Beastie Boys Launch Swing State Tour
The good news is that the Beastie Boys announced a new tour yesterday. The bad news for me, and my Chicago brethren is that the Boys are only hitting swing states during this tour designed to get more votes for Barack Obama. Now, the Beastie Boys are one of my favorite bands of all-time, and a heavy influence on my musical styling. I wish them the best on their Get Out The Vote Tour, and I seriously hope that any Virginia voters left undecided by October 28th will see the Beastie Boys, turn to the person next to them and say, ‘man, I wasn’t sure who to vote for below, but Adrock just hit his verse in “Root Down” so hard that I’m punching my ticket for Barack.”…Seriously, though, the Beasties will be joined on tour by Sheryl Crow, Jack Johnson, Santagold, Ben Harper, Tenacious D, Norah Jones, and others. You can see Mike D’s statement to Rolling Stone as well as the tour dates below.
The Beastie Boys announced their tour via an email that read:
“This election is too important to stay at home. We hope that you can come out, have a nice night, dance, sing, get your freak on, and then wake up the next morning and get everyone that you possibly can to get out and vote.” Mike D also told Rolling Stone, “Looking at musicians when they take on serious social issues with some degree of cynicism is probably healthy, because you don’t really ever know what people’s intentions are. But everybody is like, ‘What could I possibly do to weigh in here?’ You know we can try and make phone calls, and that’s good, but we could also probably reach a lot more people by doing this.” Diamond added, “”This is the first election in my lifetime that seems so crucial … Barack Obama is somebody who has really got me excited about the Presidential race.”
Beastie Boys Get Out and Vote Tour
October 28 – Richmond, VA @ Richmond Coliseum (With Sheryl Crow, Norah Jones, Jack Johnson and Santogold)
November 1 – St. Paul, MN @ Roy Wilkins Auditorium (With Ben Harper and Tenacious D)
November 2 – Milwaukee, WI @ U.S. Cellular Arena (With Ben Harper, Crosby & Nash and Tenacious D)
