POP MUSIC : The Beasties Have to Fight for the Right to Airplay

The Beastie Boys are back.

Wow . . . or so what ?

Your reaction is what Capitol Records will be anxiously awaiting next month when the Beasties--the so-called Three Stooges of Rap--release their third album, “Check Your Head.”

The Beastie Boys were the group of 1987 when their debut album “Licensed to Ill” pioneered the now-common punk-metal-rap hybrid and sold more than 4 million copies in the process. It seemed every kid in every schoolyard was shouting “You gotta fight . . . for your right . . . to p-a-a-a-a-r-TAY! “

But the follow-up, 1989’s “Paul’s Boutique,” generated so little attention that some fans of the New York trio probably don’t realize to this day that there was a second album. It sold just enough to go gold (500,000 copies).

The question five years after “Licensed to Ill” is whether either fast-changing world--rap or metal--still cares about the Beasties.

There are doubts.

“They were one of the few white groups with fans in the hard-core rap world,” says Jon Schecter, managing editor of the rap magazine the Source. “The door is open if they come out with the right record, but the whole music scene has changed. They’re sort of an anomaly coming out of the past.”

And the metal realm, which has seen the likes of the Anthrax/Public Enemy “Bring the Noise” collaboration?

“I’m not convinced that the Beastie Boys in the past meant anything to (our listeners),” says Gregg Steele, program director of Long Beach’s hard-rock KNAC-FM. “We’re not opposed to playing songs that help push the limits, help expand people’s minds about how close the genres are getting. . . . but most of the listener response (to the Anthrax/Public Enemy song) was negative. We probably played it less than 10 times.”

Capitol plans to focus on a grass-roots campaign emphasizing the Beasties’ return to the harder tone of “Licensed to Ill.” The group members play most of the instruments in the rock-rap mating that avoids the more textured subtleties of “Paul’s Boutique.”

Says Kathy Lincoln, Capitol’s director of artist development and alternative marketing: “It’s almost as if the Beastie Boys are underdogs. We’re going to work the street very hard and are not going to push this to mainstream (media) at first.”

All the uncertainty doesn’t bother the Beasties.

“What people expect from us (sales-wise) is now more in line with what we do,” say Beastie Mike Diamond (Mike D.) in a rare moment of seriousness from the trio. “The first album just took off. People thought we were gonna take Michael Jackson’s glove. . . . We’re trying to remain on the independent tip. We don’t want to get to the position where people expect anything from us.”