Out of the Shadow

Race may have also factored into the equation; Wang speculates that "(Shadow) being white and from Northern California is completely relevant, too, since he offered a different image — literally — compared to the New York school of diggers who were mostly streetwise black and Puerto Rican guys versus geeky suburban white dudes for whom Shadow was probably an easier role model to follow."

Wang notes that N.Y.C.'s DJ Spooky — who is black — has been panned in some music circles for doing ambitiously artsy projects, while Shadow has received laurels for doing pretty much the same thing: " ... what Shadow was applauded (for) — a thinking man's approach to hip-hop instrumentals — is precisely what Spooky was criticized for."

Shadow deftly sidesteps the issue now, explaining with a shrug, "I'm not trying to be anything I'm not. I'm a college-educated, middle-class dude from Northern California." He points out that he worked with Paris — a rapper widely known for his pro-black sentiments — back in '92, adding, "I don't see what Spooky does and what I do as the same thing." Shadow sees himself not as an intellectual, but as a lover of music, and if people want to intellectualize the music he loves, well, that's their problem.

Still, European audiences in particular — who weren't always suburban, but were predominantly Caucasian — fell in love with Shadow, eagerly soaking up every limited-edition vinyl single or obscure trip-hop compilation he appeared on. As one blogger blurted, "If DJ Shadow farted on the mic ... I'll prolly end up buying it."

Shadow's fans and the music-crit mafia experienced dejà vu all over again when his second album, The Private Press, was released in 2002 on MCA. And no one complained that his numerous side projects — including a Japan-only remix album, The Private Repress; the Brainfreeze and Product Placement mix compilations of obscure soul-funk 45s with Cut Chemist; and film scores for Marc Singer's "Dark Days" and Brian Cross' "Keepin Time" — resulted in a long wait time between official albums.

But while Shadow had helped to define alt hip hop through his involvement with Solesides/Quannum in the '90s, his attempts at making rap music tended to be highly experimental (like the schizophrenic title track of 1996's Latryx album, wherein Lyrics Born and Lateef's vocals are simultaneously tracked on separate audio channels) — it's a far cry from the aggressive, polished, and certifiably street-credible material showcased on The Outsider.

Unlike his online detractors, who have questioned hyphy's very existence, Shadow sees hyphy as not only a viable, authentic sound, but part of a cultural continuum connecting bay artists like Sly Stone, Digital Underground, and Keak Da Sneak. A "certain quirky sensibility" flows through them, he says; listening to their music, "you can get a sense of the culture."

What made hyphy music attractive to Shadow was its "unique energy," he explains. "It sounds like where we live." Perhaps more importantly, "it didn't have an eye to the past. It looked forward ... it felt like the future to me." After exhausting his well-worn, meticulously crafted sample- and MPC-based shtick on The Private Press — which he describes as "a really insular record" whose making was "laborious and lonely" — he decided it was time to change up his modus operandi. "I always wanna be happy making music," he explains. Rather than meet fans' expectations and keep making the same album over and over again, he chose to satisfy his own artistic yearnings.

At the same time Shadow was questioning his creative process, big things were happening in his personal life that changed his perspective on reality. "I've found a lot of reasons to celebrate life, and I wanted to recognize that," he reveals. In 2003 his wife gave birth to twins. Becoming a dad had an unforeseen effect on Shadow he wouldn't have anticipated — it lifted some of the darkness surrounding him and made him less worrisome.

Some of his new-found lightheartedness translated to the upbeat, fun-affirming tracks on the new album, like "This Time," "Enuff," and "Dats My Part," which all revel in the joy of living in the present moment. "I wanted to celebrate my talent, celebrate the bay, and celebrate the diversity of music," he says.

"I've always been able to hear music on its own merits," Shadow explains. "It's a release, a reflection of society. It can contribute to larger problems, but I don't think it's the cause of them." And while the same people who rhapsodized over songs like "In/Flux" might be shocked to discover its author grew up listening to 2 Live Crew's "Throw the Dick," he doesn't see anything wrong with making a song like "Turf Dancin."

"Some people might think, 'OK, here's DJ Shadow dabbling in realhip hop,'" says Count, a member of S.F. electronica outfit Halou, who engineered The Outsider. "Why can't he make a hip-hop record? He knows that stuff as well as anyone," he notes wryly.

Shadow's interest in hyphy "opens up Bay Area hip hop to a wider audience," reasons Nickleberry, while Wang theorizes, "it doesn't make sense for him to stick with the Endtroducing style 10 years into his career. Flourish or flounder, good artists find ways to reinvent themselves."