Beastie Boys star Mike D auctioning off band memorabilia for charity

The 55-year-old founding member of the legendary rap rock group has announced the sale of 15 items to raise funds for the Good Eats organisation in the US, which supplies free meals to school kids who would otherwise go hungry.

The 'Fearless: The Collection of Hester Diamond Part II' sale hosted by Sotheby's includes Mike's MTV Video Music Award moonman for Best Hip Hop Video for 'Intergalactic' and the Gold disc for their 1896 debut album, 'Licensed to Ill'.

Mike - whose full name is Michael Diamond - decided to sell off the items after his mother, Hester Diamond, passed away.

His late parent had held onto the collection and the musician admitted that, while he was "appreciative" to have been honoured with the accolades during his time in Beastie Boys, he doesn't wish to have them on his walls.

He explained on Instagram: "What’s up? This feels a bit weird to post, but at the same time it would feel wrong not giving y’all a heads up. I was never comfortable holding onto or looking at these awards/accolades that we got through the years. Don’t get me wrong - I’m appreciative of them, it’s just not something I need to look at. Anyway, I would give them to my mom whenever they came in and she was really happy to have them. Sadly, she died this last year. She was an amazing woman, but that’s a whole other story. Sooooo we are selling some of the stuff that she had (link in bio). I know the s*** is pricey and maybe you have none or very little interest. And that’s fine. But all the $ goes to @goodeatsorg - an awesome charity getting food to kids in need in NYC and beyond.
Thanks,
MD (sic)"

Meanwhile, the 'Sabotage' hitmakers were the subject of a photo book released last year.

The group reunited with Spike Jonze again on the tome, having previously collaborated with the director dozens of times over the years, from album covers to a stage show to numerous music videos.

The 'Her' filmmaker published his first-ever collection of photography centre around the band in March.

Simply titled 'Beastie Boys', the 256-page book boasts over 200 of Spike's personal photos of the group which he's taken over the years.

He also wrote the afterword, while both Adam 'Ad-Rock' Horovitz and Mike - whose bandmate Adam 'MCA' Yauch tragically died in 2012 from cancer - contributed text to the tome.