Paul's Boutique

Required listening for music fans. “Johnny Ryall” and “Shadrach” are favorites.

Dropping science like Galileo dropped an orange. There’s always a special spot in my ears for Beastie Boys, this album kept a great tempo and was so entertaining to listen through. The sampling was on point, the beats were tasty and the lyrics were a great mix of goofy, irreverent and at the same time absolutely well written and clever. Favorite songs - Johnny Ryell, Egg Man, The Sounds of Science, Looking Down The Barrel of a Gun 5/5 Dropped oranges.

Day 11, first 5 star rating <3

Short but good music

YES!!!!

Really cool. I see why Madonna wanted to fuck these Jewish nerds now

My favourite Beastie Boys album. One of those that needs repeated listens and a deep dive, always something new to notice. Recommend the 33 1/3 book on it if you are interested in how it was made.

Perfect!

I’ve seen the Beastie Boys twice. Once at Lollapalooza (when it was touring). It was blistering hot. When the Beastie Boys came on a rain shower appeared out of nowhere and the crowd went WILD. It was definitely a top 5 show for me. I didn’t even need to listen to this to know it’s 5 stars. The Beastie Boys reinvented themselves so many times but remained consistently the three fucking baddest white boys in the hip hop genre.

so good. Way ahead of its time - revolutionary. The best Beastie Boys album, and IMO best hip-hop album of the 80s.

A classic!

Unparalleled perfection!!! No notes. One of THE BEST albums PERIOD

It’s such a fun album. Some songs are upbeat. Some are dark. Very clever. Great sample choices.

So good!

Kinda perfect

Always good music in early rap years

Five stars. One of my all time favorites.

Raucously fun

Great piece

This is the goods. Singular record that would have begun a new genre if humanity was worthy of it. Flawless masterpieces aren't always that entertaining or fun. At Paul's Boutique art, fun, and innovation flow like wine.

What a way to start off 2024 I have come to a realization about this album and its place in society recently. I came to Paul’s Boutique in the early 2000s, possibly when this album was having a cultural reassessment and being recognized as the peak of the Beasties powers, that this was heir apparent to Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. So ambitious and pushing the limits of what music could be (figuratively and legally). 35 (!) years on it still sounds ahead of its time and a miracle that it all works so well; never does it sound like all the samples are overused or out of place. I think now though this is closer to Exile on Main Street, in a much as it’s such a ‘dude’ album that people (me included) take so much joy in explaining to people why it’s significant. Like where the samples are coming from, how unique this was at the time, that a song is made up of all Beatles samples. Like I believe that the next Liz Phair will be writing a song for song companion to Paul’s Boutique. Kicked Out of Lees Sportswear? This along with Sound of Silver are on my essential New York record list I will be starting hahaha

This is the first Beastie Boys album I was exposed to and it's still my favorite album by them. The shouting does bother some (I've noticed this in other reviews), but that's the style and so it's not for everyone. This still has my favorite Beastie Boys songs on it and the sampling is very innovative and it exhausts me just thinking about trying to get all of them together. Classic and will always be in my collection.

Best Beastie Boys album. Fight me.

Great album

Love love love

Classic and only a little dated. If you can get past the nasally voice and back-and-forth rapping style that really gives away its age, the production and songs are excellent and many times still fresh.

All time great.

Love all the insane samples, lyrics are fun too.

10/10

Best album ever!!!

I know it already! It's great!

Fabulous. Seminal. As good today as ever was.

It's the production. The Dust Brothers did something here that will never be equalled - mostly because Judge Kevin Thomas Duffy of the Southern District of New York decided that, unlike compulsory licenses available in every other form of music cover, sampling from thence forth required permission of the original songwriter. R.I.P. an amazing form of artistic expression at the hands of a disinterested legal academic.

🤘🏼

I always hear something new

Forgot how awesome this album was when it came out and still is. BB is by far one of the most talented and gifted trio of the past 40 years and will always be a huge fan of their stuff. Paul’s Boutique is an eclectic group of songs that will keep you locked in from beginning to end. Enjoy

Straight, head bobbing fire.

Masterful use of samples. Rhymes effortless.

Full of creativity and energy

Doofy and fun

All time great rap album

Loved this!! So refreshing even for 2023, let alone 1989. I was hooked from the intro.

This is IT. So fun, so silly. Amazing beats. Completely obsessed with “Hey Ladies”!

Awesome album. Love it.

The album that made the Beastie Boys what they are. Totally changed their sound from the first album. Egg man is a favorite.

Doesn't quite reach the heights of I'll communication but it's still incredible in its own way. Also B-boy Bouillabaisse is a 10/10 track title.

Another classic

Loved it. Major flashback nostalgia. Solid early b boys charm

Never listened to it front to back before. Listened to it twice today.

Favourite tracks: bboys boulabaisse; car thief; Shadrach; shake your rump; egg man

This is one of my favorite hip hop albums of all time, hearing it again for this list was a pleasure.

What a joy. Like a hug from an old friend. Hasn't lost a thing in all the years since we had the posters up on our bedroom walls and celebrated the sound of these B-Boys from Brooklyn.

It's incredibly rare to find someone who'll finish your sentences for you. So glad these three found each other.

What do you do when you've been pigeonholed as drunken frat boys, running roughshod all over and being seen as lesser than gimmick rappers? Well, the conventional thing would have been to double down and keep making money and memories that would fade amongst diminishing returns. Instead, a kaideoscopic and sprawling journey was undertaken that occupied creatively patchworked beats and oddball characters and rhymes that befitted the scene and radically reinvented not only a genre that was already well into its golden age but careers that seemed to be operating in free fall. For Paul's Boutique is not just a hip-hop album, it is a manifesto. Beastie Boys had decided that, in order to keep ahead of the game, constant stylistic turnover would be required for longevity. And not only was that achieved, it set a precedent that many are still trying to keep up with to this day. If it weren't for Paul's Boutique, Beastie Boys would have never climbed out of the 80s and into the 90s and beyond filled to the brim with memorable songs and albums that showcased their jack of all trades persona. A masterpiece of the hip-hop genre.

