SXSW 2019: Beastie Boys reuniting with Spike Jonze for upcoming live shows in New York and Philadelphia

The Beastie Boys are hitting the stage again next month.

At a freewheeling conversation at SXSW moderated by Amazon Music’s Nathan Brackett, the surviving Beastie members Ad-Rock (Adam Horovitz) and Mike D (Michael Diamond) revealed plans for a series of upcoming stage shows in New York and Philadelphia this April to be directed by longtime collaborator Spike Jonze. Few details were announced, but the shows will be filmed by Jonze for an upcoming release.

The shows will be a continuation of the live events the pair put on last year following the release of the massive Beastie Boys Book, which Diamond admits that they “forgot to film.” Beastie Boys Book made our list of our favourite pop culture books of 2018 — check out our review here.

The Beastie also discussed a potential companion piece to their book titled Funny To Us, with over 150 pages of material that never made the final cut.

The typically hilarious and wide-ranging talk touched on the legacy of MCA (Adam Yauch) who passed away from cancer in 2012, including his wildly inventive production talents that rarely get the spotlight.

“He just knew random shit about so many things in life, not just music” says Diamond. “We just wanted to let people know that was the kind of person he was.”

The Beasties also discussed their relationships in the music industry (“I introduced Wyclef to Carlos Santana and I really regret it now” joked Diamond), but as is always the case with the Beastie Boys, the line between fact and gag is never entirely clear. “The band had a different relationship with reality,” admitted Diamond.

The band also discussed the casting process for the audio version of their book, which features a huge cast of celebrities reading segments of the book, including Steve Buscemi, Snoop Dogg, Kim Gordon, Spike Jonze, LL Cool J, Rachel Maddow, Bette Midler, and many more. According to the band, there were only two outright refusals to participate: Queen Latifah, and Chris Rock, who said he had already done an audiobook for his own autobiography, and that “it sucked.”

Beastie Boys Book is available now.

Beastie Boys stage shows: