On paper, at first Viktor Vaughn 2 sounded like a great idea, however once details started leaking about the album, heads began to fear what the outcome would sound like. It was first found out that it was only an EP, which of course wasn’t positive since it’s predecessor was a full-length. Secondly, this was not an official follow-up to the Sound Ink release, because it was now on Insomniac Records, and featured none of the same producers. Of course finally, for an EP, there were an awful lot of guest emcees attached to the release. How good could this album be without Doom overseeing its construction? Would this be a worthy sequel, or would it sound like a posthumous 2Pac release?

       With a team up virtually unknown producers at the helm, such as System D-128, DiViNCi, Swamburger, Session 31, DJ I.N.C., and Dub-L, one might think that it would be impossible to recreate the magic found on it’s predecessor. However executive producer Iz-Real and DiViNCi sew this album together with little or no input from Doom and it actually works surprisingly well. The creatively cut-and-pasted intro, “Viktomizer” is a mosaic of cleverly dug movie & cartoon samples, which suggests that Doom and Vaughn are two separate entities, as one voice says “Viktor, I thought I recognized you, I thought you were somebody I know, the same features, the same build…..”.

      “Back End” officially jumps the album off as spaced-out beat kicks in at 115 beats-per-minute, with Vaughn spitting fast raps at breakneck speed, slowly blending into a more down-to-earth funky bass-guitar loop that evolves into a lovely chopped up mess of drums, cuts, and stabs. “Fall Back/Titty Fat” also impresses, mirroring last album’s “Change The Beat”, yet staying at a solid 90 BPM’s, changing up samples every 20 seconds, animating Doom’s fluid styles, with each beat doper than the next. “Doom On Vik” follows, an improvisational interlude, where a more-than-one-beer-sipping Doom rambles on about the difference between Doom and Vaughn. 

       “R.A.P. Game” marks the album’s first collaborative song, where Doom teams up with Mars Ill’s Manchild, and a less than impressive Iz-Real, yet the trio holds it down over broken RZA-esque pianos, that could been found somewhere in the 36 Chambers. “Dope Skill” is another definite head-nodder power-packed with punchy horns and a guest shot from Carl Kavorkian, which is quickly followed-up with “Doper Skiller”, arguably the album’s best track, marking the first dream collaboration between Doom and Kool Keith. As the album begins to come to a close, “Bloody Chain” teams Doom up with Poison Pen, over a spooky, mystical track tailor-made for Doom’s similar style.  

       In essence, the preemptive complaints made about this album could be looked at as negatives, however once you hear the album it’s entirely different story. Yes, this is an EP, however this leaves much less room for error, resulting in a tighter knit package. And yes it’s instead sewn together by Insomniac’s team, however despite the fact there is no RJD2 on this one, they do just as fine a job as the Sound Ink team at producing for Doom. And yes, there are a few too many guests, however they don’t overpower Doom, and while most probably feared that this would end up sounding like a compilation rather than a Doom record, it doesn’t. For that matter, it holds together much better than King Geedorah’s Take Me To Your Leader did. 

        Sure, this album is a thinly veiled commercial for Insomniac’s artists, as well as their magazine, however it’s hard to front on. Doom’s incredible flow carries it through, and his intentions for recording the album shine through with the first lyric of the LP: “Dub it off your man, don’t spend that ten bucks, I did it for the advance, the back end sucks”. While this might be true, fans of Doom that do spend that dough shouldn’t be disappointed.

However this isn’t just another name for the Metal Face emcee, as Vaudeville Villain represents a different type of album than MF Doom’s Operation Doomsday or King Geedorah’s Take Me To Your Leader. Reason being is that Viktor Vaughn Doom has completely altered his flow, and has outsourced his usual self-production, making this album a different animal entirely. However, while Doom is usually propelled by his own abstract-but-good beats, it would seem that this would take away from being a worthy follow-up to Operation Doomsday. Not so… in fact, we call Vaudeville Villain one of the best albums released this year.

The highlight of this record lies not in the production (which is also, for the most part, top notch), but in the lyrics. Listening to Viktor rap is like hanging out with a friend who freestyles just for the sake of entertaining those in the room. His cadence rarely changes throughout the album, and yes, Vaughn does exhaust this style by the album’s end, but it’s fun as a barrell of monkeys.  Case in point on the powerful, electrifying intro “Vaudeville Villain”,Vic spits “Victor the director flip a script like Rob Riener / the way a lot of crews rhyme their name should be ‘knob shiner’ / for buck they’ll likely dance the jig and do the hucklebuck / for Vic it’s a big deal, they just a bunch of knuckle fucks”. This type of poignant commentary intertwined with classic braggadocio and the childish vocab of Das Efx makes its way through the entire album, with Doom keeping listeners laughing out loud, on their toes as to what kind of outlandish rhymes he’ll spit next.

And the listener’s attention is kept thoroughly throughout, thanks to the solid production that matches the quality of the rhymes. Vic doesn’t try to insert much deeper meaning into tracks like “Lick Upon” and “The Drop”, this is just pure, clever, emceeing over dope beats, much like Eminem’s early Wake Up Show freestyles, but without the shock. The album’s best moment lies in “Saliva”, where Doom is treated to an incredible RJD2 beat (one of his best yet actually), with horny horns-a-plenty mixed with the trademark mellow vibes.

However, while the album is strong for most of its 17 tracks, as the production gets more abstract towards the end, it does tend to lose the listener from time to time, as is the case on “G.M.C.”  or “Modern Day Mugging”. Yet it almost is sewn together with the completeness of the early Wu-Tang Clan records, and Vic V. keeps your attention throughout with his excellent rhymes. All in all, there isn’t much else to say except that this is one of the most solid records of the year, strong in both beats and lyrics.