Beastie Boys ‘To The 5 Boroughs’ (Capitol Records)

Everyone loves the Beastie Boys. Seriously, even if you hate them you have to like them because they wrote the best teen anthem ever. Then they went on to release a number of albums full of unexpectedly mature hip-hop. Obviously anything is going to sound mature after “….’cos you mom threw out your best porno mag” but really they did. No-one sounds like them and few have the same wit and intelligence in their beats and rhymes. Their career has spanned 23 years and with ‘Licence to Ill’ they released the first rap album to go #1 in the American charts. Which is cool.

‘To the 5 Boroughs’ is the B-Boy’s fifth long player release, written in response to September 11th and their country’s currently overly aggressive foreign policy. Tunes like ‘Right Right Now’ and ‘It Takes Time to Build’ make no attempt to hide their open contempt of their glorious leaders (Maybe its time we impeach Tex / And the military muscle he wants to flex) and ‘Open Letter to NYC’ is a feeling ode to their home town post the 2001 terrorist attacks.

The politicised material on this album is certainly spot on and if you like the B-Boys then you will no doubt be taking knowing side glances at your mates as if to say “brother, that shit is true”. But the album isn’t all grown-up and pensive. Oh no. There is some serious rocking hip-hop on here, not least the single ‘Ch-Check it Out’ which is one of the best nu/old skool hip-hop tunes to be released. ‘Rhyme the Rhyme Well’ too brings the band back to full MC battle stations and ‘Triple Trouble’ is a smirk fest, if only for the line “What the Helen of Troy was that?”. The album notes also contain some amusing commentary from a guy called Ralph who, it appears, has painstakingly written out all the lyrics from all the tracks. Now that is dedication.

So, intelligent they may be, sympathetic to the plights of their fellow nations they certainly are, but the clear and simple reason Beastie Boys are here with us today is to write, and in this case, produce some seriously hot shit. Buy this album. If only to piss off George Bush. But buy this album.

words: Robin Harris

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