Disco de Madvillain: “Madvillainy [PA]”

In art, sometimes things get produced that are strange and influential, considered within the scope of their origin (Van Gogh, for example), and sometimes things get created that are strange for no good reason and we can only hope aren't influential at all (e.e. cummings). There's no question that Madvillainy is not a "normal" hip hop record. The question is whether that's okay.

For some people, I figure it will probably work out. For others, it won't. It's really that simple.

To address the common complaints, all of which have some validity:

1. The tracks tend to be short. Well, that's not quite true--the tracks, as divided by the album listing--are on the short side of average. The thing is that many of those tracks are almost divisible into sub-tracks, with the end result being that most of the vocal snippets (the actual rapping) don't last for more than about a minute at a time.

2. DOOM doesn't take himself seriously. I honestly don't know what to tell you about that. I think people that are faulting him for his subject matter have a stick somewhere uncomfortable they need to remove. Popular music, like any mass artistic medium, is supposed to be entertaining. It doesn't necessarily have to make sense to be fun, though that's not really a problem that DOOM has (his stuff frequently makes sense--at least, it does to me, though the fact that my perusal of lyrics at a couple of sites suggested that a number of listeners don't know who Worf is tells me I may be coming from a little bit different area of subject expertise).

2.5. Some people think there are too many skits. I classify this is a non-observation or a sub-complaint for several reasons. First off, if you think that THIS has too many "skits" (not sure what that means, at this point), you should stay far away from some of DOOM's other releases. More likely, this relates to a general feeling that the record doesn't form a cohesive artistic statement, but feels more like somebody swept up a bunch of fragments from a cutting room floor and glued them together.

The fact is, those objections are correct. You can't take DOOM seriously all the time, and if you'll do him the charity, you'll find that he's got a lot more wit to him than almost any other MC I can think of off the top of my head. The album is exceedingly fragmented, mostly in response to the frankly monotonous and overwrought state of mainstream hip hop, if you are to believe the press. There's probably a better compromise between six minutes of the same beat in a loop and a blender full of strange beats, but that doesn't necessarily imply this is bad.

Taken on its own, this is, at the least, an interesting record. I'd consider it one of the better hip hop recordings of the past five years (and no, I'm not concerned with being considered "down with the underground"). It's very different, has some great rhymes, and never stays in one place long enough to get boring, which is by far the greatest crime other hip hop commits these days.

My only real problem with Madvillainy is the fact that it puts me to sleep. And I mean that literally. If I put it on in my car on the way home, I'm drifting off by the time I hit my freeway exit. Some of that is due to homogeneity of tempo (oddly enough, even though the beat changes a LOT, it tends to gravitate back towards a few checkpoint tempos, and the frequent transition actually emphasizes that more to me than it downplays it), and some of it is admittedly due to the fact that the constant motion in the record sort of encourages you to tune it into background noise.

Ultimately, I can't recommend this album as a starting point for anybody. It's just not very accessible. We're not talking about Radiohead here (I doubt that there will be any fistfights in bars about whether or not this record is the grand statement of everything that sums up my entire life and makes me feel like some odd British git really understands what I'm going through and the utter and complete helplessness and ennui that comes from our existence in a world pervasively permeated by technology and information--and don't laugh too hard, because I'm pretty sure that at least two people have used those exact words in that same order before me, here, and, if you can't tell, I don't have much respect for that particular breed of Radiohead fan), but this isn't the sort of thing that you're going to pick up and fall directly into.

If you're a serious hip hop enthusiast, you should have this record. Whether you like it or not, this is an IMPORTANT record, if only because it attempts to do something completely different from mainstream hip hop and succeeds. If you're a casual listener, it would be ideal if you could get your hands on it before you buy and listen to it a time or two to see if it grows on you. If you're a DOOM or Madlib fan, you already have the record and I'm not sure what you're reading for.

At a time when hip-hop in many ways has made a mockery of itself, and when its premier acts are neither creative nor conscious, MF Doom and Madlib have delivered an undisputed classic. Madvillainy is a rare hip-hop "concept" album filled with frenetic beats and rhymes that are both avant garde and street-level at the same time.

It is amazing to hear their reinvention of the beat and rhyme on tracks like "Rhinestone Cowboy," "Figaro," "Accordion," and the instant classic "All Caps." Many of the tracks are short, and the interludes sometimes make little sense.

It is telling that many of the artists leading a revolution within hip-hop are its elders, like De La Soul, Common, and (hopefully) Digable Planets and A Tribe Called Quest. Madvillain sports 2 prolific veterans of the rap game who have managed to make hip-hop challenging and relevant again. In my humble opinion, Madvillainy is the most important hip-hop album of the last decade and one of the best albums of the last few years, period. Pick it up.

