: Dr. Dre Dr.
- This article is about the Los Angeles, California rapper and producer. For the New York radio and television presenter, see Doctor Dre.
Dr. Dre (born André Romell Young on February 18, 1965 in Los Angeles, California) is an influential Grammy-Award winning American record producer, hip hop producer, rapper, actor and record executive. He is also the founder and CEO of Aftermath Entertainment.
Young is a significant figure in the development of rap music. He was a founding member of the influential rap group N.W.A, which popularized the use of explicit lyrics in rap detailing the violence of street life. He has also produced albums for and overseen the careers of some of the biggest stars in rap music, including Snoop Dogg, Tupac Shakur, Eminem, Busta Rhymes, 50 Cent and The Game. With over 80 million records sold, he is widely regarded as one of the most popular and powerful figures in rap music of all time.
As a producer, he is credited with revolutionizing rap by creating the style West Coast G-Funk, characterized as synthesizer-based with slow, heavy beats. G-Funk dominated the U.S. rap charts in the period of 1992 – 1996, and is still considered one of the major living styles of hip hop today.
Biography
The early years
Young was born in Los Angeles, CA in 1965. Although he represented Compton as a member of N.W.A (which was home of the groups's founder Eazy-E, he actually grew up in the South Central LA. Dre's parents divorced before he was born. When he got older, his mother married Warren Griffin Jr., father of future West Coast rapper Warren Griffin III, artistically known as Warren G
Young started his career as a DJ and poster boy for the rap-influenced electro-pop group World Class Wreckin' Cru during the first half of the 1980s, taking the name Dr. Dre (from his first name, André) and combining it with his favorite basketball athlete, Dr. J. It is also stated in the World Class Wreckin' Cru track "Surgery" that Dr. Dre has a Ph.D. in "mixology", but that has little to do with the origin of his name.
NWA and the Ruthless Records years
In 1986 after Young had begun to dip more into actual production of beats, he and fellow World Class Wreckin' Cru member DJ Yella left the group to join premiere gangsta-rap group N.W.A, along with founding member and Ruthless Records head Eric "Eazy-E" Wright and rapper Ice Cube.
Until this point, rap had been considered a relatively benign form of music and free of profanity. However, along with fellow west coast rapper Ice T, NWA began to lace its rhymes with profanity and gritty depictions of crime and life on the street. Propelled by the hit "Fuck tha Police", the group's first full album "Straight Outta Compton" became a major success, selling over 2,000,000 copies despite an almost complete absence of radio-airplay. As a producer, Dre's vocals were limited on the album, but he achieved notoriety in 1990 after assaulting TV host Dee Barnes after she aired a segment reporting on the feud between the remaining N.W.A members and recently departed lead rapper Ice Cube. Possibly to compensate for Ice Cube's abscence, he began to rap more on the group's second album , Efil4zaggin.
He also produced tracks for a number of other rap acts on Ruthless Records, including Above the Law, and his friend The D.O.C.'s album No-one Can Do It Better. Dre frequently used studio musicians for tracks, and his work with N.W.A was co-produced by DJ Yella. But later, the D.O.C. would say that his album would be the one record that Dr.Dre produced from start to finish without help from any outside contributors (see references for details).
The Death Row Records era
Despite pioneering NWA's sound as the groups' principal producer, Dre complained of unfair contracts that left him with little compensation for the group's tremendous profits (lead rapper and principal lyricist Ice Cube had left following the release of Straight Outta Compton after similar complaints). After a dispute with Eric Wright (artistically known as Eazy-E, a founding member of N.W.A and Ruthless Records), Dre left the group at the peak of its popularity in 1991 under the advice of friend and former N.W.A lyricist The D.O.C. and his bodyguard at the time, Marion Knight, Jr., (better known as Suge Knight). Knight, a notorious strongman and intimidator, was somehow able to have Wright release Young from his contract, and using Dre as his flagship artist, founded Death Row Records after securing a distribution deal with the fledgling Interscope Records, helmed by future head of Universal Music Jimmy Iovine (See references for details).
