MF Doom's genius seems inextricably linked to his thrilling unpredictability. The rapper, producer, supervillain, and icon's deadpan verses zigzag into gloriously unexpected places, powered by potent wit, vivid imagination, an anachronistic vocabulary seemingly stolen from someone rotting away in a nursing home for the criminally insane, and a frame of reference that seems to entail popular culture in its entirety. That unpredictability extends to the way he conducts his career—his choices defy conventional wisdom at every turn. When one persona develops a following, he adopts another, only to abandon it when the fancy strikes.
This year saw the release of what may be Doom's breakthrough album: Madvillainy, a collaboration with kindred spirit and fellow shape-shifter Madlib, was rightly hailed as an instant classic by no less an arbiter of highbrow taste than The New Yorker. Most rappers would use a triumph like Madvillainy as leverage to secure a record deal with a prominent label and a roster full of big-name rappers and producers. Instead, Doom traveled in the opposite direction with VV:2—Venomous Villain, resurrecting his Viktor Vaughn persona and burrowing deeper underground with an album full of obscure producers and little-known guest MCs, released by a tiny independent with only a handful of releases to its credit.
As the lyric booklet for Madvillainy proved, Doom/Vaughn is one of few rappers whose lyrics genuinely qualify as poetry. Throughout VV2, Vaughn flexes his uncanny gift for indelible turns of phrase, stunning lyrical density, warped narratives, and evocative imagery. The entire album is a hip-hop quotable.
Augmented by a climactic guest turn from Kool Keith and stellar production that sounds melodic, glitchy, and futuristic, VV:2's 33 minutes race by in roughly half the time of Vaughn's previous album, Vaudeville Villain. Where that record was a spooky, fantastical, cross-country haunted-train trip, its sequel is a bullet-train ride that's over before passengers can catch their breath. The supervillain moves in mysterious ways, leaving his devoted cult gasping for more, eagerly anticipating the next transformation in what's shaping up to be one of rap's most original and brilliant careers.