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And can they testify from in the spirit? (Nah) Madvillain – Accordion
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Continuing the gunplay/applause double entendre.

  1. Could the witnesses testify when they’re dead?
  2. Alternatively, could you testify from your heart that you are a true fan?

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1 year

The phrase “from in the spirit” does not make sense. Shouldn’t it be “from inner spirit”?

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3 years

this annotation is spot on!! one thing missing is that in the 1st context instead of talking about witness I think DOOM is talking about the dead. the dead can only “testify from in the spirit”

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5 years

It’s “in the spirit,” 200%. As in, “in the Holy Spirit.” The clearest proof is to simply listen again – the “the” is unmistakable.

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7 years

it’s … from in the spirt

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True, there's rules to this shit, fools dare care MF DOOM (Ft. Mr. Fantastik) – Rapp Snitch Knishes
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DOOM opens by invoking Biggie’s “Ten Crack Commandments:”

I’ve been in this game for years, it made me a animal
There’s rules to this shit, I wrote me a manual

Incidentally, DOOM’s style is somewhat similar to Biggie’s in terms of using a free-associative writing style and flow.

DOOM talked about this line in an XXL interview, stating:

That’s just in general. Snitching is frowned upon basically within all levels of society, besides police levels. It’s just a typical message I’d be talking about anyway if it wasn’t a food reference. So tying it into the food thing made double sense. I didn’t mean to intimidate really. I’m just reinforcing something that everybody already knows about. It’s street rules.

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Jerks, welcome to the Octagon MF DOOM (Ft. J Dilla) – Lightworks
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“Octagon” explicitly refers to “the caged enclosure used for Ultimate Fighting Championship and similar mixed martial arts bouts,” but implicitly invokes the long history of battlerapping that dates to hop hop’s origins.

Similarly, there are a lot of comparisions between hip hop to boxing. DOOM’s friend Ghostface made a nice track about the same time as this one was written, which also refers to the Octagon, while GZA made one about shadow boxing.

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It's no puzzle, you can ask Doc Zizmor Viktor Vaughn – Saliva
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As explained by Alex Threadgold in Frank 151:

I remember another time talking about trivia from growing up in New York and we laughed about Dr. Zizmor, the dermatologist who’s had ads on local TV and in the subway forever. I’d just seen his “fruit peels” exposed as a sham on the news. DOOM must’ve liked the idea that Zizmor was supposedly a scientist, but he was kind of a snake-oil salesman, too—just like Vik. Hence the reference to the good doctor in the RJD2-produced “Saliva.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUNAwGIIv48

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Witches, warlocks, spooks and holy ghosts
RZA let's defraud the hoax GZA – Swordsman
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The hoax is to make people believe in demons, or at least modern day equivalent in politics. GZA and his cousin/producer of this album RZA team up to tell you the truth.

From the viewpoint of the Five Percenters, the “hoax” refers to religious beliefs being propagated by the 10% to enslave the 85%.

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5 years

Here, GZA seems to use the word “defraud” here to mean “expose” (as in exposing a hoax). But this usage is not technically correct, since by definition, “defraud” means to commit fraud or cheat someone, not to expose a fraud.

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Never too woozy to go study
Crews got no clues like old cruddy Officer McGillicuddy DANGERDOOM – Crosshairs
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Never too drunk/tired to do some research.

But these cats have no intelligence like… Officer McGillicuddy from the 1934 classic The Mysterious Mr. Wong.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bM0l3_uvRlM

“Never too woozy to go study” means he is never too drunk to go listen to beats/write lyrics.

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7 months

officer McGillicuddy is also the name of the Lancaster County miniature pony that became part of the police force

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The Mask DANGERDOOM (Ft. Ghostface Killah) – The Mask
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Third song off The Mouse & The Mask, a song featuring Ghostface Killah with whom DOOM reportedly had an album in the works together as DOOMSTARKS.

Samples:

“Sadness Theme” by Franco Micalizzi
“If You Only Had the Time” by Nova Local
“Rhythm’s Dealer” by Ted Atking and His Orchestra

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Sizzla Kalonji
8 years

And ofcourse it’s a reference to the fact that they both (used to) wear a mask, derp.

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Ppf835a6r5

190

1 year

I KNEW IT I KNEW IT WAS SADNESS THEME DANGER MOUSE IS ABSOLUTELY INSANE

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Awkward situation that I'm on a mission to ruin
Her big butt and smile was like camo
Hit up the men's room, we need more ammo (Reload) Madvillain – Operation Lifesaver AKA Mint Test
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DOOM is trying really hard to score with this girl, but not even her looks can cover up her nasty breath.

The phrase “big butt and smile” is a reference to the chorus of Bell Biv Devoe’s “Poison”:

DOOM uses combative language here to resemble an actual special operation. He can’t take the smell anymore, he has to go to the bathroom to “reload” his “ammo”, in other words, take another mint.

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1 year

The trip to the men’s room for ammo could suggest he is going to use the condom vending machine in men’s bathrooms

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Nc78noqefla

79,442

2 years

“her big butt and smile was like camo” as in she looks good but like camouflage is used to disguise, in this case her bad breath. Also mission, camo, ammo, (reload), ‘watch your 3 o'clock, recruit are all related to the military.

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5 years

Men’s rooms at clubs often have bathroom attendants offering, more often than any other item, mints.

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6 years

MF doom liked the girl he was talking to, so its a stretch but maybe the “ammo” is condoms. He ran out and used one of those condom machines ​in the bathroom.

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A true nerd who messed with new words since Boggle DANGERDOOM – Mince Meat
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Boggle is a game where you shake a box filled with cubes that have letters on them, and then try to make words out of the letters that come up on top, DOOM always coming up with new words.

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The Illest Villains Madvillain – The Illest Villains
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The introductory song for Madvillainy, this introduces the symbiotic supervillain consisting of MF DOOM and Madlib by DOOM’s familiar style of sampling cartoons for background information on a crazy ass beat.

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3 years

A majority of the narration on this track is sampled from the 1989 film “A Documentary History of the Cult Villains”. Voice clips from this documentary are spliced and interspersed throughout the remainder of the album.

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