In 1986, New York rappers Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz, Adam “MCA” Yauch, and Michael “Mike D” Diamond did a naked cannonball (metaphorically speaking) into the climate-controlled pool of pop music. With the guitar-laced “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Party)” as their calling card, the Beasties were out for shock value, and it worked: Licensed to Ill had become the fastest-selling album in the history of Columbia Records. They terrified grownups because their gift for writing hilarious, over-the-top lyrics about middle-class urban antics made their music feel contagious. Paul’s Boutique, an album with unprecedented layers of samples that dip in and out, capped an unregulated era when rappers could use samples without legal restriction, and it’s still studied like the Talmud of sampling. By the late 1980s, a lot of pop culture had turned cartoonish, and the Beasties started to regret their jokes about violence and misogyny. On the eclectic Check Your Head, they transformed into a tight three-piece funk band in the mold of Ohio Players or the Meters, and rhymed over their own beats, while Ill Communication, which was highly influenced by Miles Davis, added jazz and hardcore punk to the mix and spun off “Sabotage.” Beastie Boys aged gracefully into parenthood and responsibility without losing any of their humor, even rapping about their gray hairs, not to mention advocating for gun control and tossing gibes at SUVs, George W. Bush, and the KKK.