New Year’s Eve, whether we like it or not, is epitomised by excess. People are taught that seeing in the new year must be a vainglorious celebration because we achieved everything we wanted. However, for the majority of the world, this wasn’t true in 2020. The coronavirus pandemic trapped several generations in their homes and mind, plunging dreams into new depths of uncertainty. For many, all we had to keep our ambition invigorated was music, films, books and other forms of entertainment. Whether you listen to the cliched music from the Top 40 chart, an underground, experimental track which leaves friends scratching their heads upon hearing it, or an obscure album decided by a YouTube algorithm which will never leave your recommendations; music, no matter the genre, invoked happiness during the pandemic. However, December 31st, 2020 was a life-changing day for hip-hop fans.

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My New Year’s Eve in 2020 was spent drinking Asahi and attempting to dance in my room to a mishmash of 90s/00s hip-hop, 90s alt rock and electronic bangers, and pretending to be a DJ when all I was doing was clicking a little too hard on Spotify. I remember being a few beers in and felt so euphoric; I somehow had forgotten that the pandemic would trail into next year. ‘Doomsday’ by MF DOOM came on at one point during this drunken jamboree causing me to rub my hand on my desk in tune with the scratches of the beat and bop my head vigorously. After scratching my way into DOOM’s first lyric, I decided to search up his name on Google to see how he was doing. Unfortunately, an article from Complex Magazine stood right at the top of the first page with the headline ‘MF DOOM Dead at 49.’ I couldn’t believe what I just read. I rubbed my eyes with my index fingers twice to try and make it disappear. Nope. It was still there. Tears began to sting my eyes. I couldn’t believe someone so influential to me had just died so young. It turned out he had died two months earlier on Halloween, yet his wife Jasmine chose to announce his death on social media on December 31st.  

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I have spent several years on this planet loving hip-hop music. Like many millennial boys born between 1990 - 1995, we began with very little understanding of the art form and liked the first Hip-Hop album (mine was The Eminem Show at 8 years old) we listened to because of the excess swearing. I remember hiding behind the sofa and crying when I first saw the music video for ‘Hate Me Now’ by Nas when I was 9 years old because of the petrifying ‘O' Fortuna’ sample which played throughout the track. I was also caught stealing a copy of Get Rich or Die Tryin' by 50 Cent from my friend's bigger brother by my dad when I was nine. Surprisingly, he was angrier by the Parental Advisory sticker than the fact I was trying to steal.

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I serendipitously discovered underground hip-hop at 13 years old. Beyond the ‘How to Be’ sketches produced by Nigahiga on YouTube I look upon fondly and still make me giggle at 27, there was the world of AMVs (Animated Music Videos). They may have broken all kinds of copyright laws, but YouTube turned a blind eye to them, nor do I think the creators cared. I certainly didn’t. At 13 years old, I spent many hours playing RuneScape and watching PKing (Player Killing) AMVs to make me feel better after another horrible day at school. Most of the music playing in the background were songs by Linkin Park and frankly forgettable, pseudo-edgy American bands. I clicked on a random RuneScape AMV, and just like that, the nihilistic, politically charged lyrics of ‘The Point of No Return’ by Immortal Technique packed no punches and rattled my 13-year-old brain. Being in the midst of the awful Snap era in hip-hop in which the extremely repetitive ‘Crank That’ by Soulja Boy Tell’Em took over the radio and internet, hearing music with some sustenance even if I didn’t understand everything he rapped about was bound to be enticing.

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After finding Immortal Technique and listening to Revolutionary Volume Two countless times, I craved something fresh, something which was at least in my mind was uncharted territory. That’s when I saw the words ‘recommend for you’ under the music video for ‘I Hear Voices’ by MF DOOM. All I could see was a slight bit of flesh in the video’s thumbnail. I don’t know what made me click it, but I am glad I did! DOOM’s skippy flow and internal rhymes jumped through my mind like an out-of-control frog jumping from neural lily pad to lily pad. I had little understanding of what he was rapping about; nevertheless, it didn’t stop me from seeking out his album Operation: Doomsday and giving it a listen. Despite my enjoyment of Marvel films, I couldn’t help but feel a minor degree of annoyance at the skits on Operation: Doomsday; I felt that DOOM’s sampling of the Fantastic Four was rather irritating at times. I thought they didn’t add anything of substance to the album in the same way the Ken Kaniff skits did on The Slim Shady LP and The Marshall Mathers LP by Eminem. The humour was a lot more overt on the latter whereas it was a lot more subtle on the former. It may have been trivial, but I was annoyed that they weren’t songs. I wanted to hear soulful, 90s, J Dilla influenced beats and a series of internal rhymes which would leave me in a trance. Of course, I learned the error of my ways as I became older. Ironically, my favourite DOOM solo project in recent years is Mm..Food which contains an abundance of strange, hilarious and obscure vocal samples.

