By definition one cannot improve upon perfection, so what would be the point?
this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2025
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I don't think hip hop songs in general tend to get covered, or at least not that I'm aware of (am absolutely open to being corrected on that).
I guess a lot of the rhymes are often very specifically about the person rapping, so someone else doing it might be a bit weird.
That said, I do know of one good example in eLZhi's Elmatic a remake of Nas' Illmatic. It has significantly rewritten lyrics though.
Yeah. There isn't a tradition of covering someone else's rap because the rapper was originally supposed to be both writer and performer. A lot of Beastie Boys songs are written in that perspective.
That being said, not all of their songs are like that and there is some cross genre mixing with rock. I can see Fight For Your Right or Sabotage getting easily covered.
Paul's Boutique was a landmark record in music law. The Beatles did sue them. It's largely thanks to that album that sampling isn't a legal liability and allowed the practice to continue. It's one of the most important records of all time IMO.
For a modern example of something similar, Avalanches took like 15 years to release their second album, Wildflower because they had to clear hundreds of samples, including the Beatles.
Outstanding album though.
The Beatles thing is a myth. Nobody connected to the Beatles has sued anybody over Paul’s Boutique. Most of the samples on Pauls’ Boutique were cleared, especially the most obvious ones.
He adds that there are two myths about the samples and licensing on the Beastie Boys’ classic. One is that when the record was first released, neither the group nor its label, Capitol, had cleared any of the rights to the snippets of recordings that they and producers the Dust Brothers used. ‘They and their label were really cautious. They cleared tons of songs,’ McLeod says, citing the ballpark $250,000 figure that’s often reported, and the fact that the Jimmy Castor Bunch had sued the group soon after ‘Licensed to Ill’ was released.
Huh, TIL. I even glanced over the Wikipedia page before I posted that. Thanks!
I found a torrent years ago with every song they sampled on this album, I highly recommend it. Absolutely phenomenal collection of music that goes so much deeper than you expect.
If anyone ever tries it, MCA shows up their house with a few of his people.
I like his beard it looks like a billy goat.
ooo-ooo
Is my disco call
so you're saying I can summon MCA and a bunch of friends anytime I want to party?
I realise this is a parody, not a cover, but it immediately came to mind when I saw this post.
Slip n Slide by the Beastie Boys.
I don't think you could produce a punk album in the late 00s if it didn't include a cover of "Gratitude".
I hve a few in my playlist and i assume there are more. It's just by bands you don't listen to
Not covering it, but I am currently working on a song that samples "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun".
Maybe they are so bad or nieche that it does not make sense to cover them?
I mean, a piece is usually either covered because it is extreme popular, or because someone has a serious idea of how to improve it.
Did you just call the Beastie Boys niche?