Songoftheday 4/2/15 - You wake up late for school man you don't want to go, you ask you mom please but she still says no!...

"(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)" - Beastie Boys
from the album Licensed To Ill (1986)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #7 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 10

Today's Song of the day comes from the New York white-boy rap trio Beastie Boys, who went from punk rock roots to being the first rap act to land a #1 album on Billboard's albums chart. Mike D, MCA, and Ad-Rock (aka Mike Diamond, Adam Yauch, and Adam Horovitz) were well-off kids from the city (Horovitz's father Israel was an award-winning playwright), who gravitated to hip-hop through their college years. With some useful connections, they toured with Madonna and Run DMC before they even released their debut album Licensed To Ill (notoriously first named Don't Be A Faggot). While the first single, "Hold It Now, Hit It" became a minor hit on the R&B chart at #55, the second, "The New Style", landed them into the R&B top-40 at #22, a huge feat for a bunch of college kids. But while they were gettin' play and sales in the city, pop radio remained cool to the scratch-beat style. Until...

Using hard rock guitars in the same fashion as Run DMC, the Beasties' fourth single, "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)", the novelty track on the album intended to be a spoof of the frat boys that do nothing but party, they unexpectedly landed a "viral"-style hit on MTV and in record stores and even pop radio, as the comedy outweighed any qualms on airing "rap" songs...

"Fight For Your Right" became the Boys' first and only top-10 pop hit in March of 1987, while missing the R&B chart altogether. Internationally, the record reached the top-10 in Canada and the Netherlands, #11 in the UK, and top-40 in Germany and Australia.

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and here's a short (and technically crappy) vhs tape of them live in 1987...

The last cover Cory Monteith recorded for Glee before his death was this song...

And on the day of Adam Yauch's death from cancer, Coldplay took "Fight For Your Right" to another place...

Up tomorrow: a "rich" singer needs to reminisce.