MacLib (partially found unreleased Mac Miller and Madlib EP; 2015-2017)

Madlib (left) and Mac Miller (right) drinking together in Highland Park, Los Angeles.

Status: Lost

Madlib is an American record producer and rapper based in California, and is prominent in the alternative hip hop community for his collaborations with other hip hop artists, including the critically acclaimed "Madvilliany" with experimental New York rapper MF DOOM, and the albums "Piñata" and "Bandana" with rapper Freddie Gibbs. In 2015, during the production of "Piñata", Pittsburgh rapper Mac Miller was brought on to record a verse for the album's final track, beginning a period of collaboration between Madlib and Mac Miller.

According to Madlib, these collaborations had, by July 2016, formed into tentative plans between the two to create an EP together, with Madlib producing instrumentals and Mac Miller rapping over them. These songs would occasionally be played in festival sets by Madlib through 2017, which is the final time period given by Madlib for the album's production.

Mac Miller died suddenly on September 7, 2018, accidentally overdosing on a combination of drugs including the opioid fentanyl and leaving any plans remaining on the Madlib project unfinished. The first public acknowledgement of the existence of the Mac Miller project came from a February 20, 2019 interview with fellow record producer Thelonious Martin, in which he recalled an encounter with Madlib wherein a "whole album" of unreleased Mac Miller and Madlib collaboration material called "MacLib" came up in conversation. This was corroborated a day later in a tweet by Thundercat, a record producer, frequent collaborator and close friend of Mac Miller.

The following month, Madlib would address the project in a blog post on the website of his store Rappcats. He clarified that what was produced was an EP's worth of music and not an album, and added that the title "MacLib" was an unofficial name found in the metadata of one of the tracks sent to him, presumably chosen by Mac Miller. It is unclear as to exactly how much collaboration material between the two exists.

At the end of the Madlib's Rappcats post, he made it clear that there were no official plans to release the EP. Since March 2019, few recordings of collaborations between Mac Miller and Madlib have surfaced. One piece of audio features Thundercat and was first played by Madlib in San Diego, California's concert venue The Music Box. This is the only publicly available music known to be part of the "MacLib" EP. A second, longer portion of audio, over 2 minutes long, was played by Madlib during a July 2019 DJ set by Madlib at the MoMA PS1. It is unknown if this second song was intended for "MacLib" or an unrelated collaboration. The titles of these songs, if they ever had any, are not known.

Madlib playing a segment of an unreleased song featuring Mac Miller's rapping during his MoMA PS1 DJ set.

Madlib's set at The Concert Box, featuring a short segment of another Mac Miller collaboration.