We practiced enough so we had enough songs to play a show. It was just like, let’s be a punk rock band now! And since it started off as a joke, we never really took it seriously. Then when we were done, we would switch instruments and that’s how the Beastie Boys kind of came to be. We would play and we would rehearse as The Young Aborigines it was our serious band. They invited me to play percussion with them. They had a band called The Young Aborigines and they were more post-punk, think a Public Image, Siouxsie and the Banshees-ish tribal kind of thing. He introduced me to Mike Diamond and then eventually Adam Yauch. I remember meeting this guy John Berry, who was the original guitarist for The Beastie Boys, at shows. How did you end up drumming for The Beastie Boys? Seeing this band made me think, ‘Oh, I could do that!’ It’s just one of those things where it had to be in front of your face to be like, ‘Oh AH-HA!’ A bunch of girls were like, ‘we’re going to see this band at CBGBs and the singer is really cute and we should all go!’ We all went and there was this band, Student Teachers, and the drummer was a girl.
I remember there was a time after junior high and before high school during that summer. When was the moment you were inspired to play drums? It’s kind of awesome, if you’re listening. You would walk down the street and you’d hear seven different things. Puerto Ricans, Haitians, Israelis and just all kinds of cultures where everyone is playing their boomboxes and you know there’s the punk rockers and the hippies and whatever. I lived on this kind of crazy street, 14th Street, with a lot of discount stores, where it’s just like this stuff just spilling out into the street. So that’s kind of what informed a lot of us in that time period. It was towards the end of punk rock, just before hardcore was starting up and also around the same time that hip-hop was filtering into the downtown clubs coming from the Bronx. In a lot of ways it was like a tribe of kids all going to see bands, doing fanzines, and just being really creative and starting our own bands.
#Luscious jackson historian free
The kids were free and easy wandering the streets. I went to CBGBs and that was just the vibe of the city. We looked old enough to get into clubs, so we started going out to clubs and seeing bands really early – like at 13. In the 1970’s and 80’s the drinking age was still 18. Luscious Jackson and also Beastie Boys came out of a time in New York where it was very unique. Can you describe the environment you grew up in? I’m curious about what it was like growing up in New York. I’m from New York City and I’ve been playing drums since I was about 13. Kate Schellenbach: I’m Kate Schellenbach, I’m the drummer for Luscious Jackson. Can you introduce yourself to the world of Tom Tom Magazine? Past Bands: Young Aborigines, Beastie Boys, Young and the Useless, Hagatha, Lunachicks, Luscious JacksonĬurrent Band: Luscious Jackson, Pushbuttons! I met up with her in the kitchen of her home in Los Angeles to catch up and share details about a new Luscious Jackson album and talk about her journey on the drums up until now.
Schellenbach seems to understand this current state of the business and she likes it. Instead of traditional channels, there are now many different outlets to get one’s music made and delivered to the people. The music industry has changed dramatically since the band broke up. Luscious Jackson, for those unfamiliar, combined elements of hip-hop, jazz, and rock to create a sound all their own, but they disbanded at the end of the 1990’s. By Anthony Lozano for Tom Tom Magazine Photos by Anthony Buhayīest known for her band, Luscious Jackson, Kate Schellenbach was also the drummer for the Beastie Boys when they were a hardcore punk outfit.