Great DOOM interview with Clash Music

Finally! An actual interview with the Villain...

DOOM - Clash Q&A
Clash speaks to the enigmatic (MF) DOOM...

Interview Posted by Mike Diver Tue, 17/03/2009

The man has many faces, many monikers through which he channels a singular vision of hip-hop that’s been allowed to expand in the margins without coercion from corporate suits and label politics.

But here, now, today, he is simply DOOM.

Daniel Dumile’s widest-known alter ego has dropped his ‘MF’ prefix for album three, ‘BORN LIKE THIS’ (the name is taken from a Charles Bukowski poem), but the British-born and New York-based rapper’s ear for the absurd in anyone else’s hands, his love of experimentation and sculpting designs anew, remains absolutely apparent. Five years may have passed since his last solo offering, ‘MM..Food’ (an anagram of his name, FYI), but DOOM hasn’t been lazing about, resting on his laurels.

In the same year as ‘MM..Food’, 2004, he released the ‘Madvillainy’ album, a collaborative effort with acclaimed producer Madlib (a follow-up is in the works); 19 months later, ‘The Mouse And The Mask’ emerged, showcasing DOOM’s vocals alongside beats and pieces from white-hot studio wiz Danger Mouse. So, while DOOM as a solo artist has been off the scene, his rhymes have found their place in the public’s ear – both collaborations took Dumile to a new level of recognition.

And it’s this raised profile that ensures Clash gets 30 minutes phone time with the man himself. It’s late here but early there, and DOOM’s just getting started…

‘Ello?
Hey, that Mike?

Yeah. This the man himself?
(Laughs) Yeah, I guess you could call me that.

Well, you’ve adopted enough identities. Got a day of talking about yourself or is this one of just a handful?
No, I got ‘em back to back, with about ten minutes in between to play video games and clear my mind. You’re like number three on the list, so I’m rolling right now.

Good times. Well let’s talk ‘BORN LIKE THIS’. Must be a great feeling having a solo record out after five years ‘away’…
Oh well, it feels good to have it done – when it comes out, well, that could always take another five years. But the fact that it’s done, and completed, that to me is a huge thing. It’s great that people get to hear it.

Do you see the collaborative records as being part of the same process, the same continuity?
Yeah, I guess so. It feels that way, but it’s part of a whole bigger thing – every record plays its part. It’s a continuation – like, one will branch off into two or three, and then they’ll branch off too. Fractals, all day.

What’s the thinking behind dropping the ‘MF’ this time out? A development of the character, or simple aesthetic preference?
It’s a combination of the two, really – I feel like this record is more of a personal view of the mind of the character. Like, if the listener is in the character’s body, reading their thoughts, if you can imagine that; [previous solo albums] ‘Operation: Doomsday’ and ‘MM..Food’, those had the perspective from the outside, with the character speaking on whatever everybody else is seeing of him. In that respect, it’s not as formal. It’s not MF Doom, it’s DOOM, just the guy. You’re getting into the mind of the character. That’s really what it’s about. So just call me DOOM. What’s your last name?

Diver.
So, people might call you Mr Diver, but some might call you Mike, and people might be calling out, “Hey, Mr Diver!” But you’ll be like, “Just call me Mike.” So it seemed funny after a while being called MF Doom all the time.

As you’ve written from various character perspectives, do you ever get mixed up as to what voice you’re in?
I wouldn’t say mixed up, I tend to just let the thoughts come to me and not think about it too much. But then once you get the thought, that’s when I begin writing, and it may pertain to the next record, or a totally different one. I catalogue everything, so as long as I write everything down, after a while they add up and you can put them in their respective slots.

This album’s taken its time in reaching us…
I would say it took about three years to do this record, and that’s the longest any of my records have taken. It’s always been in thought, but I’d say it’s been about three years. And it just took that long; it needed that much attention, I think. It’s layered, but it’s not overdone. I’m doing a lot of experimental things with the production, too, which took time to craft and put down. I’d listen to things two months after I’d done them, to see if they passed my test – I don’t want to use the public as guinea pigs. It can be like Frankenstein – you can’t just run out there in the street like that.

And we all know how that turned out. You’ve some J Dilla productions on ‘BORN LIKE THIS’ (Dilla died in 2006, information) – do you feel you’re doing the right thing in terms of helping to sustain his legacy?
Yeah, and at the same time he’s helping us too, in his special way. He did a lot of work and then he left us, but he was ahead of his time, totally. I got some Dilla beats that nobody’s heard, and it sounds as fresh as anything today. We always spoke about getting something done, so this is it happening.

