DAILYSESSION

By JON PARELES – NY Times

Adam Yauch, a rapper and founder of the pioneering and multimillion-selling hip-hop group the Beastie Boys, died on Friday in Manhattan. He was 47.

His mother, Frances Yauch, confirmed his death. He had been treated for cancer of the salivary gland for the last three years.

With a scratchy voice that grew scratchier through the years, Mr. Yauch rapped as MCA in the Beastie Boys, who were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year. They offered many listeners in the 1980s their first exposure to hip-hop. They were vanguard white rappers who helped extend the art of sampling and gained the respect of their African-American peers.

While many hip-hop careers are brief, the Beastie Boys appealed not only to the fans they reached in the 1980s but to successive generations, making million-selling albums into the 2000s. They grew up without losing their sense of humor or their ear for a party beat. [Read More]

By Andy Beta – The Village Voice

There might not be a tidier under-five-minute overview of two decades of underground New York dance crazes than the 12-inch single “Disco-Tech (Studio 54 Mix).” KATO, a nom de production ofRonald Burrell, recorded it, and New York’s Nu Groove Records released it in 1990. Aside from name checking the glitzy club, Burrell suspends gauzy synth chords, alights upon “The Hustle,” “The Bus Stop,” “The Fox-Trot,” and “The Patty Duke,” and purrs a line from the Spinners’ Philly soul classic “I’ll Be Around” in a way that never feels overcrowded.

That it’s the least compelling moment on The Burrell Brothers Present: The Nu Groove Years 1988–1992, a visceral two-disc set compiling the work of Ronald and his twin brother, Reginald Burrell (the two were born three minutes apart), released in the years between the closing of the Paradise Garage and the rise of Masters at Work, speaks volumes to the dizzying amount of music the Queens-born twins put to wax in those five years. Primitive and tough, with jazz underpinnings and seductive r&b hooks, it paved the way forward for a scene that had been lagging behind the techno coming out of Detroit and acid house blowing in from Chicago.  [Read More]