Quasimoto’s Debut Album ‘The Unseen’ Turns 20 | Anniversary Retrospective

Happy 20th Anniversary to Quasimoto’s debut album The Unseen, originally released June 13, 2000.

For those not aware, Quasimoto (a.k.a. Lord Quas) is a Madlib alter-ego that takes the form of a yellow aardvark-like animated creature with a high-pitched voice. The story goes that the renowned producer was unhappy with how his voice sounded when he rapped and decided to experiment by recording vocals slowly and then speeding them up until they sounded like someone on helium.

The material was not intended for release, but Madlib was convinced to do so by Stones Throw Records honcho, Peanut Butter Wolf. After guest appearances on albums by Peanut Butter Wolf and Madlib’s group, Lootpack, Quasimoto’s full-length debut was released in 2000 to wide acclaim.  

One of the most gratifying things about listening to Madlib as Quasimoto is trying to figure out where the real person ends and the animated character begins. If he wrote this material as Madlib and then recorded the vocals and sped them up to become Quasimoto, does it mean these are the words of the actual Madlib, or is Lord Quas all fictional character? On a song like “Low Class Conspiracy,” Quasimoto describes himself as being black and a frequent victim of racial profiling, suggesting these are songs written purely from the perspective of Madlib himself, not some fragment of his imagination. 

Yet elsewhere on The Unseen, some songs have vocals from both regular Madlib and Quasimoto together, going back and forth on hooks or with Madlib providing responses and comments in the background. The blurred lines are compounded further on a track like “Return of The Loop Digga,” where the lyrics are rapped as Madlib, with Quasimoto this time the one providing the adlibs. All of this meta-game detail is part of what makes The Unseen so much fun. 

Having said that, the biggest revelation about The Unseen is that Madlib, as Quasimoto, is a really good rapper. Madlib is without question one of music’s most celebrated producers, but his emcee skills have never been above average. He can for certain rap, but by his own admission, he is a producer and DJ first and foremost. But Quasimoto is a better rapper than Madlib, as though emceeing as this alter-ego character liberated Madlib and gave him the freedom to have more confidence and swag, relishing playing the role of the zero-fucks-giving Lord Quas. 

It ultimately doesn’t matter if Madlib or Quasimoto is doing the talking, because The Unseen is all about the brilliant production. I have liked everything Madlib has ever made, but for every new direction he takes, my personal favorites are still the straight-up hip-hop albums he produced while on Stones Throw. The Unseen is one of the most excellent examples and fully showcases everything Madlib is capable off, throwing a bit of all sorts into the mix—timeless boom bap with cuts and scratches, low-fi soundscapes, untapped jazz samples and Melvin Van Peebles vocal snippets, psychedelia and more—while still keeping it cohesive and tight.

For me, the best moments of Madlib’s music are often the attention to detail and random moments of genius, like on “Money Folder” from the Madvillainy (2004) album where MF DOOM mentions Madlib flipping “an old jazz standard,” at which point Madlib cuts the beat for a brief standard jazz interlude. The Unseen has several of these flourishes, like when Madlib says “Quas, drop that number thing” on “Microphone Mathematics” just before Quasimoto drops a verse full of numbers, or on “Return of The Loop Digga” where Madlib gets pissed with a record store owner for only having Simon Harris breaks.

“Return of The Loop Digga” is one of the most intriguing songs on The Unseen, as it peels back the curtain on some of the source material that Madlib, one of the masters of sample-based hip-hop, favors. The song has Madlib dissing other producers for always sampling the same records, and in the record shop scene, he can be heard asking for records by Stanley Cowell, Grant Green, and Chick Corea. In the ‘90s, way before WhoSampled became the sample Police for the online generation, producers usually kept their sources secret for fear of legal repercussions and so that other producers couldn’t copy their style. To mention specific names on “Return of The Loop Digga” was new, and you can bet those artists mentioned have been sampled a lot more since Madlib gave them a namedrop. 

Madlib followed with The Further Adventures of Lord Quas in 2005, but hasn’t made music as Quasimoto since 2013’s Yessir Whatever. He does still use the character as a mascot, however, and Lord Quas recently appeared on the front cover of Madlib’s 2019 album with Freddie Gibbs, Bandana.

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