So even though he’s not around, now is the right time?
Oh yeah, it’s the right time. When I’m listening to those beats, it’s like I’m talking to him. When you clear your mind, you really can talk to anybody, because you understand what they would say from the inkling and understanding you have of them, and more often than not it’s 99.9 per cent correct. So it’s natural, it’s like he’s right here. It’s like a written letter, or code. If you listen to [J Dilla’s acclaimed album] ‘Donuts’, that as an instrumental piece is bonkers. I mean, the arrangements and slight nuances that separate it from a collection of four-bar loops… There are certain things that needed to be done by hand. That record is like a conversation piece in itself, so I tried to add my lyrics to enhance this convo.

There’s no doubt the man made his mark, in an albeit brief career.
He was a good dude, and I’m sure he touched everyone hard. He was the friendliest guy I ever met, always with a smile on his face. I had a thousand questions for him, and I still have them. And we’d kick things back and forth… But he’s a pro, he was the best of all of us.

We’ve recently been speaking to Tunde Adebimpe from TV On The Radio, and he told us that ‘Madvillainy’ was his favourite album of 2004. Fair to say that the album was the vehicle for DOOM to cross into new audiences?
I don’t think that was intentional, but the creativity exceeded what was labelled hip-hop at the time. It did sound a lot different, so I think its appeal comes down to that – people’s desire to hear something different. It appealed to people who just love music, y’know? The thing about that record was that Madlib already had all his beats done, so I was just picking them out and doing rhymes as they came into my mind. But his production style on that record, it’s similar to how ‘Donuts’ is – it’s so textured, with so many short beats. It wasn’t hard to be interested in it, and it sounded so fresh.

So you laid down your vocals pretty swiftly?
If I had thought too much about it, it might not have ended up the way it did. That was the only way I could work. Like, I’d hear a beat, and ask myself what the first thing I thought of was. Like, the song ‘Fancy Clown’ – that particular song, I heard the beat but he already had the loop, the music and the little voice sample in there. All I had to do is listen and go: “Oh, this is what I’d do right here, and then I stop right here…” His arrangements were already there. In a good way, it was a go-with-the-flow process, and I think that comes through.

Definitely. And that energy’s evident on ‘BORN LIKE THIS’, too.
Yeah, no doubt. We made sure it didn’t lose that. If I’m the producer of a project, I can lose myself in it unless I’m paying attention. This one took a longer time because I had a lot more to do with the mixing and all that stuff. But I still work to the same method – hear the beat, as soon as the idea’s there I write it down, and then do it and don’t try to do it again. A couple of times I’ve tried to do songs better, where I’ve missed a line, but the first time is almost always the best time – everything after that is an imitation of the first time, and it’s only ever going to be a different version of that first one. The human mind says you’ve already done it, so I kept the first takes – they exude that energy, around all the complex arrangements.

So the vocals came quickly, the music not so?
The arrangements took the time – the storyline, putting things together piece by piece and experimenting with the drums. But some vocals I did two and a half years ago, and some I did a few months ago. It’s spread out across time. I got a better microphone at one point, but it didn’t make the older tracks any better so I kept them the same. The end product’s a sort of collage of whatever happened over those three years.

So there’s plenty of ‘off cuts’, presumably?
I’ve got a whole 500GB drive full of ‘BORN LIKE THIS’ pieces – this track slower, this one louder. I always keep track of what’s the first one, so I don’t lose it. But I’ve got a whole bunch of stuff – I never throw anything away, and I often go back to it at a later date.

Was there anything you went back to on this album, that you’d initially written a lot earlier?
Yep, yep. There’s this ‘Batty-Boys’ song that I did a while back, and I thought it was too edgy. But I listened to it again, and it always had that fizz with it, so I had to be on there, and I feel now is the time for that convo, when it loses a little of its edge but is still like, “Oh shit, did he just say that?” ‘Absolutely’ is another one I did a long time ago, and I’m like, that’s how I feel. There was stuff going on in the media, stuff in the streets with police violence. These are real things. Have you heard about Oscar Grant? He got shot in Oakland. And Sean Bell in Queens, who was going to a bachelor party and the police shot him. So that’s what was going on. I did the song a little before Sean Bell, but that event reaffirmed why I did it. I wondered if the song was right, but when the Oscar Grant thing happened, it was like this shit has to stay on the record. It’s like something that needs to be heard, and a point of view that a lot of people have. We need to stop these things from happening.