While N.W.A had sold 2 million records of their breakthrough album, they had been a counter-culture phenomenon, and done so on an independent label (Ruthless Records) without radio airplay or major acceptance from the mainstream record industry. Interscope head Iovine saw promise in Dr.Dre's music, and saw his new sweet, synthesizer-based sound as a way of palletizing the hard beats of gangsta rap and giving it a more mainstream appeal. "One reason I hadn't been that interested in hip-hop is most hip-hop records sounded cheap, tinny," Iovine said later in a 2006 interview with The Los Angeles Times. "But Dre's music sounded better on my speakers than most rock records. I didn't know hip-hop, but I knew my speakers, and this was fantastic." (See references for details)
Dre released his first solo single, "Deep Cover," (also known as "187") in the spring of 1992. This was the beginning of his collaboration with Calvin Broadus, or Snoop Doggy Dogg (now known as Snoop Dogg), a promising young rapper introduced to him by his step-brother, DJ Warren G (see references for details).
In 1992 Dr.Dre released his debut album, The Chronic under Death Row records. To understand the impact of The Chronic, the existing climate of rap at the time must be understood. Until this point, rap had been primarily party music (e.g. Def Jam Records's The Beastie Boys), or angry and politically charged (e.g. Public Enemy, X-Clan), and the music had consisted almost entirely of samples and breakbeats. Young ushered in a new style of rap, both in terms of musical style and lyrical content.
Artistically, The Chronic continued to describe gang life much in the same way that Young's former group N.W.A had, but with more of a focus on women and soft drugs (hence the title of The Chronic, which refers to high-grade marijuana). The beats were slower and mellower, and borrowed from late 1970s/early 80s Funk music by George Clinton and his group Parliament. But despite the obvious influences, Young employed a number of synthesizers and bass guitars that created a unique, original style of music by rap's standards.
Although the album was initially unheralded, on the strength of singles such as "Nuthin' But a 'G' Thang," featuring protege Snoop Doggy Dogg and hits like "Let Me Ride" and "Fuck Wit Dre Day (And Everybody's Celebratin')" (Shortened to 'Dre Day' for Radio and Television Play), The Chronic became a cultural phenomenon and a multi-platinum seller, and is now widely considered to be one of Rap's all-time classic albums.
It soon became virtually impossible to hear mainstream hip-hop that wasn't affected in some way by Young. Hip-Hop, which had once been a sample and break-beat centered music rising primarily form New York and other east coast cities, began to see a shift in attention to the west coast, where the G-Funk style created by Dr.Dre was the most influential. Indeed, were it not for the influence of Dr.Dre, it's possible that the infamous "East Coast/ West Coast" beefs of the mid-90's might never have even transpired, as the west would have had no competing style of rap or even many visible artists with which to contrast to New York's.
The following year, Young produced Broadus' debut album Doggystyle, with similar subject matter and musical style. Doggystyle achieved phenomenal success, being the first debut album for an artist to debut at #1 on the Billboard charts. It went on to sell over 4,000,000 copies. Young was also intrumental in the creation of other hit west coast records, including the death row act Tha Dogg Pound's album Dog Food, and his own step-brother Warren G's album Regulate.
In 1996, just as Death Row records was signing rapper 2Pac and positioning him as their major star, Dre left Death Row records amidst a contract dispute and growing concerns that label boss Suge Knight was corrupt, financially dishonest and out of control. In an interview with the Source shortly after his departure, Dre alluded to incidents such as Suge Knight's beating of an engineer as pivotal in his decision to leave. He formed his own boutique label Aftermath Entertainment directly underneath Death Row's distributor, the Jimmy Iovine-helmed Interscope Records. Not long after Dr.Dre's departure, the fortunes of Death Row took a dramatic turn, following the death of 2Pac and racketeering charges against Suge Knight. Within the next few years the label's final major star Snoop Doggy Dogg would also leave and Knight would go to prison. The label entered a steady decline, and now makes profits almost entirely off of old works recorded during its heyday.
