Later, his famous mask would become a staple of merch and the artwork to classic albums like Madvillainy, plus inspire street art and Nikes that resell for thousands on the secondary market. In the late ’90s, before he affixed metal to his face, he wore a stocking cap. He entered his second act dead bent on achieving success through anonymity. When they did rediscover him, he had remade himself as one of the most vivid stylists rap had ever seen-someone who reimagined how intricate rhyme schemes could be and made a string of non sequiturs sound like the most profound thing you’d ever heard. Legendary hip-hop producer Prince Paul once recalled that it was as if Dumile had “kinda disappeared,” but the reality is that few in the industry sought him out during this time. He found himself “damn near homeless” and sleeping on benches. Within a few years, however, his hopes had been derailed by two devastating events: first, the death of his brother and collaborator, DJ Subroc then, his exile from his controversy-fearing record label. Born Daniel Dumile in London to a Trinidadian mother and Zimbabwean father, he moved to New York while he was an infant, and seemed on the precipice of modest stardom in the early 1990s as his group KMD built a following through collaborations with 3rd Bass and a warmly received debut album. The chance to embrace the absurdity on such a grand scale is something DOOM-who died on October 31 at age 49, though his wife, Jasmine, didn’t publicly reveal the news until Thursday-never thought he’d have the chance to do. Others may have viewed the mask as a crown, but for its owner, there was little precious about it. A decade later, he would still occasionally dispatch fugazis, including Hannibal Burress at Adult Swim Festival in 2019. DOOM, who understood the concept of kayfabe better than any of his peers, started incorporating the crowd’s disdain into his performances when he did show up.ĭOOM found the outrage funny, and mused about sending out a white guy or the Blue Man Group to take his place. But they caught on soon enough, showering boos on the stand-ins (and on the man himself on a few occasions, not realizing he had recently lost weight). Early on, audiences couldn’t always tell they were watching a Fauxdeville Villain. Fans would show up expecting DOOM and instead be greeted by a knockoff donning the headgear, rapping his songs. He was able to do this because of his trademark mask-a hulking piece of metal that famed graffiti artist Lord Scotch designed by deconstructing a helmet used in the movie Gladiator. In the mid-2000s, MF DOOM-the silver-tongued MC who dazzled listeners for decades and inspired cult-like devotion-began sending impostors to take his place at shows. One of the great scandals in underground hip-hop history also doubled as one of the finest pieces of performance art of the 21st century. “Few can do it, even fewer can sell it.” -MF DOOM, “One Beer”
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