During the London riots of 2011, a three-story warehouse was burned to the ground, containing the vinyl catalog of over a hundred independent record labels including 4AD, Sub Pop, Domino and Ninja Tune. Due to the cost, time and care of pressing vinyl, many of the records lost in the fire are presumed to be out of print indefinitely. Among them were MF DOOM’s Take Me To Your Leader by his incarnation as King Geedorah, released by Ninja Tune/Big Dada in 2003.

Nearing the 10th anniversary of the album, the music service Beat Delete is spearheading an effort to repress the King Geedorah vinyl. Beat Delete does it like this: working with indie labels & indie artists, they make it possible for record buyers to request out of print titles. When they reach a certain threshold of requests, the record is brought back to life.

Request/buy at Beat Delete: King Geedorah Take Me To Your Leader

Take Me To Your Leader is arguably one of the best, but least appreciated DOOM albums. It’s a 13-track concept record, conceived, written, recorded, mixed and mastered by Villain Man himself. As DOOM puts it, “This whole album is Geedorah’s alien perspective on humans, to show the listener a mirror image of his/herself and the way we see each other.”

The record was made in the months when he was completing his “rap-for-hire” record Vaudeville Villain as Viktor Vaughn, and beginning work on Madvillainy with Madlib. At the time of the album’s release in summer 2003, DOOM was a mystery, as underground and independent as it gets, but it was the best album of the year as far as a few hip-hop heads were concerned. Mark Martelli, writing a 9/10 review of the album for Pitchfork, correctly predicted: “Heads will be discovering that album for the next ten years, and it’ll still sound fresh.”

via Rappcats