Shadows of Tomorrow: MF DOOM Taught Me How to Rhyme "Accordion" with "Embroidering" By Charles Bridgers, IV (DOOM Tribute)
Honestly, it doesn't even feel like there's a proper way to elegize an eccentric and extremely talented artist such as MF DOOM, who meant so much to so many of us for so many years for so many different reasons as truly unique as DOOM himself. So, what better way to pay tribute to The Man, The Myth, THE MASK himself than by speaking to those closest to him? With a heavy heart, I proudly present Shadows of Tomorrow; a new recurring column in tribute to DOOM in an effort to re-tell the tall tales, strange stories, and lesser-known tidbits of The Metal Face Villain himself. R.I.P. Daniel "MF DOOM" Dumile Thompson.
"For many, 2020 felt like a dream, a brief interlude from reality where much was taken and little was returned. For me, it's been a year of silence, reflection, and equations. It wasn't until the death of a Daniel Dumile that I found myself trapped in a nightmare that I didn't want to wake up from. This is that story..." explains Charles Bridgers, IV AKA C4 The eXplosIVe.
"I had a dream where I was inside that Star Wars tree from the planet Dagobah, where Luke [Skywalker] fought Mustafa from Lion King dressed as David Prowse, except neither of them were there. I was holding a green lightsaber with my fake hand and The Super Villain himself was wielding a crimson sword of light. We fought valiantly for hours, he parried, I thrusted. More fencing words. He chopped MY head off. Then, my face ripped off and there was a DOOM mask under it. So, I guess, I'm my own father? Please, don't sue me, Disney+; I need to see how WandaVision ends. There is a God. Time slows up, then, speeds up, and I go with the flow of the Pandemic that cost so many so much. My social interactions are limited to a many-gendered construct that my MacBook affectionately refers to as "Zoom.'"
"My words turn into numbers and variables, as I spin sentences, sans grammar, to teach the next generation how to solve the mystery of "how to pass high school and move on to what we really want to do with our lives." I gambled on the odds of students not knowing the difference between probability and odds and it paid off. When I leave my janky 6-in-1 Victrola turntable that cannot play lathe-cut records to seek the wisdom of sunlight, it's, usually, to see if grocery stores have enough food to help me prolong this Quarantine for a few days or just to score some more Cracker Barrel cheese. Speakers are traded for headphones and I only pull them out to talk to cashiers, who [used] to be called "essential workers.'"
"While I'm dancing in the aisle looking for Veggie Straws, I am teleported back to Dagobah, an alternate reality of my dream where [Darth] Vader is no longer DOOM, but when I strike him, strands of crimson jet out of his blurred outline. No, not just red, but a touch of gold. Then, one head [becomes] three. "King Geedorah, take me to your leader." Something about a snake, like, no, "me neither." Dry spaghetti is cooked and slithers around me, plucking themselves like strings sampled from the harps of Heaven itself. Daniel Dumile's physical self decided not to enter The New Year animated... or Christmas... or Thanksgiving. Did Godzilla win? Why didn't I buy that double-LP red vinyl on Bandcamp while I had the chance? Vinyl can be red, sometimes, it's blue. Love people while you can. Whether it's your wife or some guy named DOOM."
"Surely, this is a joke; he's about to be resurrected like Monster Zero from the movie excerpts. I wonder, why it gotta be like this, hey, hey, hey, hey. HEY. Mr. Fantastik. HEY. Mr. Fantastik. What? No matter how hard they try, they can't stop us nowwwwwwww. Why? Because DOOM has gotta come back. [He's] just gotta. This isn't the first time he's resurrected himself, whether it be behind the mic, the boards, or the wheels of steel with that golden sounnnnnnnnnd. No matter How Much Damage life Kauses, there is always a second act. For an emcee who lit a match on the gasoline poured all over a soundscape made of cacti, everything is possible, even if you have to disappear after [Star Wars] Episode III to come back 30 years earlier in A New Hope. All Viktor [Vaughn] needs is another mask. He's sat through garbage open mic nights. He shot Fat Willie. He was shot down by Apani B."
"His metabolism absorbs the tragedies of a former Vaudeville Villain and shapes his persona to fit behind The Metal Faced reinforcement that the music industry is a prison, you might as well get what you can before the four walls close in on you. The walls are closing in on me. The walls are closing in on Viktor. The walls are closing in on Apani B. We are in the trash compactor on the first Death Star. We are all about to die. Our careers are about to end. I'm busy on my iPhone Notes App writing bad poems about my feelings. Dumile understands the dimensions of the four walls that [have] us contained. He doesn't care. He breaks The Fourth Wall and all the world is a stage, but no longer do the dimensions contain his essence. He is the television. Danger Mouse blesses him with some rhythm and melody. The television makes the rules. He is the rules. He rules the microphone."
"DANGERDOOM writes the Occult Hymn that sings the praises of late night cartoons and the freedom that comes from songs about "Vats of Urine." Never has there been a better time for an Adult to Swim. And above all of this? MADVILLAIN. Otis & Daniel. For me, the universe of DOOM began when I heard the "Supervillain Theme," which is ironic, because an instrumental made by Madlib made me fall in love with DOOM, instead. #BoycottRhymesayers: I will break that personal rule once and ONLY once, when they re-stock that MM..FOOD green and pink vinyl. These are the albums that I listen to, the only Hip-Hop artist I need now. Why am I only listening to DOOM rap? As long as I play his music, The Metal Faced Villain still lives on in the minds of me and other like-nerded wannabe Hip-Hop O.G.'s. LONG LIVE DOOM AND, YES, ALL CAPS WHEN YOU FINISH THE MAN'S TRIBUTE. (Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll be listening to JJ DOOM's [Key to The Kuffs] for the 23rd time in a row in an attempt to appreciate it...)"
- Crapped Out By: Charles Bridgers, IV (@seaforeex) from Four Seas Stories
