An energetic New Yorker wants to have the intersection of Ludlow and Rivington streets in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where the remarkable 360-degree album art for the Beastie Boys’ classic 1989 album Paul’s Boutique was photographed, renamed “Beastie Boys Square.”

Here’s some of the news report, from DNAInfo’s Serena Solomon:
 

A Brooklyn resident wants to name the intersection of Ludlow and Rivington streets after the hip-hop trio, marking the corner shown on the cover of their groundbreaking 1989 album “Paul’s Boutique.”

“I think the Beastie Boys represent New York in a certain way,” said LeRoy McCarthy, 46, who earlier this year proposed a street co-naming for rapper Biggie Smalls in Clinton Hill.

“They grew up here. They are New Yorkers.”

McCarthy, a film location scout who previously worked for a record label in Atlanta, has gathered nearly 20 signatures so far on a petition for the Beastie Boys co-naming, including eight of the nine businesses on Rivington Street between Ludlow and Essex streets and many of the apartments on the block, he said.

He hopes to present his proposal to Community Board 3 soon.

-snip-

“I think that the Lower East Side, what it used to be, is a good place to honor the Beastie Boys,” said McCarthy, who fell in love with hip-hop as a child.

“It represents New York. New York is always changing, New York is always on the move, New York is dirty [and] it is beautiful.”

 
Here’s the petition. Do sign it!

As it happens, I’m moving from New York to Cleveland in a couple of days, and completely coincidentally I held my farewell party about a block away from that Ludlow/Rivington intersection.

Here is that intersection as it looked in June 2011, according to Google Maps.
 

 
In May of this year Palmetto Playground in Brooklyn Heights was renamed Adam Yauch Park.

McCarthy is also looking to do something similar for Wu-Tang Clan “in the Park Hill neighborhood of the hip-hop group’s native Staten Island.” I definitely support this idea, but (speaking as a resident of Staten Island, even if only for another forty-eight hours) I propose renaming the “Spirit of America,” the only Staten Island Ferry boat currently in service that is not named for a human being, after the obvious choice: RZA. I would certainly sign a petition to that effect, and in fact I think if you jump ahead 25 years or so, it’s almost inevitable. Because RZA rules.

Here’s a very good interview from the AV Club with Jeremy Shatan, who took the original 360-degree photo. The interview is very informative, I’m a Paul’s Boutique nut but there were things in here I didn’t know.
 

 
via Brooklyn Vegan

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Beastie Boys: ‘Paul’s Boutique’ record release party, 1989
The Beastie Boys’ ‘Paul’s Boutique’ remixed and re-imagined from all the original samples