Classic and great!

I’ve came into Beastie Boys on Ill Communication, and had never listened to PB. What a mistake on my part! Absolute banger!

Great. Sounds like a giant party. I had no idea the Beastie Boys were around so early. I hear the influence they've had.

The best at this

Enjoyed the album, nice to find more BB music.

cool

A seminal sampling album with fun lyrics. For some reason, I always thought ‘Shake Your Rump’ was the single, but not only is it not, but it’s not even one of the non-singles with a Wikipedia page. Anyway, this is just a great album that flows well. Why am I constantly getting records that I don’t really have anything to say about?

It’s pretty classic beastie boys! I like the stuff they make so I can’t complain

Love it.

When Public Enemy's Chuck D--of all people--is quoted as saying that the "dirty secret" among the black hip-hop community at the time *Paul's Boutique* was released was that the latter "had the best beats", it speaks TONS about the quality of the music here. Chuck D takes "white" appropriation of Black culture *very* seriously, and he can have very harsh words about it. So him saying such things is the best tribute that could ever be given to the hip hop masterpiece Beastie Boys and their producers The Dust Brothers provided for us in 1989. About the rapping now: well, it is simply, utterly, incredible--a constant display of b-boy fireworks: inventive, imaginative, hilarious, surreal, energetic and cinematic... Summing it up as mere "shouting", as the review currently topping this section does, is pretty unfair--even though I like the funny "concept" of that review, and so can somehow respect this hot take, I guess, as incomplete as it is. I dunno... Maybe that reviewer should take herbal tea and relax a little before trying to listen to the record again... As some critic once put it: "Paul’s Boutique sat at a finish line waiting for the rest of the world to catch up." Without this album, there's no fully-formed A Tribe Called Quest (the encyclopedic nature of the samples, their sweeping between genres...), probably no Wu-Tang Clan as we know it (the fast-pace rapping, the movie soundtrack overtones...), and there certainly wouldn't be any Eminem either. 5 stars. Number of albums left to review: 445 Number of albums from the list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 258 (including this one) Albums from the list I *might* include in mine later on: 132 Albums from the list I will certainly *not* include in mine (many others are more essential to me): 168

10/10

No notes

Yea I mean easy 5 for me. Great production and one of the last and best sampling albums of all time.

I actually just happened to listen to this yesterday without realizing it was the album of the day. Classic work from Beastie Boys I'm which they push sampling to the absolute maximum. As I understand it this was a commercial disaster at the time of the release, following on the hype from License to Ill. Album kicks off in true form with Shake Your Rump, which is a perfect song to do just that to. Then it segues to a country infused song about a hobo scrounging for money to satisfy various habits. Throughout the near hour playtime they sample tons of material and show all different side of they capability. Some of my favorites are Egg Man, High Plains Drifter, Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun, and Shadrach. This album jams. One of my favorites that I come back to time and time again. Sounds of Science I could do without, but otherwise this one is perfect in my eyes.

Flawless

5 Yep, back-to-back 5’s. Once again, I didn’t anticipate that being the case coming into this album, but holy cow, this instantly became one of my favorite hip-hop albums of all-time and quite possibly my favorite Beastie Boys album. How have I never listened to this before? And why haven’t more people listened to it? I don’t understand how this wasn’t a huge commercial success when it was released, but I’m glad retroactively it gets all the praise it deserves - this feels like a majorly impactful release for the genre. I was really debating a 4.5, but when you genuinely enjoy every single song on an album, is it deserving of anything less than a 5? Every beat, every rhyme, every dynamic between the boys - perfection. I’ve always been a fan of the Beasties, but I really think this album escalated my respect for them to new heights. I don’t want to spend my review paraphrasing the Wikipedia page, but basically, after a period of being written off by both the music industry and pop culture as an annoying, frat boy-ish trend, the B-Boys dropped the rock instruments and talked sample-based songwriters The Dust Brothers into letting them use their music as the basis for their next album, one which they planned to produce themselves (and keep in mind these guys are like 22 at this point). And shoutout to The Dust Brothers, because these beats are absolutely incredible by their own merit, but man, the B-Boys elevate them into absolute musical excellence. I was about to start listing out my favorites here and then realized I would basically be just reciting the tracklist of the album - you really can’t go wrong jumping in at any point. To All the Girls is a great opener (if slightly dated), and I loved that they ended the album in a 9-song B-Boy Bouillabaisse suite. Kinda wish Spotify combined all the segments into one track (as intended), but either way, it’s really enjoyable. (Side note - if you’re like me and curious what a bouillabaisse is, it’s a kind of French fish soup. There, saved you a Google). My biggest takeaway - this is peak hip-hop, and it’s so frustrating that we’ll never hear an album like this again. Once again, not trying to make this a Wikipedia article, but for those unfamiliar with music sampling, this was released in an era before doing so required clearance with the original owner (fuck you, Gilbert O’Sullivan). That no longer being the case, an album like this with 105 different samples on it is likely something we’ll never see again, and I think that detriments the genre so much. Obviously there’s still good hip-hop in the world today, but imagine if beatmakers were still able to explore their full scope of musical ability like The Dust Brothers were able to here. Well, at least we’ll always have a taste of it with Paul’s Boutique.

This album gets better every time I listen to it. And I listen to it a lot.

A classic

Inventive use of samples and lyrics classic!

My favorite (and probably the best) Beastie album.

Legendary.

One of the best albums ever

An all time classic that only improves with age. It’s like a high concept party album.

Listened twice. Never gets old.

Top notch hip hop

This is perfection. One of the greatest albums of all time.

Remarkable spin. I’ve given so many 5s so far but fuck it. Shit slaps. Iconic and groundbreaking mixes and samples. A definitive album of the hip hop genre. RIP MCA.