Now this is pure bedroom closet studio type underground. From the second you insert Madvillainy, you feel like you're listening to the narration of a marvel comic book with Doom's taste; definately creative. Its Def, matter fact, why dont we say 'def' anymore, well I'ma use it in this case to tell yall that this CD is DEF. Madlib supposedly did all the beats on the album, but it doesn't stray to far from Doom's natural sound. If you've never heard MF DOOM, the best way I can sum up his music is, ill poetic Mark Twain style rhyming over vintage sampled beats, very abstract compared to the current mainstream, but nonetheless will still keep you entertained. Doom show's his own level of creativity, and to me that's what raw hip hop really is. Buy ya'self a copy bro, you be the judge.

I bought this album over a year ago, and it still earns repeated listens to this day. Why? Thanks to the intricate subtleties of Madlib's beats and MF Doom's wildy metaphoric lyrics, it successfully bears up under repeated listens, just getting better and better.

MF Doom is a husky-voiced MC who's been around for some time - as a member of the group K.M.D. with his brother Subroc, who was tragically killed in a car crash in 1993 after the group's 1991 album debut. K.M.D. went on to release the angry, political album "Bl_ck B_st_rds", which led to problems with their label Elektra which kept the group in limbo for the next 5 years.

MF Doom, who up until this point had been known as "Zev Love X", resurfaced with his new alter-ego and name in 1999, releasing the album "Operation Doomsday", heavily centered around Doom being a villain out to cause trouble, complete with mask convering his face so his true identity would never be known. He's subsequently gone on to release several albums, many based on his own production work.

Madlib is a Oxnard, California producer who first came on to the scene in 1999 as the producer and part-time MC of Lootpack, a group whose album "Soundpieces: Da Antidote" was critically acclaimed. Madlib has since released two more albums under his helium-voiced alter-ego Quasimoto, and has also several other album productions to his name.

Together, the group are known as Madvillain, with MF Doom on the microphone and Madlib behind the production. And both of them show off their outstanding talents on this excellent album.

MF Doom's lazy, semi-deep husky voice starts dropping excellent lyrics from the very first line - "Living off borrowed time, the clock tick faster" he proclaims on the opening track "Accordian", with a minimalist Madlib beat powered by a simple slow Accordian riff. On "Great Day Today", he says "Last wish? I wish I had two more wishes", and continues with the metaphors with lines like "Got more soul than a sock with a hole."

On "Operation Lifesaver", Doom has to deal with chatting up a girl at a bar only to be confronted by her appalling bad breath, whilst on "Fancy Clown", Doom's alter-ego Viktor Vaughn phones up a cheating girlfriend to condemn her wandaring ways, only to then tell her that's been with her friend, mother and the maid, amongst others. The stories are bizarre, ultimately, but with lines referencing terrorismm and its effect on people ("Ever since 10/11 glade she made a bretheren"), war ("it costs billions

to blast humans in half, into captured arms / Only one side is allowed to have bombs") or drugs ("recent research show it's not so darn harmful") the album touches on a surprising amount of topics, all of them delivered in a twisted, poetic style.

The music bolsters the Doom's voice with an excellent, varied style that chops and changes all over the place ; "Fancy Clown" chops up an old 70's soul sample and rearranges it into a wicked riff, "Great Day Today" rides laid-back jazz drums and a shimmering Rhodes keyboard, and "America's Most Blunted" rides a rolling guitar beat. Whilst varying in style, the tracks all blend together perfectly over the album, interspersed with strange samples from old cartoons, sound effects and the kitchen sink.

Thanks to the fantastic music and MF Doom's complex wordplay, this album still commands my attention over a year later - the sheer fact that I can even be bothered to write this review should give you a fairly good idea of much I would recommend this album. If you're even slightly interested in hip-hop, then you should certainly give this album a listen for an excellent showcase of real hip-hop.

This album is basically 46 minutes of teasing. It starts off with a nice super hero style intro to get us all in the mood. Then we have 2 songs ("Accordion" and "Meat Grinder") with just ridiculous Madlib creations and MF Doom spitting with a sick flow. The problem: the songs are both under 3 minutes!! Then we get some alright tracks, until Madlib gives us another treat with "Curls", which is again under 3 minutes. This is how the entire album is. None of the songs are wack, but there are several songs that just blow you away (other ones are "Figaro", "All Caps", "Fancy Clown"). Too bad none of them actually last very long. It's like Madlib just wants us to be fiending for more.

Out of the 46 minutes, about 20 minutes is alright, 10 minutes is throwaway filler, and 16 minutes is off the hook. It doesn't really sound like a good ratio, but I can't really complain since I CAN'T STOP PLAYING THIS CD. The good parts are just enough to keep you listening, and when the album finishes you just want to push play again. Peep it if you're a big Madlib fan or if you're willing to spend the cash on such a short album.