Hello Nasty

On their fifth album and first proclamation in four years, the Beasties pledge allegiance to the next millennium while rocking out old-school stylee. Instead of pretentiously haphazard schizophrenia, Adrock, Mike D and MCA mold Run DMC boasts, Lee Perry dub freestyles, and introspective acoustic strumming into the best album-cum-mix-tape of the first half of '98. NASTY is the true successor to their sampledelic fantasia PAUL'S BOUTIQUE, as realised by craftsmen looking to do more than just get crazy with the sonic cheese whiz. meer...

"Super Disco Breakin'", "Body Movin'", etc. are all first-rate party jams that the trio can probably come up with in their sleep. It's when the Beasties look towards the new school that the artistic flipping of the script begins. Not just in the lyrics, which are expansively conscious in nature and politically literate in content, but sonically as well. The jr. drum-and-bass of "Flowin' Prose" and MCA's acoustic singer/songwriter turn on "I Don't Know" point in directions at once completely incompatible and positively natural. Just like their mate Beck, it is the diversity of styles that the Beasties are prophesising as the key to the future--so long as that diversity's in the shadow of the old school.

Rolling Stone (5/13/99, p.66)
- Included in Rolling Stone's "Essential Recordings of the 90's."

Spin (1/99, p.91)
- Ranked #10 on Spin's list of "Top 20 Albums of '98."

CMJ (1/6/03, p.18)
- Included in CMJ's list of "Top 25 College Radio Albums of All Time"

The Source (9/98, p.256)
- "...What underlies the Beastie sound, and ultimately their widespread appeal, is their obvious appreciation of other music....Mike's scratches add another layer to the album's mighty production..."

Rap Pages (11/98, p.130)
- 4 (out of 5)
- "...HELLO NASTY continues their musical reign...Lyrically, they deliver their made-for-concert verses in perfect unison..."

Rolling Stone (8/6/98, p.)
- 4 Stars (out of 5)
- "...the collaboration that Black Flag and De La Soul might have made, mixing jaunty samples and esoteric beats with punk-guitar crunch....Hip-hop hasn't unleashed anything this fantastically dense since the heyday of De La and Public Enemy..."

Spin (8/98, pp.135-136)
- 7 (out of 10)
- "...HELLO NASTY...is filled with so much money-makin' and disco-breakin' on and on till the breakadawn, you'd think we'd taken the way-back machine into the early Kangol era. Yet such recapping doesn't sound even faintly kitschy. More like a labor of love by three premillennial mensches laying their roots down: a B-boy Anthology of New York Folk Music..."

CMJ (1/11/99, p.5)
- "...The chart-topping album finds the Beasties re-enhancing the three-way rhyme antics of their LICENSED TO ILL days using soulsonic electro-funk, cheeky bossa nova, Rachmaninoff loops and some death defying turntable moves..."

Entertainment Weekly (7/17/98, pp.81-82)
- "...a sonic smorgasbord in which the Beasties gorge themselves with reckless abandon...The melange makes for a looser, more free-spirited record than their earlier albums; the music invites you in, rather than threatening to shut you out..." - Rating: B+

Mixmag (1/99, p.49)
- Included in Mixmag's "Ten Best Albums of 98" - "...electro-tinged beats and whiney rapping..."