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DOOM was not just there in my early teen years when things were supposed to be care-free (what a lie), he was there when I was nearing the tail end of my teen years in 2012, namely when A Levels and academic pressure shackled even the smallest amount of happiness. I fell in love with Keys to the Kuffs by JJ DOOM (MF DOOM’s his collaborative project with Hip-Hop producer Jneiro Jarel) when it was released due to DOOM’s faster flow, Jarel’s experimental beats and unexpected references in each song (i.e., the allusion to My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding in ‘Banished’). DOOM also rhymed the word ‘Eyjafjallajökull’ and ‘vocal’ (some claim he said ‘vocalled’ which technically is not a word, DOOM gets a pass from me) on the track ‘Guv’nor.’’ His anachronistic live performance of ‘Winter Blues’ on BBC Radio 4 still sounds fresh and the original is one of Hip-Hop’s most underrated love songs. After listening to Keys to the Kuffs for a while, I became ravenous for more MF DOOM. I decided to check out Madvillainy by Madvillain (MF DOOM’s collaborative effort with Hip-Hop producer Madlib), MM..Food, MF DOOM's fifth solo album, and Take Me to Your Leader by King Geedorah (another alias MF DOOM adopts which he uses when rapping with the Underground Hip-Hop group Monsta Island Czars). I became infatuated with the albums Madvillainy and Take Me to Your Leader, particularly the former for its woozy beats and poetic lyrics. For some unknown reason, I wasn’t so keen on Mm..Food despite the track Beef Rapp having one of the most lyrical introductions in hip-hop. Around this time, I began writing my own short stories and poetry as a catharsis to help alleviate the monotony of A Levels and to help improve my writing. Like DOOM, I meticulously crafted several lines in both to ensure strange, internal rhyme schemes slithered through the heads of those reading them. While I don’t adopt this practice much in my works today, I always enjoyed playing with language in a similar experimental manner to DOOM.

 

He also helped me persevere and stick to a seismic revision schedule whilst studying. Metal Fingers' (MF DOOM's beat-making moniker) Special Herbs instrumental albums were looped in the background of extensive revision sessions, helping me to focus while I studied complex theories. I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I chose another revision soundtrack. Would I have achieved better or worse grades? Thankfully, I got into a university.

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Unfortunately, I haven’t listened to everything in his back catalogue. Hell, I only listened to Black Bastards by KMD (KMD was a Hip-Hop trio back in the early 90s in which DOOM rapped under the name Zev Love X) and Born Like This by MF DOOM in 2020. Does this mean my journey into MF DOOM’s discography and research of hip-hop’s greatest enigma is MF DONE? Absolutely not! For many others, however, it is only just starting.

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While the hip-hop world was adjusting to his sudden death on December 31st, DOOM’s streams skyrocketed by 870%. Billboard reported a significant rise of 25 million listens across all of his projects between December 31st and January 5th, an incredible contrast to the 2.6 million streams in the previous week. Still, a rise in streams is inevitable after the passing of any musician. Weirdly, however, very few Hip-Hop gatekeepers came out on Twitter to try and retain their idol's legacy as an underground rapper. The majority of DOOM fans on the platform encouraged others to search and listen to his discography. Although many musicians posted tributes to DOOM on Twitter to pay their respects i.e., Tyler, The Creator, Earl Sweatshirt, Thom Yorke and Danny Brown. The rapper Ugly God went to Instagram and posted ‘ya’ll n***as did not listen to doom’ a few hours after fans were getting to grips with the death of their beloved idol. Ugly God’s vague and frankly nonsensical statement was not wanted. Granted you must be a certain level of dickhead to try and gatekeep grief, I can understand if Ugly God’s statement was a thoughtless attempt to gatekeep DOOM’s music. Does it make me happy that more people are listening to DOOM’s music after his passing? Yes and no. On one hand, several more people are being introduced to a hip-hop maverick. On the other hand, the amount of depth to one of his songs may be sugar-coated by the likes of Addison Rae to become an essential part of a TikTok challenge instead of being appreciated for its musical integrity. However, that’s an argument for another time. Considering the level experimentation underpinning DOOM’s discography and his complex lyrics, I think it is safe to say the latter will not be happening anytime soon!

