Sabotage, Beastie Boys, 1994
As many of you know, I work in the School of the Arts office at a regional university and manage a team of student workers. With our age gap being roughly 30 years, it makes for some interesting interactions. I learn so much from the students daily and I hope they learn some things from me, too.
One way we bond is through our office iTunes library which mostly stays on shuffle. I have pretty diverse taste in music and I add songs/albums to the library and each student also adds to the library. We’re in our third year of building this library and many student workers who started it with me have since graduated but their songs stay with us. I think this iTunes library is a beautiful amalgam of individuals with very different backgrounds and perspectives. I’m a goober, but the music library is art to me.
Over the years, with the library staying on shuffle, reactions by student workers to some of the songs have been priceless. Here’s the story of one reaction that tops the list …
I was in my office and three of our student workers were sitting at the conference table in the main room of our small office suite – this is the room where the TV is that plays iTunes.
Yeah … I heard the opening riff of Sabotage by the Beastie Boys come on and immediately shifted into chair dance mode. I’m not even sure if I’m the one who added the Beasties but I love the Beastie Boys (from day one) and Sabotage is one of my all-time favorite songs. It’s just so different and lyrically powerful – angry but still so funky and cool. The drums … the scratching … and that bass riff, y’all, just legendary.
I promise, the second Ad-Rock started “singing/yelling,” I heard one of our student workers (Salina) say in a horribly disgusted judgmental voice, “Oh. My. God. What is this?!” One of the other students replied with, “This is the Beastie Boys.” I nodded with pride at the response only to hear Salina say, “This is the worst thing I’ve ever heard in my life!”
I lost my mind.
I tried for probably 30 minutes to sway her opinion. I schooled her, we listened to more of their work, I showed her videos, I told personal stories about what the Beasties mean to me – nothing worked, she was not having it and it broke my heart. I gave up.
Have you ever wanted so badly for someone to appreciate a song or band that you love to no avail?
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