Category: Song Of The Week

Nine Inch Nails – Burn

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All the holiday stuff has me messed up and I could have sworn yesterday was Tuesday when it was Wednesday. On well, I’ll be a day late and at least a dollar short.

This week’s highlight song comes 1994 and the soundtrack to the film Natural Born Killers. Trent Reznor was the producer of that soundtrack so it’s not shocking that Nine Inch Nails wound up on the album. In fact, three NIN songs are found there, though Burn is the only one that was new. Burn was also released as a single from the soundtrack but either did not chart or chart info is not available.

Burn is also available on certain reissues of The Downward Spiral.

As for Burn’s place in the film, that is information that is a bit tough to track down. It does appear at the movie’s end in certain “director’s cut” and unrated versions of the film, but is not present in the theatrical release and many modern versions on streaming.

Burn is a song very indebted to the electronic soundscape, something Reznor had pursued a lot on his 1994 album The Downward Spiral, often hailed as his magnum opus. Burn does cut a fair bit heavier than a lot of TDS material, something of a callback to the 1992 EP Broken. There is distortion on pretty much everything in the song save vocals. Things do build somewhat quietly to an angry climax, but it is still very noisy even in that build.

Lyrically, Burn is a song of hatred and misanthropy. It is lashing out at being a reject of society and using the hurt and anger to seek revenge and burn the world down. It is extremely harsh stuff, perhaps dismissed by some as angsty nonsense, but qutie disturbing in an objective evaluation. It was the perfect song for a movie about a killer like Mickey Knox, a person who was pretty well cursed from birth and would embody the song’s lyrics in his actions through the film.

Burn got a music video, culled from scenes of Natural Born Killers that are all apparently cut from the original movie release. (no verification on that) I will post the video below but it is from an unofficial source and might not escape the wrath of YouTube AI copyright hunter bots.

Burn has been in pretty regular rotation in Nine Inch Nails live setlists – it is the band’s 14th most played song with 404 total airings, according to setlist.fm. Sadly they didn’t play it when I saw them live in 2000, but you can’t win ’em all. Its appearance on the 2007 live video release Beside You In Time is hailed as a standout of a fantastic live set.

This song did get some sideways glances in 1999 after the Columbine High School massacre. The killers were fond of Nine Inch Nails and often incorporated The Downward Spiral lyrics and references into their journals. The band took a fair bit of heat as a scapegoat for the murders and Burn was referenced a fair bit as a conduit to world decay, but in the end everyone moved on and NIN pressed on along with Burn.

In the end, Burn is a fantastic cut from the impressive Nine Inch Nails catalog. It fit the movie it was written for like a glove, and the song has gone on to be a feature in live sets even without the benefit of appearing on an album. It is “angsty crap,” but there’s something more visceral and real about this sort of angst. It is more than hollow-heading ranting at something just for fun, this is a true connection to the type of rage and anguish of being a “failed” member of society can bring.

Oasis – Whatever

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Originally I was going to discuss 2023 a bit more. I decided against that after I got to typing – this year has been a bit of a shit to me personally and I’d rather see it just go the hell away. Instead, I’ll go with what is supposed to be my normal Wednesday routine and talk about a song instead.

Whatever, indeed.

Our song today hails from Oasis, and was their first ever non-album single. We are now 29 years and 1 day removed from its single release, it was a UK Christmas single in 1994. This would do very well for what was about to become a behemoth of British rock, the song went to number 3 on the UK charts and sold over 540,00 copies.

This was recorded as part of the sessions for the debut album Definitely Maybe, and in fact I believe it was released on a few international versions of the album. I can’t immediately corroborate this, so if anyone has more concrete information about this, please share and I’ll be happy to correct this.

The thing that kept Whatever off the debut album was the use of orchestra strings, which were recorded by the London Session Orchestra. Among the players was violinist Wilfred Gibson, who had previously been part of Electric Light Orchestra, as well as contributing to early King Crimson work, among others. Imagine being this guy who had been on decades of mountain-moving work.

