The Ringer just shared an excerpt from Will Hagle's new book Madvillain’s Madvillainy, which dropped today, detailing the story behind the success of MF DOOM and Madlib's classic, Madvillainy.

In part, the excerpt reads:

"Six months after their initial meeting in Los Angeles, MF DOOM and Madlib had cobbled together a strong offering of tracks. Given his propensity for filling up CD-Rs with the intention of making “albums” that he could listen to on his own, Madlib burned 15 “Madvillain” songs onto a disc and packed it in his bag for a November 2002 flight to Brazil.

“Some people think that that was a first draft of the album,” says Jeff Jank, artistic director at Stones Throw. “Well, it was in that Madlib put it together. But he didn’t necessarily put it together to be the album. He put it together because he wanted to listen to something that was like the album on a flight.”

The internet would regard those 15 songs as “a first draft of the album” because, while Madlib and a handful of individuals from Stones Throw were in Brazil, it leaked into cyberspace. In 2002, when the internet suffered the awkward growing pains of digital puberty, a leaked album was a potential death blow to a project for a label so dependent on vinyl sales. In the end, the leak had the opposite effect. It maximized anticipation. It helped make Madvillainy the highest-selling hip-hop album in Stones Throw history and propelled Madvillain into legendary status."

In other MF DOOM news, the late rapper's estate is demanding Now-Again Records founder Eothen “Egon” Alapatt return the late rapper's rhyme books.

Last year, DOOM's widow, Jasmine Dumile confirmed that Egon possessed some of DOOM's stolen rhyme books, and in a message posted to social media yesterday (March 1), the estate shared a screenshot of an old email chain in which the notebooks were previously requested. The emails appear to be between Egon, Jasmine, and possibly DOOM using the alias Karlo Metal-Franks. “Egon Give the Notebooks Back," the post was captioned.

Dumile previously expressed her disappointment in Egon's actions to HipHopDX. “We can confirm Eothen ‘Egon’ Alapatt is illegally in possession of rhyme books owned by MF DOOM,” Dumile said. “There have been many unsuccessful attempts to get these back prior to DOOM’s passing. We had hoped after DOOM transitioned Egon would do the right thing and return the books to the family but he has continued to ignore these requests. Unfortunately, Egon is not the only former associate abusing the likeness, art and life’s work of DOOM, more will be said at the appropriate time."

As for Madvillain’s Madvillainy, it's available now here.