the scenes but their presence resides in the beats. So on to my favorite group, the Beastie Boys, and their newest [but not all that new] member Mix Master Mike.

Ok skip the boring bio of where he was born what his real name is and his D.O.B., you can google that stuff yourself.... so onwards to his DJ career and where I heard him first. SSX Tricky.

SSX Tricky was a cool and completely unrealistic, but fun snowboarding game. The soundtrack was one of the things that really caught my ear. The main song was a slight remix of Run DMC's Tricky but I was able to look pass that to appreciate the rest of the soundtrack. The soundtrack consisted primarily of heavy bass, almost urban type beats, which grabbed me immediately, the song that stuck out the most however was Board Burner by Mix Master Mike. Of course I became even more interested once I found out he was a playable character. Interest faded a bit when newer and slightly more interesting games came forward.

Moving on to 2004, MTV was having an all day Beastie Boys marathon to celebrate the release of their latest album, To The 5 Boroughs; this marathon introduced me to the Beastie Boys as a whole group, but it was hard to ignore Mix Master Mike's role especially in the song 3 MC's and 1 DJ. That song blew me away as to what the turntable was capable of, I mean, consistently scratching to produce a beat is just cool. The marathon continued and so did my interest when they started showing some vids from some of their live concerts, now I can't find the exact vids that were shown on MTV but this song pretty much sum up the awesomeness that is MMM's super clean transitions. Skills To Pay The Bills and Intergalactic.

So after seeing so much of this awesome scratching mixed with heavy bass and sounds from space, I decided to look for independent work done by Mix Master Mike. This brought me towards the Invisibl Skratch Piklz, the DJ group to top all DJ groups, and his friendly rivalry with DJ Qbert. [Their DJ battle in the 1995 DMC DJ World Championships can be seen here.] But it was not until this year when I finally got a full whiff of a full album from him. After following him on Twitter for a while, he announced the release of his [completely free] new mixtape called Napalm Rockets [which can be downloaded here] The bass is just amazing, the transitions are clean and the selection of songs are epic [from select songs from the Beastie Boys, to an entire remix of Santigold's Creator all the way up to a feature of Ini Kamoke's World-A-Music]. I also found more albums on his site such as Live Beatdown vol 1 and the completely ill Memoirs of a Serial Wax Killer.

I don't know about you but I find his intense use of bass appealing, there are tracks on his albums that just force you to pause and sit back in awe. Some of the songs featured in his albums exposed to other genre's that I've fell in love with [particularly dubstep and grime]. You can probably tell I'm bad at describing music, and to admit it is really hard. So my suggestion is to just download one [or all 3] of his albums available on the site.

Moar LINKS!!

Skullcandy's Bio

His home page

Dubstepped in some grime: Dizzee Rascal

After a quick research, I realised that outside of the Beastie Boys, my music is primarily split into 3 parts: guitars, heavy bass and simple beats. Heavy Bass is the largest of this group and in it compiles of two groups: Grime and Dubstep. Now I shall touch on dubstep later, but because I have declared this week the unofficial week of Grime, I shall talk about one of my favorite Grime artists, Dizzee Rascal.

Grime can also be identified as British Hip-Hop but with beats for focused on heavy bass similar to dubstep. Its also relatively faster in pace, in the case of Mr. Rascal his raps border on inaudible but it sorta makes a cool beatboxing effect. First time I heard of Rascal was his song Fix Up Look Sharp which sampled Billy Squire's song, Big Beat. The beat was cool, the video was even cooler but his rapping was shit. This song stayed on my playlist on and off until my classmate who lived in England for awhile reintroduce me to it. After listening to it so more I realised that his heavy masked the really cool lyrics. Eventually I started liking more and more Rascal songs starting with Just A Rascal and Sirens then moved on to Stand Up Tall and others soon followed.

Outside of his music, Dizzee has hired some cool ppl to design his albums and choreograph his videos, Showtime is the only album who's design I did not like but the rest are all cool. They all have a defined theme and follow it.

My conclusion, try it out. If you don't like Dizzee, chances are you may like Wiley, who's like Dizzee but more audible.