I think hip-hop is, at times, the most accurate musical voice on the state of the nation, if you will – the nation representing a microcosm of the far wider world.
Yeah well, I just try to keep it to starting conversations about these things. It’s interesting listening to this story writing. But I don’t see myself as this kinda, “Here’s my goal” kinda guy – but I think as a human being that can happen naturally. Like, what do I talk about? I can only brag about my own little world so much, but maybe the more people recognise that one’s world is a microcosm of the wider one, the better we’ll be. I can touch upon a wide variety of topics. I feel that there’s a social commentary if you will, an editorial.

But you’re still able to add humour to your music…
I mean, you add satire and it makes it comfortable to hear back. But these kind of things are what I’m thinking about, and I’m sure I can’t be the only one. So, I think: “What can I say about this?” I look to push the envelope and start conversations that haven’t started.

You’ve got Tony Starks, or Ghostface Killah, on the record on ‘Angelz’, which leads me to ask about the GhostDOOM collaborative album, ‘Swift & Changeable’. Is that going to see the light of day?
Aaaah, it’s in the works. I’m gonna do the project anyway, but ‘til now the funding’s not been there. So I’ve finished this record, and I’ve started work on the next Madvillain record, so I’m keeping active. But if people keep asking for the GhostDOOM record, it’ll get done. I’m actually always thinking about it, so it’s still formulating. By the time I get some more beats and lyrics down for it, it’ll be like: SMASH.

You sound like the kind of artist who’s always working on something.
Definitely. Even when I was working on this one, I could see where things could lead, towards other records. There are all kinds of possibilities. I get constant reminders about projects, but the way the creative mind works is that you’re always on it anyway. In the few years I’ve been working on this album, I’ve kind of found a comfort zone where I have a channel for creativity – have your mind right, know yourself, don’t get too caught up on it. It’s important to step back sometimes, as that natural flow keeps creativity high.

So you are able to step away from the process from time to time, for a little perspective?
Oh yeah, totally. It’s nature – everything does that. It breathes. We’re not constantly in it, or else you couldn’t breathe. You have to exhale in order for the oxygen to pump to the blood, and ultimately gain more oxygen. It goes in waves like that – everything does. And once you figure that out, you’re set right.

Do you keep track of the more business side of your career? I see that as the only way an artist can ensure longevity today, by monitoring how they’re being represented.
I am involved in the business side, but I do keep those sides separated. Sometimes I might need a mouthpiece to speak to the business, but I am hands-on when I need to be. Some people’s natural thing is to be distant, but I think you have to have an interest. You have to get your point across right.

You’ve a couple of other guests on the LP, alongside Ghostface…
There’s a joint I have with a female MC that I produce, Empress Star. That’s me showing my production side, and capturing part of the storyline and carrying it with distinct different voices. But it’s still in the mind’s eye of DOOM, though, and that’s what’s going to come through more on this record than the others – another perspective on how everything that’s said happens.

Do you think that certain rappers have fallen foul of having too many guests on an album, and they’ve therefore lost some of their own identity?
Right, it did get out of hand. You can tell corporate structures started getting their hands in the decision making, and the artists didn’t care because they were promised that million dollars when the record sells. It started to be more of a money thing than a craft, and certain artists get the idea that they’re the biggest, and the best, so they get complacent and don’t give their new music the attention of their first record, the reason why they blew up. They don’t give it the thought and the care. They just think about buying another Bentley. I never get complacent. I tried to do that once, but found myself saying: “Stop! What are you doing?” Fuck it, I had to try though. I make records that I want to hear, and I’m sticking with my people. These cats you might not have heard of, but they fit the story.

Finally, I’ve got to ask about touring… Any plans to come visit the UK for this release?
Maybe, I’m working on it. You’ll definitely hear me but you might not see me, because it’ll be dark in there. But you’ll hear me rocking. The more people that request that I tour, the closer it’ll get to happening.

- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

DOOM speaks to Creative Loafing

Once again, not many words to share...

What the MF, DOOM?

Published 03.30.09

By Phillip Mlynar
DOOM's most infamous public appearance in Atlanta could best be called a caper.

Booked to perform at MJQ Concourse in December 2007, most accounts allege he sent along a stand-in to perform — an imposter who subsequently strutted off stage after 20 minutes of maligned lip-sync action.

This time around, DOOM's definitely in the house, holding court at Django's on Peachtree Street, ostensibly to promote his latest album, Born Like This, the project which sparked his all-caps name change and takes its title from a line in the Charles Bukowski poem, "Dinosauria, We."

