Beastie Boys looking sheepish

Monster Beasties

I heard about this odd piece of news linking the fact that MCA’s will said he didn’t want him to appear in ads at all to the Monster lawsuit. I thought the timing of both announcements to be rather odd – could be just lazy journalism but a lot of the articles linked the two. I do wonder if some PR person was intentionally using the good will over MCA’s death to try Monster in a court of public opinion – releasing those press releases next to each other, they know press will conflate the two.

I’d love to know how Monster a) is supposed to know about the content of MCA’s will a day after his death and b) why Beasties are going after what is in fact a DJ Z-Trip mixtape? Yes the Monster using it to shill their drinks is a bit damning, but I can’t help thinking this could have real knock-on effects for those who’ve been remixing and DJing with the Beasties tracks for years. Or those that host live mixes and mixtapes.

The Beastie Boys always released acapellas and instrumentals as it’s part of the hiphop culture – now that sounds like the kings of sampling could be no-go areas for remixers and mashup artists if this ruling goes the wrong way? Even well intentioned, these things always have unintended or chilling effects – and I don’t have to say is really ironic that the people that created Paul’s Boutique and even got sued about it a day before Adam Yauch died, are so litigious over uncleared usage. More FAIL than DROP!

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