Excellent. Love this album

🏆

Probably their best album.

Like Sam the butcher I’m bringin Alice the meat

Classic. Absolute hip hop classic. Nuff said bruh

Listened Before? Y Oh dear god. One of the best albums of all time. Especially for me, this one drips with nostalgia and I still can't believe the skill and talent of these three men. So amazing. Added to Library? Y Songs added to playlist: Egg Man, Shake Your Rump

This one is always a good listen. Great work by the B Boys.

Nice soft intro that crescendos right into a fun and lively party song. Everything blends very well together. Lyrics transfer from ridiculous stories and metaphors, party lyrics, but also smaller sprints of deeper meaning. Lots of sampling which make you feel as though you are listening to the radio. The more punk rock feel of "Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun" is a fun departure. Album ends with some less aggressive songs, but also the funky "Shadrach". Album ends with a B-roll of short songs. These are heavily sampled, a little funky, great bass, and little more aggressive. 5/5 Favorites: Shake Your Rump, Hey Ladies, Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun, Shadrach, A Year And A Day, Least Favorites: What Comes Around,

The Beastie Boys's best album. Lots of variety with the sampling and lots of energy and lots of fun. Clever lyrics and a style that you just didn't see in hip-hop at the time. Didn't completely stand the test of time but I'd still consider this a master class in rap music.

So I actually knew a good amount about this album before hearing even a second of it. I had heard "Licensed To Ill" and it was good but not mind-blowing and really was carried by the big hits. That made me worry a little bit about this album. Then I read that this was so different from their first album that it was panned by the public. That gave me some hope because making another "Licensed to Ill" would have been a bad decision. I also saw that it was considered sampledelia which gave me even more hope because some of my favorite albums are sampledelia like "3 Feet High And Rising" and "It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back". It did not disappoint in the slightest as this is a 10/10 record. I constantly found myself thinking there is no way they can top this song after song and the consistently did especially on "B-Boy Bouillabaisse". Overall all though the songs on this album were great with some of my favorites being "Shadrach", "Johnny Ryall", "The Sounds Of Science" and "Shake Your Rump". Overall a great album that, alongside the aforementioned albums, truly revolutionized sampling in rap music and completely morphed the genre as well as lay the groundworks for future rap subgenres. 10/10

Oh my this was fun! It had escaped my notice when it came out (and apparently I wasn't the only one) but I had a good time listening today. The use of samples makes it so different from Ill Communication, which we listened to just a week ago. I remarked how many samples I recognized from this 1001 Albums project, as well as how well I thought they were used to make something slightly familiar but also original sounding. It's more fun and less yell-y and so far is my favorite of the Beastie Boys albums we've listened to in the project.

Despite the fact that the majority of the time that you are listening to a Beastie Boys' album you are being shouted at, and I would generally try to avoid such experiences, I do enjoy the Beastie Boys. The highlight of this album really is the sampling...thank you, Dust Brothers. But there is also a playfulness, like they are all just there having fun.

Wowee! This is a super fun jam. Loved it top to bottom.

With one hit and one miss from the Beastie Boys so far on this project, I wasn’t sure where this one would land. Turns out, it was a hell of a lot of fun. Great rhymes, great samples, great music!

This one is fantastic, Beastie Boys were the best at utilizing samples. The way they married the samples with their wordplay was masterful. Yea, I guess their lyrics could be juvenile but it’s still witty as fuck. The variety of the sampling keeps this fresh all the way thru, you have rock, fuck, soul. They really didn’t miss anywhere on Paul’s Boutique, Shadrach could be the best track in their entire catalogue, Egg Man is silly but I’ve always liked the beat on that one. Everything including the cover itself is classic hip hop, easy 5 stars!

So many great songs

Love it

Not understood or respected when it first came out.

Classic Hip-Hop

Astounding. Amazing. Revolutionary. Love love love love love!!!!!

I almost wanted to dock this one star because the vocal flavor of the Beastie Boys can just get a bit too pungent for me, but they always manage to charm their way back into my heart. Couple that with great rhymes, fun times, and genuinely some of the best beats and production I've ever heard, and I see why this is their magnum opus.

The boys are back at it again. The Suite at the end is such an example of the sampling that really shines in therapy production.

A revelation of hip hop and sampling. So much going on in this album. Great lyrics, great samples, great music. Really a Beastie + Dust Bros. mashup.

Own on Vinyl

THE SAMPLES HEARD AROUND THE WORLD!!! lol. The Beastie Boys and Dust Brothers made a masterpiece (the Beasties would go on to make two more with their next two albums). The perfect mix of the inventiveness that was a hallmark of the band and the silliness of their first album.

I never gave this album a shot because ive known their biggest hits for so long. This gave me a new appreciation for their music, insane production for an album from this time period.

A landmark album from one of my favourite acts.

Wildly exuberant, inventive and exciting, possibly the Beasties best effort. Still know most of this inside-out after endless plays as a teenager. 5*

One of the GOATs!

The thought these guys put behind each song is astonishing. I think there was nothing like that back in 1989. They were able to change the immature image from Licensed to Ill and show what they can do. To me, the best Beastie Boys work.

Great album. I feel like they should have mixed different to make the lyrics better understood. Recommend listening with the lyrics option turned on

Бля, это просто идеальный альбом, как по мне. Да, некоторым он может показаться заезженным, если такой жанр им не по нраву, но какое же лютое мастерство продакшна и умение идеально выдержать настроение альбома на всего его протяжении показали бисти бойс. Юморной, драйвовый и очень прорывной для своего времени - использование сэмплов, которые очень чётко подходят как под ритм, так и под тексты, определённо сделало своё дело и конкретно закрепило этот альбом в истории хип-хопа и музыки в целом, а также в моём персональном топе навсегда. DROPPIN SCIENCE LIKE GALILEO DROPPED THE ORANGE 🔥🔥🔥 (9.5)

It’s here… it’s finally here. An album layered with samples, put together in the most disjointed way possible… but it works so well. This is overlayed with the bombastic vocals and absurd lyrics of the B-Boys themselves. A lot of quotables on here, such as: “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair, So I can climb up and get into your underwear” The Sounds of Science will forever be one of the most mental hip-hop songs ever made. All in all, one of my favourite albums ever, this shit really SLAPS my potatoes.