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Although an MF DOOM TikTok challenge may never see the light of day (thankfully), several fans expressed their fury on Twitter due to his inclusion on President Joe Biden’s inauguration playlist. I am sure that Joe Biden has no idea who MF DOOM is, nor do I believe he had much involvement in the inauguration playlist. Owing to how artificial Hillary Clinton’s ‘Pokémon Go to the Polls’ joke back in 2016 was when she tried appealing to young voters, should a lack of tact from Biden’s camp by including a DOOM song be surprising to anyone?

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DOOM’s death is undoubtedly awful, but there may be a silver lining among this tragedy: new music released posthumously. According to Peanut Butter Wolf, the founder of Stone’s Throw Records (the record label responsible for the release of Madvillain in 2004), there may very well be a sequel to DOOM’s perceived magnum opus, Madvillain, sooner than we think. Likewise, the eclectic beatsmith and Brainfeeder records founder Flying Lotus released a statement on Twitter telling fans that both he and DOOM were working on an EP together before his passing. As much as the prospect of a sequel to Madvillain and the possible MF DOOM/Flying Lotus collaborative EP should shake any hip-hop fan to the core, we must remember that it is early days. Though both projects are not necessarily conjecture, we shouldn’t be getting ahead of ourselves. We have yet to find out how the man died and demanding new music from his closest friends (or going as far to hack into their computers to ‘prove’ how much of a fan you are) is reprehensible. MF DOOM will not be MF DONE for some time. There is a lot for us DOOM fans to learn, watch and listen to understand his lyrics and alter egos. Once new music drops from MF DOOM, I urge you to keep an open heart and mind. It’s what he would have wanted.         

 

Bibliography:

 

Price, J., 2020. MF DOOM Dead At 49. [online] Complex. Available at: https://www.complex.com/music/2020/12/mf-doom-dead-49

 

Soulja Boy Tell’em. (2007) Crank That (Soulja Boy). Collipark Music, Interscope Records

 

herbalist (2006). MF Doom-I Hear Voices. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwmeMXMfAT8

 

JJ DOOM. (2012) Banished. Lex Records

 

JJ DOOM. (2012) Guv’nor. Lex Records

 

Lex Records (2012). JJ DOOM ‘WINTER BLUES’ live on BBC Radio 4. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bfMQteuzLE.

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Hughes, J., 2021. MF DOOM Streams Exploded By 870% Following News Of His Death. [online] Exclaim.ca. Available at: http://exclaim.ca/music/article/mf_doom_streams_exploded_by_870_following_news_of_his_death 

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CNN (2016). Clinton drops a Pokémon Go reference at rally. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jt6riM2aDLk

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The Star, Gaga., 2021. Ugly God Calls Out Fake MF Doom Fans And Lil Yachty Responds. [online] Hip Hop Freaks. Available at https://hiphopfreaks.com/2021/01/03/ugly-god-calls-out-fake-mf-doom-fans-and-lil-yachty-responds/

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Richards, W., 2021. MF DOOM Fans Hit Out At His Inclusion On Joe Biden's Inauguration Playlist. [online] NME | Music, Film, TV, Gaming & Pop Culture News. Available at: https://www.nme.com/news/music/mf-doom-fans-hit-out-at-his-inclusion-on-joe-bidens-inauguration-playlist-285910

 

Walker, J., 2021. MF DOOM & Madlib's 'Madvillainy' Sequel Was 85 Percent Done — & Stones Throw Has Permission To Release Material. [online] HipHopDX. Available at: https://hiphopdx.com/news/id.59992/title.mf-doom-madlibs-madvillainy-sequel-was-85-percent-done-stones-throw-has-permission-to-release-material#

 

Caraan, S., 2021. Flying Lotus Confirms He And MF DOOM Had Collab EP In The Works. [online] HYPEBEAST. Available at: https://hypebeast.com/2021/1/flying-lotus-mf-doom-collab-album-in-the-works