Mike D Follows ‘Switch Up’ With New Solo Track ‘What We Got’

Two weeks after his first solo release outside Beastie Boys, Mike D has returned with “What We Got,” a track that deliberately summons the sound of the band’s mid-’90s peak. The beat is banging, the samples are weird, and the guitar fuzz cuts through the mix like a signal from the Ill Communication era. Mike D’s flow, still sharp and unmistakable, carries lines about memory and missed chances over a production that feels handmade rather than polished.

The sessions for these new songs include contributions from his sons Davis and Skyler, alongside Jason Lader, Benjamin Pacheco, Kevin Rhomberg, Carter Lang, and Tyran Donaldson. Lang and Donaldson handled production, with Derek “MixedByAli” Ali mixing. The family presence and the return to a classic sonics are not accidental. Mike D has been staging a gradual, unexpected live comeback, playing intimate pop-up shows in surf shops, roller rinks, and dance halls, backed by his kids and their band Very Nice Person. Tonight and tomorrow he plays Brooklyn’s Xanadu roller rink before heading to Europe for his first solo dates there, including sets in London, Berlin, Paris, and Primavera Sound Porto.

The move into solo work could have been awkward after decades defined by a group that ended with Adam Yauch’s death in 2012. Instead, “What We Got” sounds like an artist reconnecting with a specific moment not for nostalgia’s sake but because the energy still fits. It also suggests these pop-up shows are more than a novelty, they are the shape of a new live identity built around family and raw, immediate spaces.