For over 20 years, MF Doom has existed in his own world amongst the hip hop galaxy, entertaining, and confounding listeners with his use of samples, showmanship, and esoteric lyrical references...and that mask. And here he is again with his latest opus that almost plays like an actual opus in the sense that the record plays out in three movements. Expektoration Live is the new live album from Doom and it demonstrates with high definition clarity the rawness, left field approach, and strange raps that this guy is all about.
Divided into two acts the album concentrates on a few classic areas that DOOM brings back from his archive. Act one centers around his releases MM..Food and Madvillainy while Act Two concentrates on Doom's debut album, Operation: Doomsday. While this is undoubtedly something to behold live on record I was left more annoyed than anything. Lacking the energy and vibe of the live experience, Expektoration Live comes off simply as a bunch of yelling, crazy laughing samples, and lots of noise. The record sounds like this weird, surreal experience that almost gave me a headache. For a genre that relies on so much studio wizardry, Doom's Expektoration Live suffers from the lack of such magic.
About the best thing you can say about Expektoration Live is the 1:30 intermission that separates the two live Act's. The thing is hilarious and almost comes off as some strange Day Job Orchestra outtake. With Worf even making an appearance, the thing is a super bizarre experience that will leave you laughing and scratching your head at the same time. Let’s just put it this way, when Worf commands you to, "Stop relaxing," you can't help but pop a few more Tylenol and try and make it through the rest of the record. Expektoration Live didn't quite exceed my expektorations and left me undewhelmed. For someone as legendary as MF Doom, I was expecting way more than what I actually received. Oh well, you can't win them all. Unless you're a hard core MF Doom fanatic, skip this record and pick up some of his studio works which are much more appealing than this.
