“Don’t step out of this house if that’s the clothes you’re gonna wear,” exclaims the parental figure in the Beastie Boys’ 1986 hit “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Party!)”. But step out they did. Not only did the three white, Jewish Lower East Side frat-boy punks go on to become unlikely figureheads for the predominantly black and, back then, still emerging New York hip-hop scene – the same year’s Licensed To Ill was the first rap album to reach US number one – but over the next three decades, they repeatedly helped reinvigorate and reinvent the genre. In their own words: “like a bottle of châteauneuf-du-pape/ I’m fine like wine when I start to rap.” And as with a good vintage, they also got better with age.

But it’s not merely rhyming couplets laden with references to obscure American TV shows, popular culture figures and breakfast cereals we have to thank them for. Over the course of their career, the group also provided lessons in how to dress. From the brands to wear (“rock my adidas, never rock Fila”) to where to find the best in men’s clothing (call Paul’s Boutique and ask for Janice – this was before MR PORTER, of course) to where they kept their rhymes (in a LeSportsac bag, apparently).

Now a member down (Mr Adam Yauch, aka MCA, sadly passed away in 2012), the remaining duo (Mr Michael Diamond, aka Mike D, and Mr Adam Horovitz, aka Ad-Rock) decided to call time on the band. As the final word on their career, they’ve compiled Beastie Boys Book, an almanac – or illmanac? – that charts the many stages of the three MCs.

Here are three photographs taken from the book and the lessons we can all glean from them.

“People always saying my style is wild,” the trio declared in their 1998 single “Intergalactic” – at once a nod to Wild Style, the seminal 1983 film documenting the inception of hip-hop culture, but also an acknowledgement that the Beastie Boys weren’t concerned about breaking a few eggs in order to assemble an omelette (see also the song “Egg Man”). Keen observers of Japanese fashion – they later referenced A Bathing Ape associate Mr Mike Takei on 2004’s To The 5 Boroughs and collaborated with the brand – the trio filmed the “Intergalactic” video in Tokyo. Full of sci-fi imagery and touching on the city’s association with Godzilla (as in the prehistoric sea beast gone nuclear had a tendency to trash the place), the promo film also features some natty boiler suits and high-vis tabards that perhaps pre-empt elements of the latest items from another great Japanese icon, Mr Junya Watanabe.

As with most Americans growing up in the 20th century, the automobile played a huge part in the lives of the Beastie Boys, and in shaping the streets of the city they called home. But the Beasties knew better than most how to turn a car into an accessory. From the stolen Volkswagen badges worn as jewellery of the Licensed To Ill era to the 1970s cop bonnet slides of 1994’s “Sabotage” video. Between those two, here is MCA photographed in Los Angeles, where the band were formulating what would become their game-changing sophomore album, Paul’s Boutique. In fitted but slouchy leisurewear and high-tops that could easily slip into a modern-day wardrobe, he stands straddled, feet planted on the roof of a parked car. It’s a good look. Unless of course you own the car.

Released in 1989, Paul’s Boutique was an audacious statement of intent. A psychedelic collage of samples, it is now commonly listed among the most influential albums of the 1980s and early hip-hop. But following on from Licensed To Ill, which sold more than 10 million copies in the US alone, and given how much it cost to make, at the time the album was deemed a commercial flop. In the fallout, the Beastie Boys abandoned their samplers and retreated towards the instruments they played when they first formed as a band, inspired by the hardcore punk sound then spilling out of Washington DC. This back-to-basics approach lead to 1992’s Check Your Head, which borrowed from the alternative rock and grunge scene then brewing on the West Coast, but also pointing the way to Ill Communication’s full embrace of funk two years later. Their sartorial outlook also took a turn towards the oversized silhouettes and flannel shirts of the early 1990s, with workwear labels such as Ben Davis getting the nod in their lyrics. Taken during the sessions for Check Your Head, this shot shows Mike D on the drums wearing a flat cap of maybe the jazz age, baggy jeans and a gurn of pure concentration.

The MCs featured in this story are not associated with and do not endorse MR PORTER or the products shown