But Oasis and the powers that be, likely Alan McGee and Creation Records, decided that Whatever didn’t fit the debut album. I’d honestly say it’s a fair call, this song does stand out as different from the vibe on the record. It might have worked, but Definitely Maybe does work just great as it is, so it’s probably for the best that this is a bonus track.

Our song today isn’t that difficult to go through, most Oasis songs aren’t. It’s an ode to being free and embracing whoever you are, like a lot of Oasis it’s a celebration of the everyday person. It’s an embrace of the free spirit of the brief Britpop time of the mid-90’s where things weren’t as grim and everyone could take on the new form of rock music while still having a good time. It’s a celebration of self, it isn’t overly intellectual and it works pretty well.

The signature part of this song might be at the end, as the last minute or so sees the strings lead the song out. It leads to memes like the one just below, and it sums up the spirit of the song. We aren’t supposed to take it all that seriously, yet in that time for us of the right age in the mid-90’s, this was pretty serious. For a brief moment in time, relatively speaking, Oasis were the voice of a generation.

Now, this song did give primary songwriter Noel Gallagher a bit of a fit – there was a lawsuit from celebrated English act Neil Innes, who contended that this song lifted parts from Innes’ 1973 song How Sweet To Be An Idiot. Oasis management chose to settle, and Innes is listed as a co-writer of Whatever.

This got played out live a fair bit, including during Oasis’ high time of 1996, and the Knebworth set that I go on and on about on here. All in all this is listed as being played 99 times during the band’s career, and was one they were playing on their final tour when shit came to shit and the band imploded. Both Noel and Liam have played this in solo sets post-split.

So at the end of the day we have a Christmas song, although it’s not about Christmas, as if Oasis would ever do that. But we do have a very nice song that didn’t quite fit the album they were putting out and we got this as a bonus single instead. A fine piece of work, if I do say.

Bruce Dickinson – Afterglow Of Ragnarok

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Usually I do a “song of the week” but this week we’ll get two as I have the new Bruce Dickinson single in my hands and, as luck would have it, there are two songs on it. One of them many are already familiar with, but we’ll get to that.

Afterglow Of Ragnarok is the lead single from Bruce’s forthcoming album The Mandrake Project. The album has now had its tracklist previewed and will be released on March 1st, 2024. Anticipation is high among the fanbase for this one, as this is Bruce’s first solo album since 2005, nearly a two decade wait. This first single was released to streaming on Friday, December 1st and it was also issued on 7-inch vinyl, which I got in the mail this past Monday.

The single package includes a small comic book which sets up the story being told in this concept album. There will also be a graphic novel running alongside the album that further gets into the crazy story Bruce has set up here. The music video for this song and the small comic inside the vinyl seem to be setting up the same story.

Afterglow Of Ragnarok

The A-side is the title song here so let’s hit that up first. You may notice the video is 8 minutes long, but rest assured the actual song is a more lean 5:40. There is an intro and extended credits cut on the video here.

This is one heavy, heavy song. It does go into some more melodic sections that give Bruce room to shine (well, sort of, we’ll get into that in a second) but this is seriously heavy stuff from Roy Z. It’s honestly a little stark just how hard hitting this one is. Not in a bad way at all, but there’s an edge here beyond what we’ve heard from Bruce or his other outfit.

Lyrically this one is a tough nut to crack. It’s not one of those songs that offer something to the usual human experience and that anyone can take a bit of meaning from. This is a pretty dense affair that has all to do with the story being told. The song functions well on its own but it will require hearing the whole album and knowing more about what the hell is going on to really get into the theme.

