Madlib

Pop culture can be as forbidding as it is inviting, particularly in areas that invite geeky obsession: The more devotion a genre, series, or subculture inspires, the easier it is for the uninitiated to feel like they’re on the outside looking in. But geeks aren’t born; they’re made. And sometimes it only takes the right starting point to bring newbies into various intimidatingly vast obsessions. Gateways To Geekery is our regular attempt to help those who want to be enthralled, but aren’t sure where to start. Want advice? Suggest future Gateways To Geekery topics by emailing [email protected].
Geek obsession: Madlib
Why it’s daunting: What’s difficult to grasp about the L.A. producer, rapper, DJ, and musician Madlib isn’t the music he releases so much as its sheer quantity. Even in an era where more artists release more music than ever, Madlib’s catalog stands out. At this writing, there are 226 items in his official discography at the website of Stones Throw Records, which has issued the bulk of it. Of those, 105 are as primary artist, either solo or in collaboration. Not all of them are full albums, of course—singles, EPs, digital one-offs, DJ-mix CDs, and stray album and compilation tracks by other artists dominate. (Not to mention Madlib’s habit of releasing instrumental versions of his rap material.) Still, it’s an intimidating mountain to climb.
There’s also the not-so-little matter of just how many monikers the man uses. Even his aliases have aliases. Born Otis Jackson Jr. in 1973, Madlib emerged in the mid-’90s with tracks for L.A. rappers Tha Alkaholiks, and in 1999, his group Lootpack issued a sturdy, inventive debut, Soundpieces: Da Antidote! After that came a flood of releases credited to more than a dozen aliases, among them Quasimoto (a.k.a. Lord Quas), Yesterdays New Quintet (whose “members,” all the same guy, have each issued “solo” material), The Last Electro-Acoustic Space Jazz & Percussion Ensemble, DJ Rels, and Sound Directions. That’s not counting collaborations with MF Doom (as Madvillain), J Dilla (Jaylib), Guilty Simpson (OJ Simpson), and Ivan “Mamão” Conti (Jackson Conti). He’s also done production work for rappers famous (De La Soul, Ghostface Killah, Mos Def, Talib Kweli) and obscure (Percee P, Planet Asia, Prince Po, Strong Arm Steady), as well as R&B giant Erykah Badu. And he has remix credits ranging from Jay-Z and Beastie Boys to Jill Scott and TV On The Radio.
On the surface, he has some similarities with his good friend and collaborator, the late J Dilla, but Madlib gets away with this hyper-prolificacy because his music is so immediately, recognizably his. His drums glug and clunk as much as they boom and bap; pocket-sized samples of jazz, Bollywood, Brazilian music, funk, acid rock, and more are chosen for their surface noise and warped timbres as much as their ability to rock a party. He works hard at seeming casual, frequently baffling listeners by changing directions in the middle of tracks, throwing gnarly noise into a track once and only once, skipping freely between genres. He’ll try anything once, often for the duration of an album. Madlib’s music is sticky, staticky, warped, and engrossing—reflecting the weed habit that so heavily marks its creation.
That grime may make Madlib the most “East Coast” of L.A. hip-hop producers, a kind of Golden State answer to Wu-Tang Clan’s The RZA in his spooky prime. The difference is that Madlib’s tracks have a wide-eared, flinty sense of agog; even the most outré stuff bustles. He’s one of the most solipsistic of great rap producers: fewer beatmakers are as well suited to headphone listening. A lot of headphone listening, and it isn’t about to abate anytime soon: In 2010, he’s releasing a monthly CD series called Madlib Medicine Show to help clean out the vaults. (What’s scarier—the fact that he’s released so many albums already, or that there was so much left?) Madlib caters to die-hards, but for everyone else, here’s where to begin.
Possible gateway: Quasimoto, The Unseen (2000)