Dumile had used the spelling variant 'M.F. In 1999 Fondle 'Em released MF Doom's first full-length LP, Operation: Doomsday, which included these singles and their b-sides, and additional tracks. MF Doom's mask has undergone at least one design revision since its adoption (it is now an altered version of the mask worn by the character Maximus Decimus Meridius in the film Gladiator).ĭumile released three singles on 'Bobbito' Garcia's Fondle 'Em Records, 'Dead Bent,' and 'Greenbacks' (1997), and 'The M.I.C.' (1998). Clean,' '?,' and in earlier photos with KMD. He weared that mask while performing and isn't photographed without it, except for very short glimpses in videos such as Viktor Vaughn's 'Mr. He meanwhile had taken on a new identity, MF Doom, patterned after and wearing a mask similar to that of Marvel Comics super-villain Doctor Doom, who is depicted rapping on the cover of the 1999 album Operation: Doomsday. In 1997, Dumile began freestyling incognito at open-mic events at the Nuyorican Poets Café in Manhattan, obscuring his face by putting a stocking over his head. ' Black Bastards had become bootlegged at the time, leading to Doom's rise in the underground hip-hop world. According to interviews with Doom, he was also 'recovering from his wounds' and swearing revenge 'against the industry that so badly deformed him. ' In the late 1990s, he left New York City and settled in Atlanta. He testified to disillusionment and depression, living 'damn near homeless, walking the streets of Manhattan, sleeping on benches. With the loss of his brother, Dumile retreated from the hip-hop scene from 1994 to 1997. Before the release of the album, it was shelved due to controversy over its cover art, which featured a cartoon of a stereotypical pickaninny or sambo character being hanged from the gallows. The group was subsequently dropped from Elektra Records that same week. Subroc was struck and killed by a car in 1993 while attempting to cross a Long Island expressway before the release of a second KMD album, titled Black Bastards. Hood, which became a minor hit through its singles 'Peachfuzz,' 'Who Me?' and heavy video play on cable TV's Yo! MTV Raps and Rap City. ĭumile and KMD's recorded debut came on 3rd Bass's song 'The Gas Face' from The Cactus Album, followed in 1991 with KMD's album Mr. A&R rep Dante Ross learned of KMD from the hip hop group 3rd Bass, and signed the group to Elektra Records. He then moved with his family to New York and was raised in the city of Long Beach, New York on Long Island.Īs Zev Love X, he formed the group KMD in 1988 with his younger brother DJ Subroc and another MC called Onyx the Birthstone Kid. 1.4 Guest appearances, production, and instrumental workĭumile was born on Januin London, England, the son of a Trinidadian mother and Zimbabwean father.

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