There is a pretty big issue here, one that I am far from alone in bringing up. For whatever reason, Bruce’s vocals are fairly buried in the music here. The instruments, which again are heavy as all hell, are somewhat flooding out a guy known as the Human Air Raid Siren. It’s a very noticeable flaw here and one I put down to production. Bruce sounds fine, all concerns about his age and past throat cancer aside. He may not wail like it’s 1984 but he can still carry a tune plenty well enough to do this solo record. But a puzzling choice was made to put his vocals under the music for some reason and it sticks out. It is maybe a bit better on the actual vinyl as opposed to digital but it’s still noticeable. I don’t know how this all works but I’m hoping someone can stealth fix this issue a bit before the full album releases, at least get the digital version of the album set straight. I do still like the song and I’ll gladly play the album but this flaw can’t be looked over.

If Eternity Should Fail (demo)

The B-side offers up a bit of a treat and a song nearly 10 years old now. This is the demo recording Bruce and Roy Z did of this song back when they were first laying plans for this album. The album was supposed to go by this title and this was presumably either the centerpiece or the starting point for the huge story.

Well, something got in the way, and that something is Steve Harris and Iron Maiden. Steve heard this demo and really liked the song, and as you may notice it is the opening track of The Book Of Souls. This led Bruce back to the drawing board and he chose a new title for the album and, after some rewrites on the background story, he also re-christened this song. I presume the track Eternity Has Failed from the album will bear some resemblance to this one but also be its own entity.

But here we have the original demo recording done in 2014. It is pretty well what most would think – it’s a demo version of this song. It is basic in structure though the song is fairly well formed, it hits the same beats as it does in its final form and there isn’t anything missing or altered. It is bare bones compared to the Maiden version but that’s certainly excusable as this is only Bruce and Roy’s demo version, they didn’t even get a chance to finish it. It’s a cool thing to have as a B-side, especially since the song proper didn’t make the album. We also get to clearly hear Bruce speak what is a bunch of distorted vocal gibberish on the end of the finished Maiden version – it’s all stuff that directly relates to Bruce’s story but Steve said to leave it on the Maiden album because “lol,” I guess.

One further note – as of now, this B-side seems to only be available on the physical vinyl single. I could not find it on any official digital service and I’m not gonna bother posting a random YouTube version that will probably get taken down in a day. This is more of a cool bonus track anyway, it’s not something essential to the album itself.

That about covers it for this new single, ahead of one of my most anticipated albums of 2024. The old guard are still flying the metal flag, gotta enjoy it while we can.

Saxon – Hell, Fire And Damnation

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First off – I haven’t been on schedule this week at all. This was a combination of the holiday weekend and just general laziness. I’ll have a post today, the next Maiden live album tomorrow, then be back to normal next week.

For today here’s a quick and easy one – this is a new song from metal legends Saxon, who are preparing the release of their 24th album this coming January. 24 records is absolutely staggering and just a great accomplishment, and that the vast majority of them are solid albums is also fantastic.

This new song Hell, Fire And Damnation was released last week and is the title track from the new record. It is a really nice song, Saxon have had a winning metal formula down now for quite awhile so it’s no huge surprise. The music does suit the pretty heavy topic at hand, which of course are also three of my favorite things – hell, fire and damnation.

I am a bit unclear as to one member of Saxon’s present line-up. The following are in place – Biff Byford as the band’s constant presence on vocals, guitarist Dug Scarratt, Bassist Nibbs Carter and drummer Nigel Glockler are all along for the ride. Back earlier in 2023, co-founding member Paul Quinn retired from touring. It was assumed he was going to be involved with future recording endeavors, but here we have an interesting quirk without a ready answer.

To replace Quinn in the touring line-up, Saxon recrutied longtime Diamond Head mainstay Brian Tatler. He was billed as a touring replacement and did state in certain terms that he would also be continuing with Diamond Head. However, the video clearly features Tatler in it and the video blurb touts the guitar duo of Scarratt and Tatler, so going by these bits of information it appears Brian Tatler is fully Saxon’s second guitarist. I’m sure all of this will be made clearer as the album’s release is closer.

