MF DOOM: The Mouse and The Mask : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

On The Mouse and the Mask, reigning hip-hop nerds MF Doom (the awesomely weird comic-book-obsessed MC) and Danger Mouse (who blew up last year with his high-concept bootleg The Grey Album) unite for a bouncy horn-, string- and piano-drenched disc that seems custom-designed to appeal to precocious teenagers. Inspired by Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim," the album features cameos from animated characters such as Harvey Birdman, Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Space Ghost homey Brak, who sings a few lines of "Turn the Beat Around." (On the non-cartoon tip, Ghostface, Cee-Lo and Talib Kweli drop verses.) The Mouse and the Mask is infused with nostalgia for childhood, as on the giddy standout "Old School," with Kweli waxing rhapsodic about Saturday-morning cartoons and eating cereal. It's a fun ride -- though you wonder what the kids will make of the Father Guido Sarducci and Bee Gees references.