The Time She Faced DOOM
the true (short) story of our eternal, mutual love for books
by Walasia Noor Shabazz fka MJ
Circa 2000 I lived in a warehouse on the East River on Kent Avenue (since torn down to become a water taxi landing). Among the other tenants were KAWS and an unknown “industrial musician”. The neighborhood was in a flux of nascent gentrification but not quite there yet. My studio had no windows — just two large metal doors with 1/2 inch of space at the bottom providing the only source of natural light.
On the walk to and from the Bedford L station, there was a used & rare bookshop called Spoonbill and Sugartown Booksellers. On my way to and from NYC or NJ where I worked at the newly-formed Complex Magazine as an Editor, I’d often stop in the street and buy used books in a rush. I built IKEA shelves and they quickly became rampant with whatever paperbacks, hardbacks and books I could afford. On weekends I’d spend much time inside, hours combing the shelves — sometimes I’d find rare first editions or old dusty vintage hardbacks.
When DOOM started visiting BK regularly to record at Devin Horwitz of Nature Sounds’ studios and to work on various projects in New York such as Viktor Vaughn, Take Me to Your Leader, MM…Food and eventually MadVillainy he’d ride the Amtrak up from Georgia lugging a bag full of Polo gear, Adidas kicks, The North Face coats and special carrying cases for his recording equipment plus he always had a backpack full of books to read and notebooks to write in. The first time I met him at the train station he was reading Charles Bukowski’s Born Into This.
Over some years we read hundreds of books together, shared and swapped books, and studied often. This was his foolproof method to avoid the dreaded “writer’s block” — ABR always be reading. If he hit a snag, he’d pick up a book or just peruse the titles and covers. My old, worn, used copy of Zora Neale Hurston’s “Tell My Horse” ended up in a lyric.
Looking back it doesn’t seem possible that DOOM and I could read this many books — he also had a large book collection at his home down South and I had hundreds of books at my families’ homes in Los Angeles but the Brooklyn Books were special. Launching and editing a new magazine (me), producing/writing/recording his most classic albums (him), shows, record label business, etc. should have taken up every waking New York minute for us both — but somehow there was always a way to expand the space-time continuum far enough to fit in a good study session.
Through very different paths we were both taught to study everything (twice) and use our sound, right reasoning to discern the truth from the fluff, the fiction from the non. Although I don’t have the original books from Kent Avenue, I’ve done my best to show the exact versions of covers. This is a tiny sliver of the hundreds or maybe thousands of books we read & studied together.
Writing this and sharing it with the world is a deeply personal decision for me but the edict has always been and will forever be Each One, Teach One. Knowledge and Wisdom are to be shared, not withheld. If you get a chance to read some of these books, may you and your children always glean the best part from what you read and discuss — and leave the rest.
The humble “librarian” of Kent Avenue, Allah’s Reflection.
p.s. Here’s a selection of books in PDF for those who want to really delve deep compiled/unearthed by Walasia can be found here https://we.tl/t-1V81JrA2sS
PEACE
