MY (tenuous) CONNECTION TO THE BEASTIE BOYS

I like all kinds of music.  You name it, I probably have it.  No, not too obscure, mind you.  I’m not on the cutting edge of who headlined SXSW – but I have everything from Frank Sinatra, to 1920’s Jazz, to Def Leppard, Rolling Stones, Enya, Melissa Etheridge, Bach, Queen, Prince, Christian Singer Larry Norman, even Rod Rodgers (known as the Ed Wood of music).  Out of my collection I simply don’t have a lot of Hip-Hop or Rap.  Okay, actually, none.  Also I’m fresh out of Punk Rock – but I do have Grunge Rock. 

I don’t know why I don’t have any Rap or Hip-Hop.  It just never “stuck” with me for some reason and my friends didn’t either give me their music or say:  “Dude, listen to this song...”  I remember in high school when a band by the name of “Marillion” made the rounds and I was told by friends:  “You’ve GOT to listen to this album!”  And we’d run down to Tower Records (out of business) and find the British fold-out album that was $20.  We’d go back to Paul’s basement and crank it up and be enveloped by the artsy twenty minute songs.  Maybe I didn’t run in the Hip-Hop crowd or listen to Hip-Hop since I was mostly into “Classic Rock.”

                                                                           

When Adam Yauch, member of the “Beastie Boys” recently died, there were dozens of postings on Facebook.  Articles in magazines, profiles, everyone spoke very highly of him.  Even my bestest friends.  And I felt like I missed out on a great segment of musical history.  Sure, I liked “You’ve got to fight...” but that’s all I really knew of the Beastie Boys.  And it’s probably one of those things where I mention that song and the other person rolls their eyes and says:  “You like THAT?  You should hear such-and-such song, on side two of such-and-such album.”

And though I had only heard one song by the Beastie Boys (and their most popular song at that), I did feel like I had a connection to them, albeit tenuous at best.

This most recent Saturday morning, after helping a friend with a screenplay, I was running some scenarios over in my head.  When you write scripts you have to think of logical ways to get the story across.  You can’t have a guy who’s never thrown a punch in his life suddenly kicking ass like Jackie Chan in his prime.  It’s why I laugh uproariously when I watch the original “Footloose” and suddenly, when the dance happens, all these kids know how to dance REALLY REALLY good.  Illogical moments like that kill a film for me.

It was in the half-sleep/half-awake state that I remembered my connection.  When I was working at the law firm of Miller Nash, one of the attorneys there (now a judge) specialized in copyright infringement laws.  One of our clients was Nintendo and, at one point, we had boxes and boxes of either bootleg games, or discs.  Some of the games were for the American 8-bit system.  Some were for the Japanese system (Famicom).  But they had to be dealt with and stored and that was my job.  My first couple weeks on the job, we had a case where there were knock-off “Troll” dolls.  You know, those dolls that are usually naked, with big eyes and hair like Don King.  In the conference room there was a large board with dozens of illegal (and legal) troll dolls strapped to it like some weird toy torture fetish.



Well...we represented the Beastie Boys.  Or, most likely, the record company that represented the Beastie Boys.  I’m pretty certain the Beastie Boys had never EVER heard of Miller Nash.  And, due to copyright infringement issues – someone had collected knock-off/fake/crap Beastie Boys tour shirts....and sent them to us.

Boxes and boxes and boxes of HUNDREDS of Beastie Boy tour shirts.  Evidence.  Dang.  Twenty, thirty, boxes.  Filled to the brim with shirts.  Some were done well on good fabric, multi color.  Some were slapped together on paper thin shirts with non coordinating color.  It was a myriad of bootleg t-shirt wear.



And...what were we to do with these?  Hold on to them.  And the twenty-to-thirty boxes got tucked away on shelves and corners and hiding places.  We would need them...eventually.

Eventually finally hit, or the parties settled out of court, or people went to jail or something and then we were left with hundreds of Beastie Boy shirts.  What to do now.

Realizing I didn’t want to box them up and send them offsite (to never be dealt with again), I was told to do what I was told to eventually do with the Nintendo knock-offs:  Destroy the suckers.  But...but...these were perfectly good shirts!  (okay, some were)

After some discussion with the client, and based on my suggestion, it was finally determined that we could give them to an organization that provided clothing to homeless shelters.  At least they’d do some good.  Plus we could take as many was we’d like.

Once I sent out the e-mail, I was surprised to find Attorneys in their mid 50’s and secretaries more akin to Neil Diamond tribute bands, rummaging through the stacks of shirts:  “Oh, this is a nice one.”  “I like this one.”  And happily running off with half-a-dozen shirts.  I took 10 or 15 myself and gave some to friends and then boxed up what was left and gave them to the homeless organization.  There are probably still homeless people out there wearing these shirts.

And that is my tenuous relationship to the Beastie Boys.  “You’ve got fight for your right...”