That is about all for this one, it’ll be one of many albums I’m looking forward to next year. I’m curious also to see just how much longer Saxon goes on, but at this point I won’t doubt the great British beast to continue for several more years, anyway.

Cypress Hill – Insane In The Brain (Song of the Week)

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The song this week is a hit cut from Cypress Hill’s 1993 album Black Sunday. This song was big business for the California rap outfit, as it hit number 19 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was a number 1 on the rap chart. It also was certified 3 times platinum as a single, and Black Sunday was the group’s second multi-platinum album in a row, it going 4 times platinum. Cypress Hill had already gained a following, but this song would blow them up.

Insane In The Brain is a song with a very, very familiar beat – if you think it sounds a lot like House Of Pain’s 1992 hit Jump Around, that’s because it does on purpose. This 2019 interview with The Guardian lays out the song’s background – DJ Muggs of Cypress Hill was the producer for the House Of Pain song. He originally tried getting Cypress Hill to use the beat but they didn’t want to record at the time, so he worked it into the HoP song. He liked the foundation a lot so he worked it up again for the next CH album. So no one was ripping anyone off on this one, except DJ Muggs ripping himself off.

Also there is a bit of the song’s lyrical background in the interview, courtesy of Sen Dog. He says the inspiration behind the title was a phrase that the hardest gangsters would use when talking to each other. If one walked up and said “I’m insane, got no brain,” that meant some crazy shit was about to go off. Even in gang culture, it was something reserved for the real heavy stuff.

As it turns out, the actual verses themselves are diss tracks, or Cypress Hill’s responses to being dissed. B-Real’s first verse is a response to a rapper named Chubb Rock, who apparently did a whole song mocking B-Real. And Sen Dog’s verse is aimed at Kid Frost, someone Sen had been close to but who changed and talked some smack about Cypress Hill.

What I’ll say is this – I’d never heard the names Chubb Rock or Kid Frost before looking into this song for this post. I’ve “heard of” Cypress Hill for over 30 years now, so I think the diss winner is pretty evident.

For all of the background that might not be evident on listen, the simple distillation here is that this is a slamming track. It is slight bits creepy and goofy, just enough of both to lend shades to the song without coloring it too much. B-Real’s vocal delivery on the chorus lends a twisted atmosphere to things, and everything comes together with the already familiar beat template to put together a total banger. No one really needed to know what the song was about, just that it was nuts and was a great time.

This song was all the rage back in 1993, when I turned 16 and was happy to enjoy these different sorts of things presented on MTV and through the alt-culture that sprung up around then. Cypress Hill had a ton of crossover appeal and it wasn’t hard for them to get heads bobbing to their songs.

I do have one funny little story, borrowed from an old friend from around that time. He had a PA system and would often DJ high school dances. I myself did not attend these but he did relay this really funny bit about this song. He had this on at one dance and B-Real’s famous line came up “Cops – come and try to snatch my crops.” The teacher who was supervising the dance came over and told him “there will be no crop snatching here!” and demanded the song be stopped. This was the life of small town high school dances in the early ’90’s, in case you were wondering. These days there will be no crop snatching because hey, it’s legal, but this was a long time ago.

That’s about all that needs to be said about this Cypress Hill blockbuster. It was fun, hard and drove everyone wild and it’s still great fun all these years later. It’s probably even more fitting now since just about everyone seems to be ate up, it’s kind of a theme song for these crazy times.

W.A.S.P. – Blind In Texas (Song of the Week)

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I’m switching up my post format for this week only due to both music news and a few scheduling conflicts with myself. There will be no Album of the Week this go around, everything will be back to normal next week.

This week’s song highlight is a single from the second W.A.S.P. album The Last Command. The sad occasion to mark this is the death last week of drummer Steve Riley, which I’ll discuss in more detail after tackling the song itself.

