MF DOOM

DOOM returns. The MF has been dropped, but the masked one's propensity for crafting slippery, left-field hip-hop remains intact. Over the course of the album's 17 tracks, we get the robotic retro futurism of Raymond Scott, Giorgio Moroder's spidery proto-electro, barfly prophesy via Charles Bukowski and a continuous onslaught of puns and tongue twisters that shirk meaning for sound. At times, it's overwhelming in its singularity and seems like nothing more than a series of in-jokes for the voices inside DOOM's head. But, then again, that's always been part of DOOM's appeal.