Lounging in Salt Lake City's E Center dining room before the night's big Beastie show, Adam Yauch, 34, explains why he left L.A. for New York City: "I felt like I wanted to go home," he says in his soft, measured way. "It's where my family came from--my friends, all that." But MCA is quick to assert that his eastward move had little to do with the subsequent return of fellow NYC natives (and prodigal sons) Mike Diamond and Adam Horovitz. "I don't feel like I exactly led a charge back to New York," Yauch insists. "We all kind of chose to move back over a period of time, for a variety of reasons."
The Boys' respective homecomings had an undeniable effect on Hello Nasty--discernible not simply in the disc's profusion of old-school 808 beats and NYC guest stars (like Luscious Jackson's Jill Cunniff) but in the settled and introspective vibe that infuses some of the songs. Part of this newfound mellowness is a function of age, of course (the Boys are now all in their thirties)--and one hallmark of Yauch's maturity, in particular, is his wife, Dechen, a Tibetan-American activist whom he first met while attending a speech by the Dalai Lama. As we eat, Dechen attempts to feed Yauch a piece of squash, but he's having none of it: He ducks and weaves, laughing as he grabs her wrist, his fingers looking impossibly pale against her creamy, coffee-colored skin. It's touching--especially since the couple seems unaware of the 250-pound bouncers and muttonchop-sporting union guys chowing down around them. It's even more moving when Dechen stands up--and I notice that MCA is gonna be a dad.
It makes sense that Yauch would be the first Beastie to embrace fatherhood: Although he had a rep as the wildest Boy in the early days--and was the last to try the marriage thing--his well-documented spiritual awakening around the time of Check Your Head made him the most serious and politically conscious member of the group.
Yauch's maturity remains obvious on Hello Nasty: His "I Don't Know" stands out, for instance, as one of the most unexpected and thoughtful Beastie Boys tracks to date. A shuffling acoustic ballad driven by his surprisingly silky voice and Buddhist sensibility, the song is heartfelt in a way that would have been unthinkable even a few years ago. "I'm walking through time, deluded as the next guy," Yauch sings, his voice stripped of any trace of the band's trademark attitude and irony, "pretending and hoping to find that distant peace of mind."
When asked about the origins of the song, Yauch strikes a modest pose. "We rented out this little basement so we could set up some equipment, and we were just going in there and jammin'," he recalls. "That one just came out one day--when I was there, you know, just messing around." This is one of the things that you notice about Yauch, these days: He seems determined to avoid the kind of egomania and hubris that were, at one time, the Beasties' stock-in-trade. Ask him, for instance, about the "Money makin', money money makin'" chant at the center of Hello Nasty's opening blast, "Super Disco Breakin'," and he's quick to insist that the song isn't about accumulating personal wealth at all: "Money makin' is just a synonym for Manhattan," he explains patiently. "Which is why we say ŒManhattan' right after."
The funny thing is, even though Nasty is selling like gangbusters (the thing went platinum in just two weeks, for Christ's sake), Yauch's sincerity makes it seem just plain wrong to push the point any further. Besides, who's going to deny this man the luxury of having both ostensible principles and success? After all, Yauch gives time and money to help the Tibetan people, uses his celebrity to spread a message of tolerance and, lest we forget, will have a baby Beastie to feed pretty soon.
It's this last point that finally breaks Yauch's intensely serious facade. "I think it's a boy," he says happily. "We did a sonogram, but it was kinda hard to tell." When I ask him if he feels any "trepidation" at the thought of becoming a dad, MCA cracks a big smile. "Well, that's a step beyond my vocabulary," he says, looking as innocent and enthusiastic as the day the Beasties played their first Manhattan gig. "But I'm psyched."