W.A.S.P. had made quite a scene with their 1984 debut record and were primed to keep the momentum rolling on with album number two. One personnel change was made – drummer Tony Richards was out and replaced by the aforementioned Steve Riley. The rest of the band was the same – Blackie Lawless on vocals and bass, Chris Holmes and Randy Piper on guitar.

The Last Command released in October of 1985 with Blind In Texas as its lead single. While the single didn’t make much mainstream chart noise, the album did go platinum and the band was bringing in a little cash to go along with its notoriety as one of the “Filthy Fifteen.”

Blind In Texas is a big and loud song, as huge as the state it’s named for. It kicks off from the first note and doesn’t let up once. The entire thing is about getting hammered and shouting out cities in Texas, there is absolutely zero deeper meaning to this song and nothing to be read into. It was one of many early W.A.S.P. Cuts that translated well live, hard to beat a straightforward rocker about getting messed up.

The song is great and full of energy, but the occasion to bring this one up is rather sad. On October 24, 2023, drummer Steve Riley died at age 67 after a long battle with pneumonia.

Riley got going in the Los Angeles scene in 1984 with Keel and their debut album The Right To Rock. Riley was quickly approached to fill the vacant drum position with W.A.S.P., where he would play on two studio albums and one live record. After departing W.A.S.P., Riley was almost immediately taken on in L.A. Guns. He would hang around that group for quite while and eventually wound up in his own version of the band these past few years. A new Riley’s L.A. Guns release had been planned for a 2024 release.

Steve Riley himself had said he was pretty lucky to wind up in both “waves” of the 1980’s rock and metal coming out of L.A. His contributions to that were immense, as a drummer of good caliber he played on music still remembered nearly 40 years later. While he has sadly passed on, his music will continue to live on.

Robert Palmer – Addicted To Love (Song of the Week)

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I was just talking about Robert Palmer a bit yesterday so I might as well have at it and go over his best-known song. While this song is well known there is still a fair bit of interesting background to go through on it.

Addicted To Love was the second single from Palmer’s late 1985 album Riptide. The album sold well but that isn’t radically important in comparison to the massive success of this song, which was the driving force behind the album sales. This was a US number one hit and would be Palmer’s only actual chart topping single, though he got very close a few other times. It also hit number one in Australia and charted highly in several other countries.

If you think the band was Robert Palmer with a handful of extremely attractive women dressed as mannequins, well, you would be wrong. A bunch of people worked on the album with Palmer, but he would have some assistance from old bandmates in a group called Power Station. From there on this song are Tony Thompson, Bernard Edwards and Andy Taylor, yes that Andy Taylor from Duran Duran.

And this song was originally conceived as something extra – it was supposed to be a duet with Chaka Khan and was recorded as such. Khan’s management demanded that her parts be removed from the song because she had a few big hits around that time and they didn’t want her being overexposed.

It’s true that Khan had a lot going on at the time, she’d lit the charts up with her own songs as well as a guest shot on Steve Winwood’s hit single Higher Love. But I’d say her management dropped the ball here, as I don’t see the problem with having yet another number one hit to your name.

Addicted To Love is pretty simple to figure out, the song’s theme is spelled out in the title. Being hooked on love is a real thing and songs about love are what move a lot of people to listen to music so it all comes together pretty well. “Love as a drug” is something I guess is established by science but I don’t know much about science so I’ll leave it at that. Coupled with the smooth pop rock of the music, this is a winning formula right out of the gate.

The song did fantastically but many remember the music video. Palmer appeared on stage with a group of models who are acting as his backing band. This got everyone’s attention and Palmer would use the “girls in black” for his next few videos. Also, everyone and their mother either spoofed or copied the gimmick for their own videos over the course of the next several years. This remains one of the most iconic videos of the 1980’s and was nominated for the MTV Video of the Year, but it lost out – that was the same year Dire Straits did the Money For Nothing video and there’s no beating that.

