But hip-hop is such a fickle and fluid medium (here today, gone today, as Chris Rock might say) that it would be easy to overrate these albums in retrospect — the actual music, that is, not the influence. It would be simple to let nostalgia take hold and remember them for what they were instead of what they are. It happens all the time. You build up something you loved as a child until the actual article cannot possibly live up to the memory. That, however, is not a problem here. In fact, Tougher Than Leather comes off even better than it did at the time, divorced from the unwieldy pressures that came with trying to follow up their masterpiece, Raising Hell. “Beats to the Rhyme” and “Run’s House” particularly hold up well, with a spare, swaggering style not too far removed from Jay-Z and Kanye West. The Beastie Boys continue to make records that sound exactly like Tougher Than Leather.

Still, on first listen, these albums sound alien, related to current hip-hop in form and little else. The music and lyrics are too straightforward, the subject matter almost quaint in comparison. But listen deeper and you’ll hear bits and pieces of everything that came after it, whether it’s a beat, a rhyme, or just an attitude. Kind of like the way every rock song, at some point, owes a debt to the Beatles. That’s not nostalgia talking. It’s present-day fact. — Zac Crain