A uniformed cop stands guard at the door, where the codeword "villain" must be given to enter. Upstairs, it's as if DOOM has turned the venue into a hideout. The masked man himself sits center stage behind a large table. There's a laptop to one side, a closely guarded metal case with undisclosed contents to the other, and four cronies with identities obscured by balaclavas and stockings over their faces fill out the scene.

Sitting like the boss of operations, DOOM says in that distinctive buttery voice of his, "I'm in here every day. This is like the club house."

Three hours later, after they've made their way downstairs for a photo shoot and ravaged the bar, DOOM and his troops will exit the scene, strutting out through the front door in an organized single-file line. No one among the bar staff seems to have ever seen DOOM in the venue before. Of course, most have no idea who he's supposed to be, either. Chalk another one up to ol' Metal Face's ongoing and highly engaging smoke and mirrors show.

Whether you're still fuming over $30 spent on a ticket for DOOM's alleged no-show show, or whether you're willing to accept that the stunt was all part of DOOM's masked persona at work - as confessed in an open letter to Elemental magazine back in 2005 after he sent a hype man to pose as him for a cover shoot - there are few characters in the world of music more intriguing than the various incarnations of DOOM, cooked up by Daniel Dumile.

From behind his fabled metal mask (actually one of four currently in rotation), Doom has taken creative and commercial liberties, licensing various personas to a litter of labels. He's recorded under alter egos ranging from King Gheedorah, a three-headed monster, to vaudeville villain Viktor Vaughn.

His songs brim with the same seductive obliqueness. Few DOOM verses are straight-forward, and few lyricists pull off the balancing act between being tricky and memorable with such prowess. Now with Radiohead's Thom Yorke and indie rock darlings TV On the Radio remixing tracks from Born Like This, DOOM's prepped to amplify his rhymed musings on the largest scale yet.

But for those who can't help but wonder how seriously they should take him, DOOM refers to the album track "Costume Foolery" on which he snarls at a gaggle of superheroes looking "like a leotard fest."

"A lot of my stuff is toying around," he says. "Obviously I ain't robbed Batman and them! There's obviously a lot of fiction mixed in with it, so I'd say it's usually a fictional play on a reality situation with me.

"I think adults either get it or they don't," he says regarding the iconic mask that serves as his shield and literary sword. "I'm multi-faceted so this is my way of not being pigeon-holed into one character. I use the example of 2Pac — a prolific writer, very talented human being all around, with many facets — but I think a lot of times his work, his MC work, got kinda cornered 'cause it's 'you' and it's your face. But with the mask, I can do different sides of things."

Then, as if despairing at grown folks who don't know how to react to the imaginative malleability of the metal face, DOOM adds, "Children though, they love the mystique about the mask. They're not as stand-offish as adults who might be like, 'Oh, I see the mask, what's gonna happen next?' Children gravitate towards it, looking at you friendly at first, like a superhero. They love it."

Jaunt at Django's aside, these days Dumile claims he lives some version of the quiet life just outside the city. "Atlanta's a unique place," says the native New Yorker. "I definitely like it here, it's comfortable. I really moved out here for the simple fact of children, the environment, schools, better to raise children here."

But when it comes to DOOM the character, he talks determinedly about becoming a "gazzillionaire" — a fanciful number that's used in the title of a track on the new album. And when he says, "I go do a show, see that the fans know all the lyrics, and I'm like, Oh, so you have been listening!" it's as if that night at MJQ was just another staged mirage long since forgotten in the winds of DOOM's infectious ether.

Sitting there, with a batch of empty shot glasses scattered on the table before him, he attempts to add some sort of clarity to the shenanigans. "It's like I'm still speaking to you now as the author," DOOM says, before pointing to the mask on his face and explaining, "This is for aesthetics. So when you write this up you'll be like, 'Well, so he had the mask on. I wonder if he wears it everyday?'"

Then, a knowing pause, before he says: "For the record, I do."

- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

DOOM interview with The Village Voice

Not much of an interview, but still a good read...

DOOM Laughs Last

Rap's biggest enigma is back with more off-color jokes and apocalypse theories

By Phillip Mlynar

Tuesday, March 24th 2009 at 3:07pm

"What's the last good joke I heard?" There's a long pause, and then DOOM—a/k/a Daniel Dumile, a/k/a nefarious rapper MF Doom, who's graced himself with a shorter, all-caps moniker for his new record Born Like This, though he still orchestrates his comic-book antihero persona from behind a metal mask—tilts back his faceplate, sips from his pint of Black & Tan while lounging in a downtown Atlanta bar, and says, "I would say the one in the New York Post, about the monkey with the stimulus plan."