SLAPS CLASSIC BEASTIE BOYS

Loved it.

Hell yeah! The way the Beastie Boys transformed themselves into a more artistic and thoughtful act while retaining their playful adolescent charm is impressive. This album is a true labour of love, friendship, and growth. And even though it’s comprised entirely of samples, it’s somehow a stunningly original and charismatic listen. A true gem, proving the Beastie were so much more than an immature fart joke.

If it helps you, I made a pilgrimage to the corner in the Lower East Side that is on this front cover. Which might give you an idea of how much I love this album. It somehow manages to be incredibly intelligent and stupid as hell at the same time. If I'd known it was going to be this kind of party...

A sampadelic bouillabaisse of hip-hop evolution.

When "Fight For Your Right to Party" came out it was humorous for/as a teenager but honestly still kinda sucked - the kind of joke that worked once or twice then got tired; hard pass on the Beasties for me then. And as an aside I wasn't ready for hiphop at all yet. Then this album hit and a friend of mine bought it and played it for me and .... holy hell - this was completely different. I still found it hard to break from my "traditional" rock roots and pretending to be offended at all the classic samples that were used (e.g. Zeppelin, Isley Bros, Curtis Mayfield, Beatles, etc) so I merely stuck to the immediately-accessible "funny" cuts like "Shake Your Rump" (that BASS) and "Hey Ladies" at first. But damn. This album is awesome. It was a new artform and it sounds idiotic but once I let myself be open to it I loved the entire album almost immediately. The time and creativity spent to craft the beats is almost unimaginable to me - fitting it all together to make 15+ songs that are (mostly) catchy as hell, not to mention the really good and rhythmic raps. The only negatives are I suppose what I'd deem hangovers from their first album - the humour occasionally isn't all that funny; the infantile stuff barely passed back then and now just doesn't work for me. BUT it's almost entirely ignorable because even as they're being young morons :P the beats are so good and funky that I've already forgotten (or just not paid attention to) them, but a small personal deduction for immaturity. Lesson for my younger self: don't be a closed-minded idiot. This is a classic. 9/10 4 stars.

Ma-la-de. Le travail de sampling sur cet album est tellement intense et bien fait. Ce n’est pas leur premier, mais c’est le premier d’une série - avec Check your heads et Ill communication - Qui représente la quintessence de ce band.

Album essentiel. Pochette emblématique. L'énergie du groupe est contagieuse. Tout le travail de sampling sur cet album est phénoménal.

Paul’s Boutique is like being invited to a crazy house party by three charismatic hip hop kids whose record collection is impeccable. The choice, range and quality of samples is impeccable and elevates the art-form - something new from something old, respectful of the past making something for the future. The infectious energy of the rap rhymes, the back and forth and swapping verses, the messing with the beats - all a joy, all fun, often missing from Hip Hop. Beastie Boys fair spun the formula around from Licensed to Ill, dropping the rock samples for jazz, disco, soul and funk, alienating early fans, selling badly at the time but becoming a classic. Endlessly listenable, always fresh, brilliant from start to finish.

This album has such great sampling and rhymes. The Beastie Boys make such unique and fun music. Super solid album, it has me listening to more of their catalog today after going through this one. Standout Tracks: Shake Your Rump, Egg Man, The Sounds of Science, Hey Ladies, Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun, Car Thief, Shadrach

10/10 haven’t heard any of the Beastie Boys later stuff but their first two albums are bangin 🔥

great samples, 10/10, no skips

Listened to this in high school.

A collage of sound

Love the Beastie Boys and am ashamed I have never listened to this straight through. I suppose I prefer listening to singular songs as opposed to albums when it comes to them. Still enjoyed this thoroughly.

A really fun album, with really witty lyrics and it has some of my favourites songs from the Beasties.

Obviously, one of the best hiphop albums ever made.

Classic

awesome

Heard before but properly for the first time. Damn you couldn’t make this these days. That Sgt Pepper sample! A shit ton of fun. Proud to be a semi-obnoxious NYer music. Weirdly Stuy

The best masterclass of sampling

Heel cool om weer te horen!

This album was perfect. Something I will listen to over and over. I never really dove into the Beastie Boys in the past but this one got me sucked in!

A landmark hip-hop album whose cost to reproduce today would be astronomical due to the amounts of samples. I didn’t really care for it too much as a kid which just further iterates the point that kids are dumb.

Fizzing with invention, humour and wild feats of imagination. It's got tunes, phat beats and I can bug out to it.

Top 3 Songs: 1 - Shake Your Rump (2) 2 - Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun (10) 3 - Shadrach (13)

My favourite album by my favourite group. Do not expect objectivity from me.

HELLLO BROOKLYNNN!! Upon waking, I was delighted that Paul’s Boutique was my selection for the day. It’s not my favorite Beastie Boys album (Check Your Head), but I knew it would keep my morning good mood flowing. It’s impossible to listen to the B-Boys and be in a crappy headspace. The mix of the boys from Brooklyn and The Dust Brothers heralded this audio masterpiece that’s just so much damn fun. I have so many great memories of amazing times that involved this record. My top tracks: *Shake Your Rump *High Plains Drifter *Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun *Car Thief *Shadrach

One of my all-time favorites.

The Bestie Boys have a penchant for putting together some of the best beats and samples. Their rapping style features a fairly simple flow, but their combative back and forth delivery has become a signature of the genre. Paul's Boutique features a more mature sound than Licensed to Ill and despite its 53 minute length, flows so well that it never becomes unwelcome. This is understandably incredibly critically acclaimed and is one of the greatest hip hop records of all time.

besta b-boys platan imo

Album blows my mind every time time I listen to it. There will never be an album like this again, the Sgt Pepper of the 80's.

