Review Summary: A hidden collection of some of DOOM's best and rarest tracks!
DOOM is notorious for embarrassing his own guest rappers on his CDs, but this isn't the case for once on this CD. This is a collection of guest features that mostly hold their own alongside DOOM. Whether it was connecting with emcee greats like Talib Kweli and GZA or legendary producers like J Dilla, this CD turns out to hold a collection of some of DOOM’s best beats and lyrics overall, and if you know anything about DOOM you are already downloading this by now. While
Unexpected Guests might not stack up to classics like
MM.. Food or
Madvillainy overall, on many tracks it replicates the comic book atmosphere and lyrical brilliance that only DOOM is capable of pulling off.
Almost every song on this album is performed by DOOM, if not, it is produced by him. These tracks were previously released at various points throughout his career, however, when you look at his discography only two tracks are from previous CD’s of his (“?” from
Doomsday and a remixed version of "Angeles" on
Born Like This ). Most of the rest are from guest CDs, if you are wondering what CDs these songs came, look at this Wikipedia link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexpected_Guests
Although secondary to the genius lyricism, the album’s production is outstanding throughout the entire CD as well. “Sniper Elite” is a J Dilla beat that uses a catchy guitar riff but it seems like it would be impossible to turn this into a rap track, but DOOM finds a way to flow to it. DOOM is no longer on good terms with some of these artists. On the song “Yikes” he had to edit out the verses of his onetime friends and partners from Scienz of Life. I highly recommend listening to the full version of “Yikes” on Scienz of Life’s
Project Overground: The Scienz Experiment and also to listen to that entire CD, as they may be the only guests besides possibly MF Grimm to ever surpass DOOM in emceeing on his own CD’s. He did however feature verses by them on the next track “Sorcerers” which will show you a preview of their brilliant combination of jazzy beats, smooth flow and poetic lyrics that mirrors dooms in many ways. After taking a slight downturn for “Da Superfriendz”, “Quite Buttery” comes back with a beat that creates a tropical-paradise atmosphere and is probably my favorite DOOM beat of all time. The album reaches its high point on the track “My Favorite Ladies” compares different women to different drugs with wordplay that is nothing less than brilliant:
"So fly, she should be in the sky with diamonds
Little young thing, she liked to do the tongue thing
At times, she would play hard to get, fronting
Or something, she made me feel like the number one king
Run into her now, and we still catch a fun fling
Met her out in Central Park...that’s one sign
Had the God mentally sparked, reflecting sunshine
She said ‘you need to stop messing with that white girl
She ***ing with your head and got your heart in a tight curl’
We messed around once or twice, but she don’t know me
She helped me get money at the dunce price OT
Plus she from Colombia, so she really Spanish
Cookie known to make a cat bank account vanish”
This album doesn't flow great as an album because the tracks aren't sequenced as well as they could be, but this CD is one of DOOM’s longest CD’s with NO SKITS OR INTERLUDES! It has his best guests spots of any album, by far. The production doesn't help the album flow as a whole, but individually many of these songs are some of DOOM's best productions. But what makes this a necessity to add to your discography is that his lyricism on is on par with any of his classic CDs.