This would be the peak of Robert Palmer’s success, though he’d still be lingering toward the top of the singles charts for awhile. His 1988 song Simply Irresistible was another massive tune but was kept out of the number one slot by some song called Sweet Child O’ Mine. Palmer would go on touring, recording and reuniting briefly with his Power Station bandmates until 2003 when he died of a heart attack at 54.

This song was everywhere just as I was growing up and really starting to pay attention to music. Though to be honest one didn’t have to venture far to find this on a radio or TV. This is truly one of the definitive cuts of the ’80’s and a magnificent time capsule of that period.

Judas Priest – Panic Attack (Song of the Week)

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This week it’s a special one, as we finally have our first taste of the new Judas Priest record. Finally announced for March 8 of 2024, Invincible Shield will be the band’s 19th album. It features the very colorful album cover shown above.

Panic Attack is the first single released from said album, this hit digital airwaves last Friday, October 13th. It does appear to be a digital only single, as most are nowadays. The clip on YouTube has already snagged over half a million views since Friday so this is was a pretty well anticipated drop.

One quick thing before I get further into things – I’ve checked out a fair few reviews and reactions to this song and almost everyone is saying that it’s “very long.” Folks, this song is 5:27. It isn’t some huge stretch to have a 5 minute song, I don’t know where people are getting that this is super long or anything. We aren’t in Opeth territory where 8 songs comprise a double live album, this is a fairly average traditional heavy metal song. That one has been throwing me off and I felt the need to say something there.

This one opens with a synth intro for the first 40 or so seconds. It’s not a return to the days of Turbo or Ram It Down, it’s an intro more reminiscent of something from Iron Maiden’s Somewhere In Time, if anything. The intro is fine and there are small but effective uses of electronic effects throughout the song, like sirens here and there and something akin to the “Transformers” sound at transitions between the verses and chorus. These enhancements work out really well and I think add to the song just fine, the base structure of things is still guitar, bass, drums and Rob Halford’s unholy wail.

The proper song is another burner and in keeping with what Priest have been up to on their past few albums – a more straight-on heavy metal attack. It’s fresh and relevant for a band with guys over 70 years old in it, no small feat when many others fall by the wayside at over 50 years into their existence.

There’s a good bit of guitar soloing here, which you would expect from a band famous for its twin guitar attack. And yes, Glenn Tipton is playing here along with Richie Faulkner. But even when not taking center stage, the guitars are kicking out very nice riffs to move the music along.

The star performer here though has to be Rob Halford. 72 years old and he sounds like this? He is in full voice here and also using different parts of his range. Many singers have sadly fallen off as they hit their mid-60’s, but Halford joins Klaus Meine as those who have kept their power and vitality well beyond that. His stint here is something to behold.

Lyrically, Panic Attack is a direct shot aimed at the culture of the 2020’s. It tackles the misinformation, screeching keyboard warriors, opportunistic politicians and all of the dread and hostility surrounding pretty much everything these days. It’s not common for Judas Priest to take on these kind of current issues so directly, but here they go for it full throat. It’s very impressive and they do very well to avoid the now common trap of simply complaining about cancel culture – instead they really get to everything and all of the various issues that come together to create this shitshow we’re currently in.

The one and only “criticism” I have isn’t even really a complaint, it’s just something pretty funny in the song. At one point roughly 3 minutes in, Rob in full high-range wail belts out “World Wide Web.” I got a chuckle out of that, it does seem a bit out of place but then again it’s kind of what the song is about.

Overall I’m very impressed with Panic Attack, and I’m looking forward to exiting the winter that hasn’t even hit yet to get my hands on the full length Invincible Shield. So far it’s lining up to be yet another nice entry in the Judas Priest catalog.

Metal Church – The Dark (Song of the Week)

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It’s spooky season so it’s a great time for a song about spooky stuff.

Metal Church released their second album The Dark in 1986 and today’s song is the title track. This album got a pretty mixed reception from critics, who were more in love with the band’s self-titled debut, but this album and song have its fans and I am absolutely one of them.