Now this shit’s genius. And it was a welcome relief after the License to Ill which I absolutely hated. I remember my buddy saying I had to give Paul’s Boutique a chance back in the day, and was immediately into it. The samples are fantastic and unexpected, it’s fun and funny, and has a timeless groove to it. Probably my favorite Beastie Boys record.

I don't own many Beastie Boys albums on vinyl, but this one sits on my shelf, and is a must - massive tracks like Hey Ladies, and Shake Your Rump are ubiquitous and rightly so. This is guaranteed to get you dusting off your best funky chicken moves - lots of groovy samples threaded throughout. Far less 'angsty' than their earlier work. Anyone who can thread the word 'mortgage' into three syllables earns their place as lyricist extraordinaire! This is arguably their best album

All-time classic

Suburban hip-hop is the best way to explain what I just listened to. It was chaotic and had a similar feel to Run DMC. I enjoyed it!

Un classique. La construction des chansons avec tous ces samplings est stupéfiante.

Barn storming lesson in sampling. This is some album.

fuckin belter. classic.

A masterclass in hip hop and sampling

I loved this album, every time I felt like it was getting a little stale, they brought a completely new idea out of nowhere. I loved looking at all the different samples. Favorite tracks: Egg Man, The Sounds of Science, Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun, and Hello Brooklyn

Excellent. Good samples

Still sounds pretty new and fresh!

This collaboration between the Beastie Boys and the Dust Brothers is a legendary achievement. I highly recommend the 33 1/3 book about the making of this record. I also recommend you check out a playlist or Youtube video that breaks down all the samples. Best track: Shake Your Rump

One of my favourite albums - good fun to work my way through the list of samples in the wikipedia article

Shit yes. Can't give enough stars

Perfection.

Очень энергичный. Не ожидал, что так понравится

Fantástic

YAS LOVE

9/10 Very amazing. incredible beats and rhymes

Outstanding album. I have never fully listened to this one before, and even the songs I wasn't fully familiar with were complete party anthems. What a classic!

Groundbreaking. Love it!

My most-listened to hip hop album of 2021. I love everything about it. The samples are insanely good. They just kept slapping sample after sample and incorporating them ridiculously well. The lyrics are silly, catchy, and exciting. All the songs are solid. There's a crap ton of diversity in these tracks. One ends and the next is a completely different experience but just as intriguing. Not to mention each track is only a few minutes long... meaning each song gets its shine to appreciate before moving on to the next masterpiece. This is one album I need to listen to from start to finish. One time I heard "Hey Ladies" playing in a music store and I just had to pause. Love the cowbells and the screams so much, without a doubt my favorite pick. If I'm looking for fun hip hop, Beastie Boys is always my first And this album, in particular, engages me every minute. There are segments that I can rock, funk, groove, or dance to. There are parts that always impress me. It's hard for me to dislike much about it.

JOHNNY RYALL!

The excellent splicing of samples makes this a glorious listen. Favorites: "Shake Your Rump", "The Sounds Of Science", "Hey Ladies", "Looking Down The Barrel Of A Gun"

What a banger - so many excellent samples from before when it was too expensive. Loved it

I don't personally care for the Beastie Boys but this album was fun and the production was superb.

LOVE THE BEASTIES! Already high on list of albums I listen to so although was gonna try and be objective it's getting a 5

The best album the beasties boys and a gateway drug for us ol indie fellas into hip hop and electronica back in the day. The bass on this album is amazing and some of the crunchiest funniest ever. The lyrics absurd from egg man to the Bouille bass skits at the end. Barrel of a gun is a thumping rock track and joyride just glorious. I have listened to this album many times and it never gets old. 'Some static started in the pool hall, hit the motherfuckers face with the que ball!'

Awesome! Loved this, still do.

Perhaps their best album, absolutely brilliant. 5 stars.

Paul's Boutique is the second (and best) album of Beastie Boys. It is impressive what a step the guys made from Licensed to Ill to this album. The songwriting is still catchy, but the songs are so much more refined. No one dimensional hip hop rock tracks inspired by hip hop legends, but mature songwriters becoming legends themselves.

Five star classic. Both an incredibly fun album and also an incredibly important album in the history of sampling, hip hop, plunderphonics, intellectual property law, etc.

All time favorite. I could write a novel about this band and each of their albums. While not mg favorite of theirs I believe it is their most important work.

Hell yeah! You can't go wrong with Beastie Boys

Already loved it

The Beastie Boys follow up their debut album with a record that goes way harder in an urban, hip-hop sound. With clever, well-crafted lyrics, deeper drum tracks, and the greatest use of sampling for any album ever, this record solidified the rap trio beyond a one-trick pony. Paul's Boutique capitalizes on creating moods and moments rather than just being an in-your-face banger record that its predecessor was, which is why I don't think there are recognizable "hits" to the layman listener. Don't let that fool you from thinking there aren't energetic tracks, some of these tunes have the freshest, most advanced production I think an album could have for the 80's. It feels like the Frankenstein's monster of hip-hop with each B-Boy contributing unique and chaotic writing that translated into something beyond anybody's imagination. It's a record that was simply ahead of its time. The ending "B-Boy Bouillabaisse" suit feels like a fire mixtape within an even fuller album, and anybody that listens to rap or hip-hop that utilizes samples can look to this collection as the influential obelisk. Favorite Songs: Shake Your Rump, The Sounds of Science, Hey Ladies, Shadrach Least Favorite: Egg Man

Had this on cassette back in the day. It's where I really start liking The Beastie Boys. They are transitioning out of their earlier sound into something much more complex. Bursting at the seams with samples. Love the flow of the tracks, almost especially when they suddenly smack up against one another, culminating in the collage-like "B Boy Bouillabaisse." The album moves along at a good clip while covering alot of different moods/sounds, but mostly exuding contagious excitement and fun. Wish more contemporary hip hop had this kind of manic ADD energy.

