Additional personnel includes: Miho Hatori, Brooke Williams, Biz Markie, Jill Cunniff, Lee "Scratch" Perry (vocals); Brian Wright (violin, viola); Jane Scarpantoni (cello); Steve Slagle (flute); Paul Vercesi (alto saxophone); Nelson Keane Carse (trombone); Mark Nishita (keyboards); Joe Locke (vibraphone); Eric Bobo, Richard "Sammy's Dad" Siegler, Duduka (percussion); Robert Perlman (drum programming); Mix Master Mike (DJ).

HELLO NASTY won the 1999 Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Performance. "Intergalactic" won the 1999 Grammy for Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group.

Personnel: Brooke Williams, Jill Cunniff, Lee "Scratch" Perry, Miho Hatori (vocals); Brian G. Wright (violin, viola); Jane Scarpantoni (cello); Steve Slagle (flute); Paul Vercesi (alto saxophone); Nelson Keane Carse (trombone); Money Mark (keyboards); Joe Locke (vibraphone); Eric Bobo, Richard Siegler, Duduka (percussion).

DJ: Mix Master Mike.

Recording information: Dungeon, New York, NY (1995-1998); G-Son Studios, Los Angeles, CA (1995-1998); Ted Diamon's House Of Hits (1995-1998); Tree House, New York, NY (1995-1998).

Photographer: Michael Lavine.

Unknown Contributor Roles: Pair Extroidinaire; Ed Durlacher; Pat Shannahan; Alex Bradford & Company; Dean Jones & Company; Les Baxter; Los Angeles Negros; Nine; Run-D.M.C.; The Jazz Crusaders; Barbara Lynn; Leopold Stokowski.

Hello Nasty, the Beastie Boys' fifth album, is a head-spinning listen loaded with analog synthesizers, old drum machines, call-and-response vocals, freestyle rhyming, futuristic sound effects, and virtuoso turntable scratching. The Beasties have long been notorious for their dense, multi-layered explosions, but Hello Nasty is their first record to build on the multi-ethnic junk culture breakthrough of Check Your Head, instead of merely replicating it. Moving from electro-funk breakdowns to Latin-soul jams to spacy pop, Hello Nasty covers as much ground as Check Your Head or Ill Communication, but the flow is natural, like Paul's Boutique, even if the finish is retro-stylized. Hiring DJ Mixmaster Mike (one of the Invisibl Skratch Piklz) turned out to be a masterstroke; he and the Beasties created a sound that strongly recalls the spare electronic funk of the early '80s, but spiked with the samples and post-modern absurdist wit that have become their trademarks. On the surface, the sonic collages of Hello Nasty don't appear as dense as Paul's Boutique, nor is there a single as grabbing as "Sabotage," but given time, little details emerge, and each song forms its own identity. A few stray from the course, and the ending is a little anticlimactic, but that doesn't erase the riches of Hello Nasty -- the old-school kick of "Super Disco Breakin'" and "The Move"; Adam Yauch's crooning on "I Don't Know"; Lee "Scratch" Perry's cameo; and the recurring video game samples, to name just a few. The sonic adventures alone make the album noteworthy, but what makes it remarkable is how it looks to the future by looking to the past. There's no question that Hello Nasty is saturated in old-school sounds and styles, but by reviving the future-shock rock of the early '80s, the Beasties have shrewdly set themselves up for the new millennium. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

On their fifth album and first proclamation in four years, the Beasties pledge allegiance to the next millennium while rocking out old-school stylee. Instead of pretentiously haphazard schizophrenia, Adrock, Mike D and MCA mold Run DMC boasts, Lee Perry dub freestyles, and introspective acoustic strumming into the best album-cum-mix-tape of the first half of '98. NASTY is the true successor to their sampledelic fantasia PAUL'S BOUTIQUE, as realized by craftsmen looking to do more than just get crazy with the sonic cheese whiz.

"Super Disco Breakin'," "Body Movin'," etc. are all first-rate party jams that the trio can probably come up with in their sleep. It's when the Beasties look towards the new school that the artistic flipping of the script begins. Not just in the lyrics, which are expansively conscious in nature and politically literate in content, but sonically as well. The jr. drum-and-bass of "Flowin' Prose" and MCA's acoustic singer/songwriter turn on "I Don't Know" point in directions at once completely incompatible and positively natural. Just like their mate Beck, it is the diversity of styles that the Beasties are prophesizing as the key to the future--so long as that diversity's in the shadow of the old school.