The first thing that comes across as you listen to Czarface Meets Metal Face is that the production of the album is absolutely outstanding.
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Therefore, as Czarface and Doom team up to create Czarface Meets Metal Face, a series of skits sets up a very loose narrative about Czarface being on the lookout for a villain to fight and coming across MF Doom, asking Doom to become his arch nemesis, under the justification that “Every hero needs a villain” (which also happens to be the name of one of Czarface’s other albums that MF Doom made a guest appearance on). MF Doom has a similar shtick of depicting himself as a supervillain, hence the mask he wears (which was originally designed after comic book character Doctor Doom) and his collaboration with Madlib being called Madvillain. Czarface has a running shtick in which they depict a comic book character named Czarface who is a superhero (although he looks more like a supervillain) and their music is laden with references to superheroes and comic books, with all their album covers designed to look like comic book covers. It’s a team up within a team up within a team up, as Czarface is already a collaboration between Wu-Tang Clan member Inspectah Deck and Boston underground hip-hop due 7LES, which consists of producer 7L and emcee Esoteric. With MF Doom favoring collaborations so much, the team up with Czarface makes such perfect sense that it seems like these artists were always meant to come together.
In fact, most of Doom’s albums have been part of some sort of collaboration, and the ones that haven’t been were mostly released under pseudonyms, with only two solo albums ever actually released under the name MF Doom. Danger Doom is one of the many collaborations that Doom has taken part in over the years, including Madvillain (MF Doom and Madlib), JJ Doom (MF Doom and Jneiro Jarel), and NehruvianDOOM (MF Doom and Bishop Nehru). The album was a brilliant piece of postmodern self-indulgence, and I was drawn to Doom’s mumbly-mouthed lazy flow. The album, which was released in conjunction with Adult Swim, featured songs about and featuring characters from the various Adult Swim shows at the time, including Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law, Space Ghost Coast to Coast, and most notably Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The first time MF Doom piqued my interest was with his short lived hip-hop duo, Danger Doom, consisting of himself and producer Danger Mouse.