September 23, 2021 Love this stuff for working!

Best sample record ever!

I mean. Cmon.

I was going to take a star away just because this isn't my favorite Beastie Boys album. However, it has been a while since I've pulled this album from the shelf, and I may have been wrong. This might just by my favorite Beastie Boys album.

Amazing album. I've always loved it.

5.0 + Foists me back in Brooklyn. I’m rummaging through a mental flea market of strange and oblique cultural references. I’m surrounded by cartoonishly menacing characters but I’m drunk and zonked and clowning with my boys and we’re wilding and we’re one with the whole scene. This album is a non-stop troll party. Too many jokes, stunts and memes to appreciate with one listen. As it happens, this was my fifth full listen and I’m only just starting to make headway. Incredible.

5* for what goes around

Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique Love this album 5 Stars

A classic!

Absolutely rocked out to this hard.

Been so long since I listened to this as an entire album. It's better than I remember So many memories...

Excellent album

Yep

Yes.

Never heard a song on this entire album but I was into it the whole time.

Amazing amalgam of thick beats and the boys at their best. Fave: Three Minute Rule

hip hop

SEHHH NENA

Alright, this is a really fun, jumpy, quick, album. It's fast, it's daft, it's fun. 8.6/10

What an album. It defines the beginning of sampling. (Listened to it on Apple Music)

I was looking forward to this one since it’s often the highest rated of their albums and I haven’t heard any of the tracks before. I thought it was pretty good, but it didn’t really sound very distinctive from other rap of that era. They really developed their unique sound later on. It sounds like the sampling is what this album is really known for, but I didn’t really catch anything familiar on a first listen.

Can't believe I've never heard this before! I've liked the other three Beasties albums I've heard, so not sure why this one has eluded me until now. I guess this is the reason I carry on with this thankless task! Back to yet more dire 70s rock tomorrow, no doubt...

"some of it seemed good"

A great album, some songs have a truly unique and often bizarre sound, some of which I love, and some not so much.

My last reviewed album was Afrika Bamdaataa’s Planet Rock released in 1986. This is only three years later. I mentioned in that review how it was cool that they had sampled Kraftwerk in the first song. It’s amazing how fast music evolved in three years because this album is basically back to back samples. It’s a fun part album most people are already aware of. My only issue with the Beastie Boys is that the Run DMC, finish each other’s lines shtick kinda gets old when it’s every song on every album.

*Famous for its sampling, this is an essential hip hop album.

It's hard to follow up License to Ill, and this album is unfortunately lesser known because of that I think. But it's still an awesome one, you can hear all the inspiration from other genres and the experimentation. Beastie Boys are known and stand out for good reason. 4/5

"I was making records when you were sucking your mothers dick" is a crazy line.

I wrote a whole thing of listening notes but they disappeared. I enjoyed this one a fair amount i just thing the beastie boys are dumb fun. I enjoy the instrumentals being pretty minimal in that they are typically just drums, bass, and occasional stings from other instruments. Nothing super special lyrically but its so fun to listen to. Another 3.5 graded 4

I spent so long assuming Beastie Boys were the epitome of lazy, transgressive hip hop leading into the '90s but I was ignorant :'( still not a fan of Licensed to Ill, but the production and writing on this album and Ill Communication are just too nice. Highlights: "Shake Your Rump", "3-Minute Rule", "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun", the entire Bouillabaisse series

Banger banger banger banger banger. The Beastie Boys are full of bangers

Beasty

Chaotic and hard to listen to sometimes but still fun

Before today I don't think I really knew what genre Beastie Boys fell into and I had never listened to them before. So this really surprised me with how great it was. It's a wonderful blend of punk and hip-hop with some wonderful samples dotted throughout. I was so engrossed by this album that I accidentally set off the alarm at work and the police were called. I blame Beastie Boys entirely. Favourites: Shake Your Rump Car Thief Shadrach

So much fun

liked that one much more than License To Ill, the voices are less annoying here. Samples cool

me amarrei nesse álbum. produção boa demais a mistura de hip/hop com o rock em algumas músicas caiu muito bem, e os samples são muito bem usados tb. gostei muito da energia punk da banda, tanto na entrega dos versos, das batidas e na própria coisas que eles estão dizendo, queria entender as referências mas eu consegui pegar as críticas ao governo e a postura contra o preconceito da época. deu pra ver que é bem inspirado no west coast (pelo fato óbvio que a banda é de nova york). confesso que o flow deles ficou meio repetitivo em algumas músicas, queria ver mais mudanças na cadência e na entrega dos versos deles. curti muito shake your rump, the sounds of science e looking down the barrel of a gun.

incredible album, crazy good samples

The Beastie Boys are another band with which I have had next to no experience so this was a pleasant surprise. The production felt surprisingly progressive for its time at parts, no doubt because the Beastie Boys coined the direction hip hop would take after them. When you hear the drumming and some of the guitar lines, you can start to understand why people thought Nu Metal would be a good idea. The lyricism is also irreverent, funny, and holds up better than I thought it might have, and on that note, it is so impressive how in-sync all the Boys are, as if they are in spirit all just one Boy. There are a just a few moments where the music shows its age (The Sound of Science), but sometimes you just gotta settle for a finger roll rather than a slam dunk. Really nice album from some of the best guys the East Coast has to offer.

Complaining that the beastie boys yell is like complaining that water is wet. Good energy, some good lines, enjoyable album. After rating a bjork album 3/5, it feels criminal to give this less than 4*

4.1

Pretty good. Not all the hits type of album

I love this album because its quirky, good to dance to and fun to listen to the words. I love the beastie boys because they're different and both their voices are different to each other. my favourites of their song are egg man and car theif because i love listening to the words.

