Beastie Boys:Hot Sauce Committee Part 2

7.2/10 dropps

There is something so comforting about the phenomenon that is three white boys spitting rhymes over old-school beats. That comfort has returned with the Beastie Boys’ Hot Sauce Committee Part 2. The lyrics and self-production are classic Beastie Boys; basic funk beats and lyrics that aim to get their IDGAF point across to new age rap lovers, who are used to samples and three to four levels of different sounds at the same time. Hot Sauce is an album that takes rap back to the 80’s, when the Beastie Boys were born, but still lets newer audiences know that this isn’t a group of rookies.

“Yes, here we go again, give you more nothing lesser,” Ad-Rock states as the opening lines for ‘Make Some Noise’, the first single for Hot Sauce. This is just what the Beastie Boys do, they don’t attempt to try something new, and while that may seem a little unadventurous, I’m a firm believer in the whole “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, “ mantra. Plenty of people follow this formula well, Snoop Dogg still has the same laid-back flow today as he had when he was rapping about being laid-back in Gin and Juice, Mick Jagger never attempts to sound like anything other than his Brit-Soul-Rock self, and Beyonce is always a fearless, independent woman with a strong voice in any fashion. The fact of the matter is, the Beastie Boys know what sets them apart from everyone else; some may think of it as remaining stagnant, but in actuality, the Beastie Boys use their classic sound to keep their loyal followers, and gain new minions who long to hear something that doesn’t belt out directions to the most relevant dance craze.

In ‘Too Many Rappers’, Nas comes to the aid of the rap trio to diss and dismiss all the rappers that are currently poisoning the airways with their lack of artistry. You could call this the Beastie Boys’ version of ‘Hip Hop is Dead’. “Too many rappers and there’s still not enough emcees,” the boys chant on the chorus. Yet again, they rhyme about how they are veterans of the game they’re in and Nas goes on to insult wannabe rappers “slug peeler you’re not, Mafioso no,” but not before Ad-Rock reminisces about “the real hip-hop with which [he] persists.” Overall this is a strong collaboration of hip-hop originators, which has the basic that anyone could rhyme two words together, but it takes a real hip-hop artists to talk about issues and have a unique flow.

The Beastie Boys’ newest effort is definitely something that hip-hop lovers and indie artists alike, should check out. The album is eclectic yet classic at the same time. Ad-Rock, Mike D, and MCA prove that they may be old but they’re still good. The Beastie Boys set out to make sure that everyone knows that they are the original white boy rappers—of any talent anyway—and they are going to remain a staple in hip hop history for as long as humanly possible.

-Brianna Pierre