by John Bear
Daily Lobo
The pervert general of hip-hop returns.
Kool Keith is arguably the weirdest MC ever to grab a microphone. He changes names more than J-Lo changes husbands. His most popular album didn't even come out under his name.
Dr. Octagonecologyst, the now-classic collaboration between Kool Keith and Dan "The Automator" Nakamura, was released under the alias Dr. Octagon. It featured Automator's signature classical music-infused beats tweaked to sound spacey enough to suit Keith's slanted, often incoherent rhyming style.
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It worked like a charm.
The album produced the hip-hop classic "Blue Flowers," and skits involving patients dying of cirrhosis of the eye and horses running unchecked through hospital halls.
He has had mixed results since. Keith has released countless albums following Dr. Octagonecologyst, but most have gone largely unnoticed. Sex Style dropped right around the same time and finds Keith doing his "porno-core" style. This is one of his best.
The Black Elvis/Lost in Space album followed Dr. Octagon's modus operandi somewhat, making little sense to anyone at all. First Come First Served found Dr. Octagon being gunned down in the opening skit by his nemesis Dr. Dooom. This one was OK. Matthew is mostly Keith yelling curses that don't seem to be directed at anyone. Skip this one.
Kool Keith seemed on the verge of being a has-been. He is prolific, but that detracts from his appeal somewhat. And all it takes is one bad album - see Matthew - to make fans run screaming. That's what happened to me.
But The Return of Dr. Octagon finds Keith back on point. He has steered away from the crazed hate lyrics he had used almost exclusively - once again, see Matthew - choosing instead to rhyme about nonsensical Kool Keith topics. This is the realm in which Keith works best.
The beats on the album are produced by One Watt Son, a Berlin production team that consists of Ben Green, Simon Walbrook and John Linland. I have never heard of any of these guys, but they apparently like Kool Keith. They have produced an album of highly danceable electronic beats that are well suited when Dr. Octagon starts talking about dying trees, operators being unable to take your call because they are pleasuring themselves at the moment, or dogs wearing lingerie. Don't ask me. I don't know.
The songs all progress. That is, they don't fall into the repetitive trap that hip-hop beats tend to fall in. They come off a little too techno at times, but overall, the production is the best since Dr. Octagonecologyst.
Kool Keith has returned from the brink. I have always been a rabid fan of his, so I am happy about this, because all of his bad albums during the last few years almost made me cry. Now I can dry my tears and nod my head.
