Beastie Boys 
I was also quite partial to Vanilla Ice.
The Beastie Boys are hipper than hop
Vanilla Ice always was shite though. I liked a sample of him being used in a M&S advert a few years ago though.
I think the sneer factor with the Beastie Boys comes from just after No Sleep... (or whatver the first album was called) when they were very much viewed as a wannabe hip-hop-lite boyband and before they started getting critical acclaim from the more trendy members of the music press. Thus I still feel that they are the sort of band that are sneered at (wrongly) by a certain generation.
Saw them at their first UK tour - thought that they were the greatest band Id ever seen until Run DMC came on next! the Beastie Boys doing Walk This Way with RunDMC was pretty good!
Vanilla Ice I think had potential, but was very much lead astray by the record company - they tried to turn him into a "pretty boy with attitude white bobby brown" type thing and it all went to his head a bit. Before he got into the charts he'd never be seen dead in a shiney suit or expensive hair cut. I found his later stuff, after he'd been used up and spat out by the record industry quite entertaining too.
Anyway, it's a good thing that I didn't mention Rick Astley!
