Big up to the birthday boy Daniel Dumile, AKA MF DOOM, who was born on this day back in 1971.
DOOM was born in London and lived there for only a few years before his family moved to New York, where he lived up until 2009, though never receiving American citizenship, and was eventually deported back to merry old England. Whilst in New York though DOOM's talents as a hip hop artist truly blossomed, starting with his work in the rap group KMD, in which he performed as Zev Love X alongside his brother DJ Subroc and MC Rodan.
KMD made a name for themselves within the underground rap scene with the first album Mr. Hood, however tragedy struck shortly before the planned release of their second album, when Subroc was struck and killed by a car whilst crossing a road. To make matters worse, KMD's record label dropped them the same week, essentially shelving their second album, Black Bastards, in the process, which would still go on to become a bootleg hit amongst the hip hop scene.
During this time however DOOM all but vanished, essentially living homeless and sleeping on benches for three years, before popping up at open mic-nights around Manhattan performing freestyle with a a pair of women's stockings over his face, thus (somewhat) hiding his identity. Shedding his Zev X persona in favour of MF DOOM, DOOM also threw out the stockings in place of a mask modelled after Doctor Doom's from the Fantastic Four, fitting given his tragic past almost seemed to hit the beats of every classic comic book villain origin story, as in DOOM's own words, he intended to seek revenge "against the industry that so badly deformed him".
DOOM quickly rose to the forefront of hip-hop with his rad fuckin' albums, some of which saw him take on additional personas, most notably one in honour of King Ghidorah of Godzilla fame, which DOOM has used multiple times with various spellings, along with other members of his Godzilla-based rap troupe M.I.C, or Monsta Island Czars. Other monikers have included Metal Fingers and Viktor Vaughn.
Through his rise of infamy DOOM has collaborated with numerous big names in the music scene, which only helped to propel him further into the sights of the mainstream audience. Starting with his collaboration with Madlib under the group Madvillain, DOOM would go onto feature on Gorillaz, Flying Lotus, and Avalanches tracks, produce Ghostface Killah tracks, and most radical of all, teamed up with Danger Mouse to produce the incredible The Mouse and the Mask, which featured collaborations from Cartoon Network and Adult Swim.
Seeing himself as more of a producer, writer, and director, DOOM has also been known to pull the ol' switcheroo on unsuspecting audiences at his shows, often sending out impostors to perform his sets, which has led to some backlash when the faux DOOMs have been, shall we say, dog shite. Most recently at an Adult Swim festival last year, Flying Lotus brought DOOM out on stage to perform, only for it to later be revealed this was another faux DOOM, this time played by Hannibal Buress - though it is unknown if DOOM actually had anything to do with this prank.
MF DOOM, have yerself a most excellent birthday.
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