The sheer newyorkness is overwhelming, the second the beat started on the 2nd song I instantly hated New Jersey pizza and was a die hard fan for the Knicks. Music wise tho it was mid only good thing was the samples, still 4

Idk if i was just in the mood for it today, but this was great. Even the extended edition

Yes, the tracks do sound really similar to each other and it gets repetitive. Still, I liked how catchy and energetic this record is, I kept nodding my head along through all of it. I will probably listen to it again!

Rowdy!

Before I got to the halfway mark I was pretty sure this wasn’t going to be for me and I don’t think it’s an everyday album for me but I would return. Incredible use of sampling (before legality took over and there was still true creative freedom) Playlist add: “Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun” but could’ve also been “What Comes Around”

Some absolute classics. A bit of filler in between.

Rating: 8/10 Sick stuff. It really does some interesting and experimental things with its sampling and hip hop production, pretty immaculately done in that regard, and the record does not age poorly at all. It's a lot of fun and most of the tracks are honestly just good or great, a couple more mid that I can't remember. I'm not usually itching to put on some Beastie Boys but it's good when it pops up like this. The best song of the bunch I think was Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun, love that one

the sample from "the end" by the beatles in 4th song was really nice. cool sampling, thought provoking.

My 2nd favourite BB album, love that this is what came after Licence to Ill. Great samples, funky, funny it really stood out stylistically from the crowd in 1989…. Probably why it flopped commercially. 4.3

Favourite songs: Johnny Ryall, Sounds of science

3.7 Definitely worth revisit. DJ is quite comedic though. Random sound clips that don’t really blend into the music, especially that one where it just shifts into high speed country

Always ridiculously fun.

Never been much of a fan of beastie boys from a lyricist perspective, but oh my days the production just more than makes up for it. Masterclass in sampling

Not my favorite Beastie Boys album but the rhymes and lyrics are all pretty good, what else do you want me to say

my favourite beastie boys songs are not on this but still awesome

I had heard their popular songs before and never really enjoyed their voices and lyrical delivery - it always came off as nasally, scratchy, and loud. I did enjoy the instrumentals/sampling on this album, however, so that was a positive for me. I'd personally give this a 3.5, but I'll push it to a 4 cause of the instrumentals.

4,4/5

RATING: 8.5/10 HIGHLIGHT: Egg Man LOWLIGHT: 3 Minute Rule

Some of it is obviously really juvenile but I still love the beastie boys. The samples and production are amazing.

It was pretty good, liked the flows and the beats.

Les prods / samples sont imaculés. Le reste jsp il y a une vibe mais je trouve ça long sur l'ensemble de l'album. Je préfère 100x Tribe dans le style (qui s'inspirent d'eux quand même j'imagine). Ça reste de la très bonne musique et c'est super original.

To all the girls - 3 Shake your rump - 4 Johnny ryall - 4 Egg man - 3 High plains drifter - 3 The sounds of science - 3 3-minute rule - 3 Hey ladies - 5 5-piece chicken dinner - na Looking down the barrel of a gun - 4 Car thief - 3 What comes around - 3 Shadrach - 4 Ask for janice - na B-boy bouillabaisse - 3 a - 59 chrystie street - 3 b - get on the mic - 3 c - stop that train - 4 d - a year and a day - 3 e - hello brooklyn - 4 f - dropping names - 3 g - lay it on me - 3 h - mike on the mic - 3 i - a.w.o.l. - 3

Paul's Boutique is such a fun album. I've loved this since the 90s. It's sort of silly at times, brilliant use of samples to make a tapestry of 70s rock songs and the Beasties wit.

So impressed by how they use three distinct voices, separately and together, to form such a unique and fun vocal performance. And the beats are sick, of course. What’s not to like?

This album sounds like a party you really need to be at. Favorite track: Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun

Gravitas amiga !

I'm personally always amazed by the number of musical references the Beastie Boys make with their samples. I can spend hours listening just trying to identify everything.

Classic Beasties.

Gran álbum. Sonidos muy interesantes y el humor de los Beastie Boys siempre presente.

what a way to start an album

I do love the early hip hop beats and samples

I actually really enjoyed this album. It’s the second time I’ve listened after my dad sent it to me some time ago. Enjoyed it significantly more the second time around. Fun to listen to.

Really enjoyed this! 4/5

Typically don't love the Beastie Boys but this one was fun. Enjoyed the sampling a lot.

Somehow dumb and genius at the same time

By no means their best offering, and extremely varied/erratic, but good fun, signposting the kind of creativity to come. Some classics like Shake Your Rump, Shadrach and Hey Ladies hold this whole thing together.

Non-stop fun with beats that go hard af

This album really shows off the perfect harmonies between MIke D, MCA and Ad-Rock. Almost like the Hip-Hop variant of the Beach Boys. However I do prefer License to Ill since it is shorter, simpler and features two of my favourite songs. This does not have as many memorable tracks and I find the overabundence of sampling makes the tracks seem to blend together. However heavy sampling can work when there is a central theme, like in Public Enemy's Fear of a Black Planet. So I don't hate this album but the songs don't stay in my head for that long.

Woah

Great stuff.

Beastie Boys sendo Beastie Boys, nao tem como errar

This was a fun album. I really enjoyed them using samples to end their lyrics. 4 stars for the variety of styles and tempos. I liked hanging out with them for an hour, but that's enough for one day. The Beastie Boys have nailed their style and delivery. The Sounds of Science was my favorite!

Some lovely moments

Production was great, songs were ok

Banger

On first listen: Samples are so random and funky; the vocals sound like cacophonous Bob Dylan Months later: Quirky sample-heavy hip hop. Goes beyond their frat-rap sound for more abstract ones.

quintessential hip hop album, i really really enjoy it!!

This is widely recognized as innovative and creative. I'd say along with their debut, it's essential listening. They did some interesting stuff with the production and it's a good listen. I could do without the filler tracks and what seems like a lack of direction at times. It's one of those records that suffers from it's length, honestly. They easily could have trimmed off the filler and not hurt the impact of the record.

