#18-DOOM (MF Doom)-"Born Like This" (2009)

I know what you're thinking. I'm gonna start this post blathering about how the early/mid 90's were the golden years, everything made post-'98 is crap, Illmatic still sounds modern, Nas' flows still sound as fresh as the downy dryer sheets you use with your towels and bed linen, and about 98% of the videos aired on Rap City from 1991-1996 were pure gold. put that in a blender with the "Hip Hop then coupled with Indie Rock now" analogy, and well, you just might have me figured out.

Transparency and self-deprecation can work for or against you in the field of journalism. I guess you just have to be creative in how you use it. Pretty soon, you have to move away from the "Oh my god, I'd bet NOOOOBODY reads this" elementary sarcasm, to the "let me sling mud toward my own opinions/thoughts" paradigm, if you really want to write hip hop record reviews for free. As my dad would say, it's a jungle out there.

For today's post, I guess I had to spit all of this nonsense simply because, while the record we're talking about came out last year, the artist, MF DOOM, has been around for some time, namely in the early 90's group KMD-I guess I just had to cover all my bases.

KMD recorded two records, 1991's Mr. Hood and 93's Black Bastards. The latter would not see the light of day for some time due to controversial cover art; KMD's then-label Elektra shelved it until the group amended the cover art, obviously that never happened, so BB would fade into obscurity for some time.

Enter Daniel Dumile. Lyrical mastermind behind KMD, he loses his brother, DJ Subroc, in a car accident in '93, the same year Black Bastards was supposed to be released. (Subroc repped KMD crew also.) Distraught, Dumile, roamed the streets for a few years, freestyled/rhymed at some open mics and was ready to take on the game again, with a new, reformed persona; he first disguised his face by wearing a stocking over his head while performing, later evolving into a gladiator-esque mask. Scorned by the loss of a family member and catching wreck from a major label, he remerged as MF Doom, to "swear revenge against the industry that so badly deformed him". If that isn't some anti-social moxy you can get behind, pinch yourself.

I had been intruiged by Doom's story for some time, after copping the Dangerdoom release on vinyl (a venture w/ Doom, Dangermouse, and cartoon network), it became increasingly obvious that the more I slept on doom the more I'd regret it later. Born plays like a prodigal son roaming the wasteland of bad record deals and heartbreak. Flows requiring attention. showstopping production by Doom himself and J Dilla, amongst others. Check out "Lightworks" if you want to hear a killer beat matched with an award-worthy vocal; the track "Cellz" takes from one of my favorite poems, Charles Bukowski's Dinosauria: We, the spoken word dialogue that opens the track read by Hank Chinaski himself. Track after track, boasting lyrical guest stars like Raekwon and Ghostface Killa, I can't believe I write a hip hop blog and have not been kneeling at the altar of MF DOOM already. I felt like an idiot, and I kind of still do.

Doom's still slaying hearts and winning over 30 something hipsters, 20 something underground heads, and probably a dad or two. Still rocks the mask. still brings it live. still goes into the lab and comes out with beats that cut through his contemporaries like a machete. Some people say it's the life experience that makes the man. While Doom's life may have defined his persona, the raw emotion he puts into his work defines him as an artist.

-Marty.