Beastie Boys Perform "Sabotage" | Letterman 

This is a perfect example of a live performance that bests the studio cut due to the irreplaceable force of live spontaneous raw energy.

The best live version of Sabotage!!!!

Probably one of the best live versions of the song.

One base lick, a two note guitar solo, and some beats and almost 30 uears later it still hold up!!!🎉😊

I love this because it's true to their rap fame but also to their punk beginnings.

I stayed up late to watch this when it first aired. I recorded it to VHS and watched it over and over again. I was 13 years old. Still love it!

That Punk sound never left the band no matter what genre they play. They were really good.

Never thought about how unusual it is for a Beastie song to feature just one singer. Also I love how Money Mark gives Paul Shaffer a warm gesture at the end for letting him play his keyboard.

Yauch with his hat, Free Tibet sticker on his amp and chest bump requests… what a legend. Still missed!

amazing how one can recognize genius just by listening to one chord. these guys were on another level

One of the best bass solos of all time. RIP my hero MCA

What a lucky live audience, they got their faces melted off with that performance. BRAVO!

A masterclass in how to rock a single chord.

I don't often listen to The Beastie Boys, but when I do, so does the neighborhood!

Adam Yauch, aka MCA, trying to do a chest bump with Dave at the end of the song. LOL

Another reason why the 90’s was just Awesome!!!

Just reminds you how good we had it and we didn't know it

ICONIC performance!!!🤘🤘🤘

I'm telling you.....one of the best live performances on a talk show EVER!!!!!

The bass sound on this track is so distinctive and perfect for it. I dare anyone to listen to this song and not bob their head when that beat drops.

Epic performance of this song... will never get tired of this version. This song is perfection! The vocals, the drums, the keyboards, the guitar, the record scratching and that absolutely sick bass !!! RIP Adam

SOLID piece of music. Huge performance. The world is a better place thanks to Beastie Boys + Spike Jonze.

Epic. One of the best live TV performances. I was lucky enough to catch it back in the day when TV was live. Still get goosebumps watching this. RIP Adam Yauch. A legend.

They were an amazing liveband! I was lucky enough to see them perform twice.

Lifetime Beastie fan…this live performance is a freakin mind blow

Legendary performance. Nice to see it posted legit.

David's show was my favorite part of my day..back in my high-school days.....80-84.....

This is the best Beastie Boys song their is. It just sounds so awesome its like a work of art lol.

Love the Beastie Boys..this track rocks

LIVE rap and hip hop is honestly THE BEST when it's performed with live instruments. I love it. Plus this song is like literally one chord, YET IT WORKS!

Such a great band and song. Beastie Boys rocked

By far my favorite Beastie boys song. Still so good.

Their sound around this time was amazing. The organ and the drums... And of course DJ Hurricane.

So nice to have the official, full quality version of this performance on here! This has to be the absolute best live performance of a song I've seen on TV. I actually like this version better than the studio recorded album version because it has even more energy! I always liked the Beastie Boys but for some reason really got into them during the COVID lockdowns and would listen to them nonstop because their energy was helping me with anxiety of all the stuff that was going on and later dealing with my late father's health problems and so I'd put on my Beastie Boys playlist and go for long bike rides but I'd make sure and have Sabotage in the mix more than the other songs! It's a masterpiece.

love the fact that Hurricane is wearing a shirt with his own face on it

Boys absolutely killed it 🤙🤙

Still 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 after all these years.

One hundred thumbs up ! If a band can play, live, on national TV and sound that good.

Maybe the best musical performance in the history of the show

Very distinctly remember this original broadcast and watching the boys set the bar that much higher.

Totally remember watching this live as a teenager on a tube tv. One of the greatest moments on letterman 😊

They can play their own music!!!! Awesome!

Hardest G# chord of all time.

They were great at Lollapalooza that year!

Probably the greatest live music performance on tv ever, of any song.