Yes, that cartoon, the one Al Sharpton is quite possibly still protesting as we speak. Another lift of the mask, another gulp, and Dumile flows on: "It was one of those edgy jokes. It was kinda a bad joke, but a good joke if you look at it as, How popular was the joke? It's the President of the United States—a figure of the utmost authority—in a high-profile publication like a newspaper, and they try to make fun of it. All presidents get made fun of. But the vein of it, the strain of it, the tying-in-to-the-monkey part of it, it's kinda funny. To me, it was like, 'Oh, they said it like that?' In that essence, that was the last good joke I heard—it was kinda in bad taste, but it's still a good nigger joke."

This isn't the first time Dumile has found himself holding court at the juncture where racially provocative imagery inches out into the mainstream. Back in 1994—then going by the moniker Zev Love X as part of the rap group KMD (think DayGlo-and-daisies-era De La Soul laced with Nation of Islam teachings)—his self-sketched "Little Sambo" figure, whom he'd intended to depict being lynched for the cover of the group's second album, Bl_ck B_st_rds, ruffled the suits at Warner Bros.–owned Elektra Records after a Billboard writer criticized the image. In spite of the illustration's intent (a "hanging of stereotypes" according to then–Elektra A&R VP Dante Ross), the argument came in the wake of Ice-T's "Cop Killer," a song that outraged both George Bush I and Warner Bros. shareholders. KMD found themselves dropped. Soon thereafter, Dumile's brother and KMD cohort, Subroc, was hit by a car and killed. Cue Zev's disappearing act, until he re-cast himself as MF Doom, announcing his return to public life at the Nuyorican Poets Café in 1998, rapping with a stocking pulled over his face ("I couldn't get a mask made in time, so I figured I could use a stocking," he recalls).

Since then, he's established himself as hip-hop's premier cult figure, clocking up Adult Swim endorsements, his own Nike Dunk sneaker, and an imminent Thom Yorke remix, all sparked by his solo debut, 1999's Operation: Doomsday. It was the most perplexingly brilliant rap record of that year: With the Neptunes' futuristic, super-sharp sound dominating the radio, DOOM seemed to be broadcasting from a freshly soiled bathroom and was content to sample the warm grooves of '80s r&b hits. His slurry verbals reveled in tricky phrasing ("With more rhymes than there's ways to skin cats/As a matter of fact, let me re-rephrase/With more rhymes than ways to fillet felines these days"), he sketched an alter ego while dropping autobiographical clues ("Remember when you went and got the dark-blue Ballys?" he reminisces to Subroc) and used vocal samples from a Doctor Doom cartoon to stitch it all together. To this day, it's his most revealing work.

Then came a five-year flurry of product: sets as the triple-headed monster King Geedorah and the time-traveling Viktor Vaughn; separate hookups with Danger Mouse and Madlib; one-offs with indie labels Rhymesayers (MM . . . Food, an album of songs with food-pun titles) and Nature Sounds (a live recording). It was Dumile in all-out money-making mode—even the most dedicated disciple might've balked at the set of 10 instrumental Special Herbs albums. But with overkill looming, things went quiet for a couple of years, and Born Like This sounds like a re-introduction. There's not much science behind the gestation period ("I was just taking my time," he says nonchalantly), but with the album title inspired by a line from Bukowski's dystopia-conjuring poem "Dinosauria, We"—the set's centerpiece, "Cellz," samples Bukowski himself reading it—this is Dumile's most openly political moment.

He cites "Absolutely," a song speculating on a strategic reaction to police-against-citizen violence, as his album highlight: "That's me asking, 'What happens if we take up arms, and we have a whole planet, and we have rules to this, and we're out to get them?' It's fiction, but it's based on what could happen based on reality. It's like Bukowski has that post-apocalyptic, worst-case scenario, walking-through-these-wastes angle—a lot of the things he said we ain't reached yet, but some of the things we've reached after the shit was written. It's like a glimpse into the future if it keeps going that way. That's this album."