Metal Church are more accurately described as a US power metal act than a thrash band, though this song might convince some otherwise. This is a hard and aggressive track with pounding riffs and rapid fire vocal delivery from David Wayne, who is almost rapping through the chorus. There is an instrumental break but not really a proper solo, this song pretty much just slams in and out.

Lyrically the song is about being stuck in a house at night while sinister things are about. No telling if those evil things are real or imagined, but all those noises in the night are making the song’s subject paranoid. He feels like he has to stay up all night to avoid being prey to whatever lurks in the shadows, if that thing is even real. Playing upon that fear of things that may or may not be there, often a childhood thing, can be far scarier than an actual monster on a rampage.

The Dark wasn’t released as a single but is a relatively well-known song from the band’s output. IT doesn’t have the profile of songs like Watch The Children Pray from this same album or a few cuts from the widely celebrated debut, but this one still stands as a signature Metal Church track. It was covered by Stone Sour in 2015 when that group focused on playing several cover tracks.

Metal Church would go on through a lot of line-up changes, hiatuses and tragedies through the years, including the death of David Wayne in 2005. Founding guitarist Kurdt Vanderhoof has been the band’s caretaker through the 2000’s. While Metal Church have been through a lot of ups and downs in the decades since their 1980’s breakthrough, they have also contributed a lot to the realm of metal, including this great song.

Beastie Boys – Sabotage (Song of the Week)

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The song pick this week is one of the more iconic audio and video clips from the early ’90’s. The song is fantastic and the video is totally unforgettable.

Sabotage was the first singe from the Beasties’ fourth album Ill Communication. The single was released in January of 1994, while the album was a few months behind in May. The single had a rather light performance conventionally, landing at 18 on the US Alternative Airplay chart and 19 on the UK Singles chart. The album was a smash success, claiming a Billboard number 1 and hitting 3 times platinum in the US.

The Beastie Boys were always a genre-bending outfit, combining elements of hip-hop, rock, metal, punk and whatever else around the house wasn’t bolted down. In the music environment of 1994, Sabotage simply qualified as a rap-rock song, nothing unusual to find on the radio or MTV at the time. Of course, the Beastie Boys were also one of the primary influences on the fusion of rap and rock, so no great surprise that another single of theirs would be right at home among a host of music they helped influence.

Lyrically, Sabotage is a venomous rant against the music industry and specifically a producer that had screwed the band over – except that nothing of the sort really happened. Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz relayed in the 2020 Beastie Boys Story documentary that they were simply spewing a fictional rant at Mario Caldato, the song and album’s producer. Caldato was not truly doing anything untoward, it was just a way that the Beasties came up with lyric ideas.

Sabotage is inseparable from its music video, which was what truly launched the song into immortality. The clip was helmed by director Spike Jonze and was styled as the opening credits to a 1970’s-era cop show. Each member of the band played a member of the police force, with Adam “MCA” Yauch getting two roles in the video.

The video is simply amazing. It does truly look like a cop show from the time period it represents and could easily be mistaken for a trailer to a real show. Just ask Beavis, who is probably still wondering where the real Sabotage show is. All of the Beasties look the part and the high-flying action is captured perfectly. MTV did originally censor portions of the video, including the parts with bodies flying out of a car and off of a bridge, though it was abundantly clear that dummies were used in the “stunts.” The YouTube clip above features the full uncensored video.

The video was in constant rotation on MTV and was the catalyst to the song being played over and over again for anyone tuning in throughout 1994. The video was nominated for five awards at the 1994 VMA’s but was infamously shut out, mostly losing to Aerosmith’s Cryin’ video. That should be considered a crime, honesty. In 2009 MTV created a new award centering around videos that should have previously won awards and Sabotage was the winner.

Sabotage and Ill Communication would help turn the Beastie Boys into total household names, something they had been well on their way toward anyway, but the ever-present MTV video and success of the album would be the point of no return. No doubt that Sabotage is one of the defining songs and videos of the time period.