Madvillain – Madvillainy Demos LP

Stones Throw (2024)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for thirty plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

Many people have told the story of the Madvillainy demos over the years, they leaked, folks got mad, folks got excited, the album was changed before being released, people loved the new version too.  I don't have anything to add as I wasn't paying any attention to that when it was happening and final released version Madvillainy is not a record that clicked with me as much as others.  

You could say that about MF Doom in general for me.  Though I have come around on him in recent years and have added most of his records to my collection, at the end of the day, I'm still more of a Zev Love X fan.  But again, I've come around and have started to enjoy several of his records.  With that newfound respect in mind, I decided to check out the Madvillainy demos to see if I liked them more than the other version of the album.  And as it turned out, I do.

There's an energy here that I don't hear on the final version.  The beats seem to hit a little harder and the vocals are delivered in a more spirited way.  At least I think so.  Again, I'm not super familiar with the other version, but whether it's the sequencing or the versions of the songs used, this version connects more with me, to the point where I actually bought the record.  There's some meandering instrumentals that don't always land, but as 36 minute long listen, the demos version is tighter and again, just connects with me more than the other.

Madvillainy has always been one of those records that I feel like I should like more than I do based on the opinions of people whose taste I trust.  But this shorter, rougher version?  This is more my bag.

Madvillain – Madvillainy Demos:
https://madvillain.bandcamp.com/album/madvillainy-demos