Magoo, the Virginia rapper who was a part of the duo Timbaland & Magoo and who featured on the hit songs “Up Jumps da Boogie” and “Luv 2 Luv U,” has died. He was 50.
Timbaland confirmed the information of Magoo’s demise on Instagram. “This one hits totally different 🥲🥲🥲 lengthy dwell Melvin aka magoo !!!💔💔💔 Tim and Magoo without end 🕊️🕊️🕊️ relaxation straightforward my king,” the rapper-producer wrote. No additional particulars or reason behind demise had been supplied.
Magoo was a part of a collective of Virginia rappers and producers that rose to prominence within the mid to late Nineteen Nineties, a bunch that included Timbaland, Missy Elliott, Pharrell Williams, Chad Hugo and Shay Haley of the Neptunes and N.E.R.D., the rap group Clipse and producer Danja. Magoo discovered mainstream success working with longtime good friend Timbaland to kind the duo Timbaland & Magoo. The pair’s debut album Welcome to Our World would go platinum and change into a traditional, ushering in a interval of chart dominance for Timbaland’s signature sound.
Born Melvin Barcliff, in Norfolk, Virginia in July 1973, Magoo attended highschool in Chesapeake. Opposite to fashionable pondering, his rap title was not taken from the cartoon character Mr. Magoo, however from the surname of an aunt who raised him, which he later shortened to Magoo.
Whereas nonetheless in highschool within the early Nineteen Nineties, he would get his begin in music and hip-hop by way of break dancing. He would co-found the group S.B.I., an acronym for Surrounded by Idiots, that was a Virginia Seaside-based MCs that consisted of Magoo, Larry “Dwell” Lyons and a younger Timothy Mosley (a.ok.a. Timbaland though he was referred to as DJ Timmy Tim at the moment) and Pharrell Williams. S.B.I. recorded a couple of demos and carried out a couple of reveals however didn’t launch any main recordings and rapidly disbanded.
After being seen by Jodeci member and producer DeVante Swing, Magoo signed to Swing’s label Swing Mob and have become a member of the artistic collective dubbed the Da Basement Cru that included Missy Elliott and her group Sista, Timbaland, Ginuwine, Tweet and Playa. The collective recorded music and collaborated on Jodeci’s third album in addition to their very own tasks. By 1995, the Swing Mob had folded with the members putting out on their very own, however Missy Elliott, Ginuwine, Tweet and Timbaland & Magoo continued to collaborate beneath a unfastened collective dubbed the Superfriends that additionally included up-and-coming R&B star Aaliyah.
Remarking on his lengthy friendship with the group of younger Virginia rappers and producers who would later come to dominate mainstream music and win a number of Grammys, Magoo informed YouKnowIGotSoul in 2020, “I look again and give it some thought, who can say of their lifetime that they’re pals with one of many biggest feminine artists of on a regular basis in Missy Elliott, three of the best producers of all time with Pharrell, Chad and Timbaland and among the biggest teams of all time like N.E.R.D. and Clipse?”
He added, “All of us rode in the identical circle and we might see one another at totally different occasions and this was earlier than the celebrity. All of us ended up making it as a result of we had been critical.”
Magoo would make appearances on Ginuwine’s 1996 tune “G Thang” from the album Ginuwine… the Bachelor and Missy Elliott’s 1997 tune “Beep Me 911” from her debut album Supa Dupa Fly amongst different visitor appearances earlier than taking middle stage with Timbaland & Magoo’s debut studio album Welcome to Our World, launched in November 1997.
Welcome to Our World would change into a crossover success, peaking at No. 33 on the Billboard 200 and attaining platinum standing. The album featured the singles “Up Jumps da Boogie,” “Luv 2 Luv U” (which featured the memorable Magoo lyric “You so absurd I assumed you heard/If you happen to don’t know, the fowl is the phrase/Sure the fowl fowl fowl, the fowl is the phrase/The fowl fowl fowl, the fowl is the phrase) and “Clock Strikes.” “Up Jumps da Boogie” was a significant membership hit and peaked at No. 12 on the Billboard 100 and have become a hip-hop traditional. The album can be a showcase for Timbaland’s manufacturing sound that might discover extra mainstream success with albums from Ginuwine, Aaliyah and Missy Elliott.
As a rapper, Magoo was usually in comparison with Q-Tip of Tribe Referred to as Quest attributable to their similar-sounding voices. The comparability with Q-Tip pissed off Magoo, and he spoke about it in a 2020 interview, “I had comparisons with Q-Tip due to my voice, however individuals don’t get that that is simply how I sound. I’ve at all times seemed like this even earlier than I began rapping… I hate the Q-Tip comparisons as a result of I’m an enormous Tribe Referred to as Quest fan, however there was nothing I may do about my voice.”
In 2001, Timbaland & Magoo launched Indecent Proposal, their second studio album. The follow-up wasn’t practically as profitable because the duo’s debut, though it peaked at No. 29 on the Billboard album chart, and the singles did not chart on the Billboard 100. The pair launched one additional studio album, 2003’s Underneath Building, Half II, that once more failed to duplicate their early success, peaking at No. 50 on the Billboard album chart. Though Underneath Building did spawn the one “Cop That Shit” that includes Missy Elliott that was a radio hit.
Regardless of his success as a rapper, Magoo was by no means eager on fame and in later interviews usually talked about he wasn’t capable of get pleasure from a lot of the early success of Timbaland & Magoo. “I’m going to maintain it actual, I didn’t get pleasure from any of that. I by no means felt like me and Tim obtained an opportunity to get pleasure from our early years and it by no means even felt like we had been this million-selling group,” he informed YouKnowIGotSoul.
A deep thinker, Magoo’s dislike of fame and the non-studio points of being an artist pushed him away from rapping and after his document contract expired in 2010 he largely retired from music, making solely sporadic appearances on songs by his pals Timbaland and Missy Elliott. “That’s why I walked away from it. The music enterprise is a promise that may’t be saved and that’s fame. After I had a primary tune, I noticed I’ll have been higher with my 9-5 earlier than I left Virginia,” he informed YouKnowIGotSoul. “It’s arduous to be completely happy since you’re preventing for all the pieces you earned and also you simply don’t have time to get pleasure from it with your loved ones. You aren’t as shut with pals anymore and individuals are treating you totally different after you have that hit document. I lived two totally different lives and being a celeb wasn’t enjoyable.”
After stepping away from being a performer, Magoo labored behind the scenes within the music business.