His pint now heartily refreshed, Dumile delves back to his earlier musings: "There was some ill cracker jokes back in the day. Or the Polish jokes: 'How many Polacks does it take to screw in a lightbulb?' I forget the answer, but it was something retarded. That was always the funniest joke to me." From there, he swings back to Born Like This: "I got jokes on my album about niggers, I got jokes about crackers—and I think those jokes that make humor of somebody else's culture, in a way, they bring us together. At least it's some kind of dialogue. Even though the cartoon does show the monkey with two holes in his chest like they killed him—it's kinda bad, but at least they're joking. The newspaper apologized for the joke, so now they know how serious it's taken, and it starts a dialogue. It's better than somebody actually getting shot in the street, and then we got to talk about it."

And then, the big finish: "Laughter brings people together. When you can laugh at someone else, that's bringing everyone together." Dumile slugs the last of his pint, shrugs, and adds, "Anyone who's salty at that needs to get their sense of humor intact. Go meditate or something—or drink a Black & Tan."

- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

Mos Def speaks on DOOM

I think he's listened to 'MM..FOOD' a few times. DOOM should've sent Mos out to perform shows behind the mask, no lip syncing, his DOOM voice is on point.



Throwback Bonus: Mos performing Madvillain's "Rainbows" at a sound check...



- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

'BORN LIKE THIS.' having successful digital sales

DOOM's latest release 'BORN LIKE THIS.' has quickly risen to the top of the charts in the iTunes store, ranking as the top album in the "Hip-Hop/Rap" category and the 10th album overall.



- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

Slug talks working on 'BORN LIKE THIS.' & DOOM

Slug recently sat down for an interview with Urb magazine and touched on his 'BORN LIKE THIS.' feature, as well as his views on the villain...

I got the DOOM album a while back and noticed you were on it. How was that experience? What are your thoughts on DOOM, his career from KMD to now?
He asked me to be on his record and I of course, there’s no magic story. I just said yes because I’m a fan of him and all the weirdness that he represents. DOOM hit me up and I was like “hell Yeah, give me a fucking beat!” When I got it, I thought it was wild. He actually had to coach me through it a bit, and normally, no one has to coach me through a beat. ANT does my coaching and that’s even rare. When DOOM hit me with that beat I thought it was bananas when I heard it and it made me kinda nervous. And DOOM was like “in your head think of it like this and that”. But it didn’t reallyhelp, so I just ended up writing to the drums basically [laughs]. I wish I had more time because when I re-listen to it, I thought I could have done better, but oh well. He was happy with it, so I was happy to make DOOM happy.

That’s my whole thing anyways—I don’t really give a fuck about being the best of all time. I just don’t want to disappoint people. That’s why I was such a good worker when I was blue-collar. I mean, I had dreams about stabbing my boss in the neck, but I always worked hard. It’s just something that’s in my work ethic I guess because I don’t like to be a disappointment to anybody.

So you’ve been a DOOM fan since the early days?
Look, a lot of people, especially white kids, champion the fuck out of 3rd Bass. I get it, I can see why; you finally get to see somebody that looks like you, doing the music you love, and that’s motivation. I understand that. 3rd Bass could rap better than the Beastie Boys at that time because the Beastie Boys were still doing their old-school style. 3rd Bass came out with more up-to-date styles and beats and everything. But to me, the best thing 3rd Bass ever did was introduce me to Zev Love X. No disrespect, but if I had to give 3rd Bass a VH1 hip-hop honor, it would be for introducing me to Zev Love X. Sorry Serch.

Then DOOM’s story got even thicker as his homies passed away; the record never got released, and KMD went through all the turmoil. Then in the mid-90s, he comes back with Bobbito. And I hadn’t heard anything from Zev Love for years until someone told me he put out a 12-inch as MF DOOM. So I bought it and thought “this dude is buggin’!”

His new album is a monster. What do you think of his career thus far?
I’m just a fan of him and his ideas and what he does with them. People were on his dick so fucking hard, harder than most underground rappers you’ll ever see. And I mean, there are were cats that sold more records and were more popular, but people just jocked the fuck out of DOOM. The image, the icon, the personality, the mask—people loved it all. All this time, no one even really knew what he looked like! To me, that was genius how he made people eat up an image that wasn’t even him.

I mean, I was a huge fan of the Mr. Hood record. I loved their singles because they had weird extra shit on them and the b-sides were fresh too. At the time Elektra was unstoppable—they had KMD, they had Brand Nubian, Leaders Of The New School. These groups were all fresh to me.

Click here to check out the full interview.

- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix

'BORN LIKE THIS.' review round-up

I'll be updating this post with reviews of 'BORN LIKE THIS.' written by major hip-hop sites as they appear...

(Click images to be taken to full review)

Pitchfork

okayplayer

URB

HipHopDX


- Subroc, The Hip Hop Hendrix