Now this is a perfect example of an album that justifies the existence of this list. It's fun, it's interesting and unique. Quite revolutionary in its day. All the Beastie Boys sound like they were meant to work together, with their voices complementing and playing off of each other. The sound is rich and layed groundwork for albums by other artists (Endtroducing... & Since I Left You being amongst them). Highly recommend.

Er svak for samples, men PB har aldri vært min favoritt av BB.

A lot better than I remember- and I remember a good ass album. This is one of the most entertaining hip hop albums I've heard in a hot minute. Not a second feels wasted. While I do have some gripes, most are minor. This is just one hella tight album. Ludicrously entertaining. It just... it sounds so GOOD in my EARS!!

Highly enjoyable and insane production, but there's a few too many ideas not fully refined

The Beastie's incredibly annoying voices are placed perfectly in the mix on this record - to the back, under the samples, far away from my ears. So already that makes this the best Beastie Boys record I've ever heard. .....actually this is pretty excellent. The layers and layers of samples is really fun to listen to. And "Five Piece Chicken Dinner" made me laugh out loud. Well-crafted backing tracks and some pretty entertaining rhymes. I can see why this has such a reputation. I dig it. FOUR STARS

This is when they really start to cook. Obviously, the star here is the production more than anything else, the wild, crazy incorporation of samples, the interplay of different styles of music, the pure funky drive of it all. A 25-year-old rap album is always going to sound dated, but this is still incredibly fun to listen to. It’s still not flawless, mainly because of the topics. Obviously, the casual sexism and Playboy nonsense in this is something that they would abandon in later years, but it’s also not out of place in the genre, even if it’s not my thing. What really doesn’t work for me is the songs where there posing as tough guys, talking about toting guns, robbing people, etc. For most hip-hop acts, this is a fantasia and not a reality (and it often ends in tragedy when it *is* a reality). But, as I think I said in my review of License to Ill, while the Beasties come by their love of hip-hop honestly, any pretension towards being gangstas just rings as incredibly inauthentic (e.g., “High Plains Drifter” “Looking Down the Barrel Of a Gun” “Car Thief”). Perhaps that takes a shine off it a little bit, perhaps a little bit of the extremely old-school cadence does as well, but it’s still fantastic. The very best songs (“Shake Your Rump” “Hey Ladies” “Shadrach”) really hold up, as do many stretches of “B-Boy Bouillabaisse.” When the sample from “That Lady” comes in? Mindblowing, still.

JL : 5, Shadrach A : 4, Sounds of Science

one of my faves of all time

Bra! Minnen från förr typ. En tid när musik skapades av personer som tyckte livet var kul och sket i vad andra tyckte. Kreativt och kul att lyssna på. Det känns nästan som man är i New York i slutet av 80-talet när man lyssnar och om det är något jag vill slippa just nu så är det samtiden. Detta album är ett bra steg i detta. Väldigt förtjust i detta!

Très très bon ! Du très vieux hip-hop (à l'échelle du genre) riche en samples, hyper énergiques, chaque rappeur apporte son grain de sel et les échanges entre chacun sont très dynamiques, j'adore ! Peut-être qu'au bout d'un moment, ça tire un tout petit peu en longueur, mais en vrai, je comprends son statut culte !

3.5

Me cuesta creer que este álbum fue hecho por gente blanca. Muy divertido, si bien puede parecer repetitivo cada canción tiene su toque especial. Hacen un uso de los samples espectacular que le da a cada tema una vibra única. Además esa mezcla de géneros para construir un hiphop es espectacular.

4 out of 5. Having only listened to License to I'll before this album came as a pleasant surprise. I can now hear why their use of sampling was so influential.

The Beastie are one of a kind. Although this album doesn’t stand up to License to Ill, it’s still pretty damn good. Beasties use rock beats to support their nasty rhymes. The album is fun, easy to listen to, and serious all at the same time. A collection worthy of being on this project.

Review - a lot better than the last Beastie Boys album I got (which I didn't realise was their debut). Have listened to this before and it holds up really well, great production for its time. Score - 7.5/10 Need to listen? YES

Not as many singles but overall a better album than Licensed to Ill

Maybe my favorite Beastie album. What a collage of sound. Never a dull moment. 4.25/5.

cool album. 4

Дебютник круче будет, но биты заебись

The Beastie Boys usually sound pretty good and this one is no exception. Solid album.

Will return to this!

Super fun sample-based hip hop. I hadn’t heard this in forever, but I was quick to remember how this became “the” Beasties album over time.

I don't know if I've ever done a proper front-to-back listening of this album, though I'm definitely familiar with every song. It's a fun ass album and (as commonly recognized) groundbreaking in its use of samples. I try to avoid the "it all sounds the same" critique when discussing genres that I don't listen to a lot, because I know it takes time to develop a distinguishing ear, but I can't help think when listening to the Beasties, "Would it kill them to try using a different cadence?" But then I catch myself. It's that cadence that makes the Beastie Boys the Beastie Boys. Saying they should change it is like saying Green Day should change their guitar tone. So that got me musing . . . In punk, the instrumental music sounds similar, but it's the vocals that tend to draw musical distinctions from song to song. Whereas in rap - at least Beastie Boys rap - it's the opposite. The vocals are the same, and the music does more heavy-lifting to make the songs sonically different.

I'll never get over how creative these boys from Brooklyn are. The beats, the rhymes, the samples are all just top-tier. They're unexpected and fun. I love albums that are just fun. So many great songs here, but "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun" was my favorite.

I like the Beastir Boys and I like this album. I think Licenced to Ill remains my favourite due to it coming out when I was a teenager but this isn't bad.

Best production on any hip hop albums from the 80s far and away. It's crazy how ahead of the curve they were. The Beasties had very advanced sampling techniques and infinite creativity. There is just sample after sample, always something going on in these beats and it's endlessly fun and cool. The lyrics match the vibe, so funny and unique. But let's face it, everyone listens to this for the production and their off the wall energy that matches it.