When Paul's Boutique by Beastie Boys was a high point of sampling artistry
In 1989, the Beastie Boys released an album that would win the once-derided band critical acclaim and make them hip hop's first act to be taken seriously as artists. Two years later, a court in the US passed a judgment that effectively all but criminalised the record and much of hip hop's canon up to that date.
Paul’s Boutique
Beastie Boys
Capitol Records
In 1989, the Beastie Boys released an album that would win the once-derided band critical acclaim and make them hip hop's first act to be taken seriously as artists. Two years later, a court in the US passed a judgment that effectively all but criminalised the record and much of hip hop's canon up to that date.
Why the sudden change?
Apart from vocal contributions from the band's rappers Adam Horovitz, Adam Yauch and Mike Diamond, practically none of Paul's Boutique was original; in a music-history first, the backing music was almost completely created by cutting and pasting samples of other people's songs. The Beasties, their core fans and the critics loved it. But the artists whose songs had been sampled - and in thousands of other hip hop and rap records - cried foul, declaring it theft of intellectual property.
Matters came to a head when Irish/British crooner Gilbert O'Sullivan took rapper Biz Markie to court in the US over sampling of his ballad Alone Again (Naturally). It wasn't the first time an aggrieved artist had sought recognition for his sampled work, but it was the first to succeed. The upshot was that rappers would from then on have to seek and pay for permission to clear samples of other people's music.