FISTFULAYEN

[photo © glen E. friedman / www.Burningflags.com]

Glen sent an email yesterday linking to a classic 1985 Beastie Boys radio interview live on Loyola Marymount college radio station KXLU. The show belonged to Adam Bomb and came from his blog where he’s uploading sound clips (check the blog for more interviews with Circle Jerks, Wasted Youth, Venom and more). The email from Glen:

classic BEASTIE BOYS interview from KXLU 1985
(just found this online by accident)
I set this up for them when they came to L.A. for the very first time
opening for Madonna.
I was showing them around town
and brought them to my friend Adam Bomb’s radio show

part one

part two

some classic tunes too including Russell’s rap on jazzy jay’s record
produced by Rick,
and a live version of their current record at the time “Beastie
groove”, and some Minor Threat too.
this shit is really funny… I took these photos outside the KXLU
studio just after this show

Sorry Mike and Adams if hearing these now is embarrassing to you — I understand but don’t sweat it. Y’all were kids and we love you for it. It’s notable for the music (this is the first I’ve heard that MCA and Burzootie track) and to remind us all about when hip hop had a sense of humor, something it seems to have lost in the years since. Future hip hoppers could take a lesson from forgetting about “hip hop” and just getting together with a group of friends, making music, and having fun.

It also reminded me to make links to the Tour Zines I did from the road in 1995 and 1998. Danny Trommer put them up as part of his decade-long effort to build an online Beastie Boys museum, which is a damn good thing since I’ve moved ten times in the past twelve years and lost pretty much everything I own in the process, including every photo I took on those tours with those prehistoric digital cameras. Thanks, Danny!

So click here for the entire
1995 Beastie Boys Tour Zine, live from the road. Remember, the Web was a different place in 1995. You weren’t there yet, yungun, there were no background colors yet and no Javascript let alone “AJAX”. Putting text down the side of an image was relatively new. So don’t make fun of the “design”. Highlights:

• Dallas is where Mark Thompson (later known as Mark Driver) started making shit up. Backstage poetry slams? Come on.
• Mark and Judah from the Blues Explosion have a crawdad eat-off, with Black Through of The Roots looking on saying, “Y’all mu’fukahs are eating bugs!”
• Buying $200 worth of Common, Today Is The Day, and Thee Headcoats vinyl in the ATL.
• Russell Simins from the Blues Explosion tells us about how is dad built Nassau Coliseum.
• Mark’s hilarious comparison of US and Canadian warning labels.
• Visiting the Knicks dressing room.
• Click here to browse all the dates.

I managed to sneak on tour again in 1998, older and wiser, but unfortunately without Mark Thompson. I rode with the band instead of the crew (more hotels, less work) and didn’t have to babysit my computerized contraptions every night anymore (long story). Much fun. Thanks again to these guys for having me along and giving an Indiana kid experiences he’ll never forget. I owe ya forver.

You can browse through the tour diaries from the 1998 dates here. Since Mark wasn’t along the writing wasn’t particularly funny, sorry. The best thing we did was start taping shows to MiniDisc from the board, listening to them on the bus, then posting them on the site as MP3s. MP3s were a “new” thing in 1998, and Capitol wasn’t too happy with this “free music” thing we were up to. It landed Beastie Boys on the cover of Wall Street Journal and Red Herring, and me a job at Nullsoft. Below are the tracks I still had in the “Mini Disc Cuts” directory, I assume they’re a few of same ones we posted on the site back in 1998 (there are definitely some good ones I’ve lost, like Biz Markie joining them for Bennie and the Jets — anyone still have them all who can send them to me? I’ll post.):

Mix Master Mike’s Tom Sawyer show opener and Time For Livin, from Denver. Check the crowd noise when The Biz starts singing. Crazy.
Slow and Low, live in Kansas City
Ricky’s Theme, also from Denver
Flute Loop, recorded live in Chicago

Enjoy.

ian