MF DOOM

by Douglas Passion

MF Doom basks in contradiction. The metal mask, originally installed as a shield from the gimmickry of contemporary Hip-Hop, has become an iconic accessory he remains unrecognizable without. His lyrics are baroque strings of pop-culture references and colorful slang, all delivered in a conversational deadpan more suited for the recitation of an impotency drug's side-effects. He's a veteran rapper that has somehow redefined himself as a hot commodity in an industry where the young devour the old and comebacks are limited to $500 guest appearances on underground rap compilations. Yes, this is an old-school street dude who has been incongruously embraced by the same trendoids who tremble with excitement at each new release from Kid Robot. But these apparent inconsistencies all wither into inconsequential dust when confronted with one simple, easy truth: MF Doom is obsessed with words. It’s not “true-school” cliché; it’s who he is and what he values most in his art. His single-minded devotion to arcane terminology, rhyming architecture and just plain being more ill than the next dude is what makes him a unique artist. After fawning over his releases for several years, Loosie finally had the chance to talk with the Metal Face Villain. We didn’t squander the opportunity. Broken down into a three-part series, we offer one of the most comprehensive and sprawling interviews ever conducted with MF Doom. We begin by discussing his current project, the collaborative DangerDoom album he created with producer Danger Mouse.

So how does DangerDoom tie in with Adult Swim?

Those are our peoples. The way they do it creatively and the way they spin it, it’s similar to how we spin it. We all laugh at the same jokes and shit. The humor side of it. One of the key points, on Aqua Team in particular, your man Karl, dude sometimes be talking about Rap or Hip-Hop and how it’s corny or bubblegum music. He’s giggin’ on them a little bit. So kinda I played off that a little bit, like I’m an emcee and I’m giggin’ on it too like, “Yeah, the shit is corny now, they got it on TV.” But at the same time, I’m rhyming and it’s straight Hip-Hop shit. It’s almost contradicting itself, one of those slight, funny contradictions.

What sort of input did you receive from the people who produce the show?

They let us run with it. “Whatever you guys want to do…blaow! See what you come up with.” We had kind of full creative control on it. So that was peace – that’s how I usually work, anyway. I knew Danger was like that; he ain’t tryin’ to have nobody telling him what to do. It was a mutual respect. They respect how we get down and know how professional we are. And at the same like, they doing their thing too. We met at the crossroads.

The internet has been buzzing about the album's collaboration between you and Ghostface.

Starks is my people! While I was working on this joint with him, I was finishing up this one and he’s finishing up his solo joint for Def Jam. We traded back and forth like “Ba-Boom!” I’d throw him a beat; it was like on of those kind of moves. It was the chemistry. I’m not gonna be working with nobody if I ain’t got no regular chemistry with him. It ain’t gonna be like, “Okay, I got beats and we never meet and I just send beats online and we got an album out all of the sudden”. A character like Starks -- you just gotta love him when you meet him. Cool dude, real positive brother. We got to the point where we were like, “Yo, let’s do this record! You was feeling this joint? It’s about the masked rapper.” And I’ll trade something, we trade something -- it’s good.

We know that both of you have worn masks, but how did the concept for a song like that evolve?

I came up with a song about the mask before I knew I was gonna have him spit on it. But the angle I was coming on was more about the mask was its own being -- it’s an entity by itself. And it’s really like the mask is the star in this whole thing and I’m just an emcee trying to come up. It’s that particular accessory that makes it noticeable. Then it’s up to me catch the wreck. It’s like a partnership, in a way. The mask, he’s his own being; the emcee (which is Doom in the song), he’s kinda of upset about the way the mask is splitting the money funny. He’s trying to have me doing all the work. It’s almost like the mask is trying to front on me, so I’m trying to get rid of the mask. I’m pointing out the reasons why. So then [Ghostface] comes with the reasons why he had to get rid of his shit and why he had it on. It’s just based on the fact of how the mask is its own entity in itself.

John Updike that said, “Celebrity is the mask that eats into your face.” I thought that was an ill-ass quote. I wanted to throw it at you.

You know what? I would say that’s definitely ill and true in its own way. My mask, in particular, is a shield from that, in a way. The mask, whatever face that you got…it definitely works like that.

I remember seeing you back at Wetlands in like ’99 or 2000. It was probably about 105 degrees in there.

It was mad hot, I remember that.

You rocked without the mask. Have you done that since?

