By the late '80s, the pressure was on for the Beastie Boys to produce a follow-up to Licensed to Ill (which went on to sell 10 million copies). But in the immediate aftermath of its release in 1986, hip-hop had exploded in popularity and creativity, with acts like N.W.A., Public Enemy, and De La Soul emerging and taking the form to new heights. If the Beastie Boys wanted to prove their mettle, their second album had to be pretty good. 

While Ill leaned hard on the rock part of "rap-rock," Paul's Boutique was almost purely hip-hop and, as such, built around sampling. The non-lyrical part of the album was the work of the Dust Brothers, producers who'd intended for the music that became Paul's Boutique to be their own record. "They had a bunch of music together, before we arrived to work with them," Adam Yauch told Clash. "As a result, a lot of the tracks on Paul's Boutique come from songs they'd planned to release to clubs as instrumentals — 'Shake Your Rump,' for example. They'd put together some beats, basslines, and guitar lines, all these loops together, and they were quite surprised when we said we wanted to rhyme on it." The Beasties enjoyed critical acclaim for Paul's Boutique — Rolling Stone gave it four stars — but it didn't come close to matching the success of the chart-topping Licensed to Ill. It peaked at #14 on the Billboard album chart and finally reached double platinum status ten years after it hit stores.

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7qL7Up56eZpOkunB9l29ncW9fqbWmedSnq6iklGLBs8HToWSonl2ptaZ5wZ6YrKyZmnqju9isZg%3D%3D