Artists I liek [apart from ze b boys]

no specific order btw

RUN-DMC

way too much cool songs by them jus to list a few: King of Rock, Jam Master Jay, It's Like That, My Adidas, Walk This Way and Sucker MC's. These guys bridged rap and rock way b4 the beasties. its a shame tho that as time progressed their popularity shrank and their hits too. it all peaked with the death of JMJ [altho the group already split b4 his death, this jus prevented all hope of reunion]

Afrika Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force

As fruity lookin as these guys are, this is where hip hop started. The beats were mind blowing, even today u can still hear ppl using samples from songs like Planet Rock and Looking for the Perfect Beat. I only really enjoyed their first album, Planet Rock, which is a mix of techno, hip hop and break dancing

Fatboy Slim

cool name, cool guy. strictly instrumentals with like a single phrase being repeated throughout the whole song. jus as cool as his music is his song and album titles. favourites include.. Don't Let The Man Hold You Down, Weapon of Choice, Right Here Right Now, Praise You and Rockafeller Skank

Jimi Hendrix

super cool, #1 guitarist in history. if anyone attempts to rock strings like him there is goin to be a good chance that they'll be doin it via computer. he peaked at woodstock playin his own version of the star spangled banner, which most ppl easily recognize once played. other cool songs to his credit.. Voodoo Chile, Purple Haze, All Along The Watchtower and Hey Joe

Slick Rick & Doug E. Fresh.

the coolest rap duo evar, the story teller, Slick Rick on the vocals and the human beat box, Doug E. Fresh doin every instrument. by themselves these guys are cool, but together their jus epic. highlights include La-Di Da-Di and The Show

Favourite Albums [by ze Beastie Boys]

ye waitin for smtn to dwnld so until then let me do some top 10, 20 or w/e listing, I think I'll just do 8 for this.




1) Paul's Boutique: Best album hands down, it was their second album and pretty much followed the theme of heavy sampling [makes Kanye look like he's not trying, imagine songs composed from like 10 different songs]. This [and #2] is the only album from them I can listen to back to front. At first I wasn't found of it but ut just got cool over time. Best Song? B-Boy Bouillabaisse [12 minutes of 9 songs all with their own different sample types, one song used from this is Hello Brooklyn which Jay-Z sample for his song Hello Brooklyn 2.0] Album was released 2 months after my birth lol.



2) The Mix-Up: Another experimental album. This is their most recent album. Their first fully instrumental album [also grammy winning], which shows off the bands diversity. This album is just a cool mellow collection of jazz like beats, a version of this was planned to be used with vocals but later dropped [it probably would have spoilt it] I also find that for the past two seasons of Top Gear, they've been using songs from this album as background music. Best Song? hmmmm dunno they all sounded similar and flowed well into each other but I'd say Freaky Hijiki, the most mellowest song on the album.



3) Licensed To Ill: ok the name is quite cheesy but it was their first album. It sold like hot bread and the mass public loved it. It was produced by the great Rick Rubin who also did LL Cool J and Run DMC's first albums. The beats are clear the rhymes are bold [actually took that from a song on their album] Best Song? No Sleep Til Brooklyn, a good mix of rap and rock and roll [and a cool guitar track]



4) Hello Nasty: another weird named one. Album #5, this was similar to Licensed to Ill but more modern. It was the first album to feature the newest Beastie, Mix Master Mike [making his intro on Three MC's and One DJ]. This is the album that got me interested in them especially with Intergalactic [their most popular song by far] and also best song on the album.



5) Hot Sauce Committee Pt1: this album isn't even out yet and I've only heard one song, but this is filled with promises. This is their first album with songs featuring artist's outside the group [exception of some short appearances by Lee Scratch Perry and Biz Markie]. The first song off the album. Too Many Rappers [featuring Nas] pretty much brags about them rapping since 83 [quite funny wen u think bout it]. The beat is truly & uniquely Beastie [also the song already picked up a grammy nomination]. Other songs featuring Santigold [I'm excited for that one] are soon to be out.



6) To The 5 Boroughs: album #6, very NY based album [especially since this was their first album since 9/11] Some songs are protest songs while others are Intergalactic type. I can't really say I enjoyed all the songs on this album, but most are good. Best Song? Tie. Open Letter To NYC [their most mature song to date] Ch-Check It Out [winner of the most immature music video where everyone ends up fighting about stuff like getting an electrician stuck in ur ass]



8) Check Your Head: Album #3, pretty much an album where they did all the instruments themselves, using real instruments [and a bit of sampling] This was their first 100% independent album, pretty much an album they did for themselves. Best Song? So What'cha Want.



9) Ill Communication: Album #4, this produced one of my favourite Beasti songs, Sabotage, in fact this song was the highlight of this album, Sure Shot was another cool song with a mellowish type of beat.