Nah. The mask at the time was under construction. The show came up and I had to throw the stocking on. I had a stocking cap on out there to cover the face. I ain’t have the metal joint, though, definitely not. There’s a few metal ones, different models of the same one. Ever since I had the first one, I’ve made sure I’ve had enough backups so when you see Doom, he will have the mask on.

How many masks are currently in rotation?

There’s like four in rotation right now.

Are there differences between them?

Oh, yeah. No doubt. Different accessories, different upgrades. One may be more lighter. But I don’t want to go too much into the technological side of it. I don’t want no leaks of information, know what I’m saying? But there’s definitely different technological differences in each one, weight differences, some is for black-tie affairs, one is maybe for more of a Wetlands-type show where you might jump in the crowd.

One of my friends worked on a Philly show with you a while back at Fluid. He said you were a cool cat the whole time – until you threw the mask on and completely changed. Is that accurate?

Well, I’m like this – I compare it to a robbery. That’s the best way to describe it. Right before a robbery, you might be staking out the joint. Go in there, eat a sandwich or whatever, play like you a patron. Scoping the scene out, you don’t want to bring too much attention to yourself. But once you throw on the mask and you grab the heater – it’s a stickup! It’s different; the dude sitting there isn’t the guy that robbed the store. Once he takes the mask off, he goes back to normal. So in a way, it’s true. It works like that.

According to Danger Mouse, DangerDoom was under construction for almost two years. But between this, MM…Food and MadVillain, you’ve been really productive. Is there some sort of work regiment you use?

It’s weird. Sometimes I look online or I might read an article and it says there’s a lot of stuff coming out. But to me it don’t seem like it’s that much. I could be doing more. But when the creative spurt does happen, it’s like “Baow!” If you know how to do something, you just do it. It clicks, automatic. I plan to increase the productivity at this point; I feel like I’m kinda slacking. I’m trying to get more into my studying -- to have more things to talk about, to broaden my range a little bit. I hope the party people out there ain’t getting too tired of a nigga. I know they seen a nigga name here and there, but I’m like, “Yo, anything y’all hear definitely gonna be different.” The rhymes is gonna be on point. I ain’t really just throwing records out there to hear myself talk. I don’t even want to hear myself rhyme, really. But, when it’s time for them to cop, there will be updated info and new styles and all that good shit.

Why don’t really like hearing yourself rap?

I’m not the kind of cat that don’t like hearing his own voice – I mean, I like it -- but I spit it once, I hear it, okay, fine. I’m not going to keep listening to it. I do that shit, put it to the side and go do the next one. You know how you got that cat in the circle, he’s just talking and rambling on like he gotta hear his own voice? Or cats that put records out with that bullshit? You know records that be like that. It’s the same thing. For me, I’d rather not speak; I’d rather hear what the next cat got to say – [he might] drop jewels that come around to me. If it comes around to me and I got to add on, I’ll add on.

So you don’t get in the Doom Mobile and there’s a bunch of Viktor Vaughn shit there?

Nah, nah. Definitely not. My wife will tell you: I get in the truck, she turns that shit off. She and the kids listen to it all day – I get in, that shit come out. I don’t want to hear none of that, that’s work. Throw a beat on, some instrumental music, Jazz, whatever, anything else besides that.

Besides the music we’ve heard, do you have Tupac-status vaults of material sitting around?

Hmmm. That’s an interesting question. It’s weird, I’ve got a bunch of notebooks with mad shit in them that I ain’t fucked with yet. So, in a way, I do have shit sitting around, but it ain’t refined enough to put out like that. I still got to put it through the editing process and all the difference processes I put it through to make it to that point. So, in a way, I do got it stocked up and in a way I don’t -- ‘cause lately I just been using just new shit off the top, boom. So shit is piling up. Right now I’m been giving them the spontaneous, come-off-the-top, thought-about-it-that-day, kinda rhymes. For the DangerDoom project, it was half and half. Some premeditated with the notebook, but when I hear the beat, I’ll write it right there in a few hours from scratch. As opposed to a Doom album, I’ll take more time and each song will have a topic and it’ll be more structured. You can tell it’s not as spontaneous as MadVillain, which was 100% “throw the beat on” – I didn’t have nothing pre-thought of or no type of format. [DangerDoom] wasn’t too tied into the cartoon theme, but it’s got enough references. Did you hear the album?

Yeah, I heard it.

So you already know the thunder. [laughs]