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Baker's Dozen

Vanity Subjects: Baxter Dury Picks His 13 Favourite Albums
Patrick Clarke , March 18th, 2020 11:10

Patrick Clarke meets Baxter Dury in his West London flat, to talk about his favourite albums from Frank Ocean to his father, and an excruciating encounter with Lou Reed and Lana Del Rey

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Beastie Boys - Licensed To Ill

I saw The Beastie Boys when I was about 14, perhaps around the corner at Hammersmith Odeon. I was fucking obsessed. There were loads of twats like me wearing ill-fitting Adidas, looking like Harry Enfield characters. We were so into it, but very young. I started off with Run DMC, though, I liked the stuff where it was just a drum machine and them singing. We were really into Def Jam, and we pre-empted a big wave of other people being into it. I think we saw Run DMC as well, that was a bit tougher. I guess with Beastie Boys, cynically they were just Russell Simmons and Rick Rubin saying ‘let’s make a band for all the white kids’, and we were just gone, we were away.