Very few bands/groups/singers/rappers sound just as good live as on album. BB is definitely one

Still one of my favorite tv live performances of any band. My man on the timbales killed it. Letterman had a lot of good musical performances over the years. Radiohead Karma Police is another I remember.

seeing them at Lollapalooza in Charlotte was awesome! Sabotage came on and the crowd erupted with energy!

I own the albums and music videos, but I keep coming back to this

The podcast “60 Songs that Explain the 90s” did an episode about this song. Lots of background info on the band.

MCA: “We don’t shake, BROTHERS HUG.”

Been waiting for this one! One of the best performances of all time

I will never get bored of watching this performance of Sabotage. Such a great song and it’s so fun to play too 🥁

Great sound quality on Letterman's set....they sound fantastic!

It’s been 10,813 days since this aired on tv and it never gets old😊

So far ahead of their time, most of the world will never catch up! Freaking genius!

The theme itself screams to you : "this gonna be a hell of a ride " 🔥

If you are still listening in 2024, you are a true legend. 🤝

Ahh, Beasties and Letterman. Two great tastes that taste great together.

Peak Beastie; Grand Royal label in the mid to late 90s had some of the best in the NY music scene. Three years later the Boys are headlining the Tibetan Freedom Concert.

RIP Adam, Rockin the hard 90s style in the hardest way

This could be the best live tv performance ever 📺

i was 4 months old when this came out! favorite hip hop album ever!!

Love the Beastie Boys (Music is timeless And this song still rocks) ❤️🤘🎤🎸🪕🥁🍻

Thanks for combining the performance with the Letterman talking bookends. Good archive.

we had so beautiful childhood , with this music

Wow! They were so good live!

This is a great release by letterman. The video quality is only superseded by the lights out beasties! Iconic and bombastic beats

Legends of a live performance....cant replicate

Superb performance. The organ is a superb touch. God bless Adam's memory.

Bass line is great

This is awesome. Dave always had the best bands. I hope they upload Pearl Jam - Hail Hail from 1996.

A beast of a performance!!!! Good days indeed. Proper band.

Beastie Boys is always pure skill.

KUDOS to the graphics department for getting the Sabotage video logo into the thumbnail. I know it was a struggle, and it was well worth it!

This is easily the greatest late night talk show music performance ever. THIS WENT HARDER THAN THE TRIPLE MURDER THAT THE EVENING NEWS REPORTED!

My God, what a perfect live performance, Amazing!

Timeless and SUPERDELUXE !!❤❤

Let it be noted that the Beastie Boys started out as a hardcore punk band before they did hiphop. It shows in songs and performances like this ❤

This is the soul of New York.

Somewhere I have a VHS copy of this I recorded the night it aired. I remember being so excited that they were performing on Letterman! I knew I had watched an epic performance!

The bass absolutely slaps in this

2024 and still awesome...❤

Absolute masters. How does this have less than a million views?

This is pure gold

Great song! I used to play it in a cover band and nobody knew what it was but it was our best song. So much energy and coolness

My partner and I saw them perform last year at the Calgary Stampede. The best show I've seen in years. They still have the authority to do music their way. That being said I was working at a blockbuster video when they started selling CDs and AQUA was the best seller at that time. I was a sour teen at the moment and didn't give AQUA the benefit they deserved then. Most of Todd's notes are on point to how I felt forever. However that all changed after I saw them perform live. Do I listen to their music voluntarily? No. But I appreciate them more after witnessing their passion in front of me. Well done Todd.

Great live performance 🍷

Ohhhhhhhhh yeahhhhh ❤

One of those tracks so iconic that they just feel like they HAD to exist in music history, and nobody could have done it better here.

I was lucky to see them at Hollywood Bowl and Run DMC opened for them and it was crazy show

Haha, "the big kid making the canary noise" is DJ Hurricane!

This is precious

One of my favorite things right here

Omg to see that in HD and not vhs, my eyes are not worthy !!! Thank you for preserving this!!!!! ❤❤

Truly a band of our time

Absolutely amazing. They are missed. What a time…

Amazing tape, even today. Thanks Beastie Boys

One of the BEST live single performances pulled off inside that building they just had it

Letterman had some of the best musical guests.