Outside the Lines With Rap Genius - Dante Ross Excerpt #4: MF DOOM lyrics

Dante Ross: So I knew DOOM when he was really young, and Subroc. They were little kids. He was a prodigy, he was a child prodigy. At 17, he really produced "Gas Face." People don't know that. At 17, 18 years old, he was producing records for people. And "Gas Face," he did the drums on it, not the whole sh** but the drums and no one knows that He was a prodigy, and so was Subroc. So of course you're going to see them grow and evolve and change. And because of circumstance -- tragedy, as much as anything -- he reinvented himself. I feel like his reinvention was...it has a lot of symbolic messaging to me. It's kind of like...I know it sounds corny and sh**, but it's kind of like the strength of black America when I think about him. Because you can throw black people a handful of sh** all day long, but they're gonna go make the greatest thing in the world with that handful of sh**. You could f**ing X, Y, and Z a motherf**er, motherf**ers are gonna take that X, Y, and Z and make it something beautiful and incredible So his brother died, he got dropped from his label, and he turned around and became a bigger, more important artist on his own, and in his own way, following his own path, by his own means. And to me, he's a metaphor for the power of black people -- like, his career He's an amazing, remarkable person. I haven't seen him in a long time, but I love him. He's like my brother, he's like my little bro. Him and Sub, they'd f**ing stay at my house for weeks on end. We'd f**ing share a slice of pizza down the middle. I love those guys. And watching him transform, because I knew them so well and I saw how incredibly talented and artistic and creative and knowledgeable he was, does not surprise me at all What people don't know is, he's a great artist. He drew all that KMD sh**, too. Him and his brother both could draw anything. He's reading Bukowski at age 19. What rapper's reading that sh** at 19? He would come to my house, and him and Del would be at my house and just make crazy music. That guy is super-talented. He's a natural. He's an extraordinary person