The Aftermath years 1996-2001
The Dr. Dre Presents...The Aftermath album, released at the end of the year, featured songs by the newly signed Aftermath artists, and a solo track "Been There, Done That". The track was intended as a symbolic good-bye to gangsta rap, in which Dre suggested that he was moving on to another level of music and lifestyle. While initially going gold (500,000 units), the album was considered a critical disappointment by Dre's standards, failing to raise much talk of the label. Today, the compilation album is most notable for the fact that none of the artists introduced on the record went on to successful careers. In 1997, Young produced several tracks on Nas, Foxy Brown, AZ, and Nature Present The Firm: The Album; although the album went platinum, it was met with similarly negative reviews from critics. Rumors began to abound that Aftermath was facing financial difficulties.
The turning point for Aftermath came in 1998, when Jimmy Iovine, the boss of Aftermath's parent label Interscope, suggested that Dre sign the white Detroit rapper Marshall Mathers, artistically known as Eminem, to Aftermath. Interscope saw promise in Mathers, but feared that the fact he was white would harm his credibility in the overwhelmingly black market of hip hop. It was hoped that pairing him with Dr.Dre would help establish him as a credible star (Since then, Iovine has made similar matches with other Interscope artists, pairing Canadian singer Nelly Furtado with hip-hop producer Timbaland, and former ska-pop No Doubt lead singer Gwen Stefani with Pharrell Williams, see references for details). Dre produced three songs and provided vocals for two on his controversial album, ["my name is", "guilty conscience", "Role Model"] The Slim Shady LP in 1999. On these tracks, Eminem's over-the-top "Slim Shady" persona was contrasted with Dre's older, more sober, post-gangsta attitude to rap. On the song "Guilty Conscience", Dre and Eminem give conflicting advice to people faced with moral dilemmas, with Dre urging the song's characters to do the right thing, and Eminem urging them to give in to their darkest impulses. At the end of the track, Eminem begins to protest that Dre's "Do right" advice is coming from the same man who had a physical altercation with TV host Dee Barnes in his younger, wilder years (the incident was later resolved out of court). At first, Dre protests that those were older times, but eventually sighs "---- it" and sides with Eminem's "evil" reaction.
 Eminem's Slim Shady LP was followed by the even more successful and controversial sophomore release, The Marshall Mathers LP in 2000. The album featured angrier vocals from Eminem and took his "Slim Shady" persona to dizzying extremes (In a 2000 Spin magazine article, Eminem credited his improved vocals to Young's coaching). The album eventually went Diamond, selling over 10,000,000 copies, and established Eminem as one of the biggest music stars in the world.
In 2000, Dre won the Grammy award for Producer Of The Year, for his work on "The Marshall Mathers LP" and "2001". The albums followed a new musical direction, characterised by high-pitched piano and string melodies over a deep and rich bassline. The style was also prominent in his following production work for other artists, including hits such as "Let Me Blow Ya Mind" by Eve and Gwen Stefani (whom he would produce again on the Stefani and Eve track "Rich Girl"), "Break Ya Neck" by Busta Rhymes, and "Family Affair" by Mary J. Blige.
The Aftermath years 2002-present
By the time Eminem's third album The Eminem Show was released in 2002, Mathers was producing the bulk of his output himself. However, Eminem's association with Dr.Dre remained a large part of Eminem's identity in rap. "The Eminem Show" sold over 9,000,000 copies and was an unqualified success.
In late 2002, Dr. Dre and Eminem produced the major-label debut Get Rich or Die Tryin' for Queens rapper 50 Cent, featuring the Dre-produced hit single "In Da Club", as a joint production between Aftermath, Eminem's boutique label Shady Records and Interscope. On the eve of its release Dre declared it to be one of the best rap albums made in the past ten years, an opinion the record-buying public enthusiastically agreed with. The album went on to sell over 11,000,000 albums worldwide, establishing yet another major rap star under Aftermath and the Interscope umbrella.
In early 2005, Aftermath released rapper The Game's debut album "The Documentary" in conjunction with Interscope and rapper 50 Cent's boutique label G Unit Records. Propelled by the lead single "How We Do" produced by Dr.Dre and featuring 50 Cent, the album sold 586,000 copies in its first week and eventually sold over 2 million copies in the U.S. alone, establishing yet another superstar under the Aftermath label.
Shortly after, Aftermath/Shady released 50 Cent's second album The Massacre, which fared even better, selling over 1,000,000 records in a short week (the album was rushed out to combat bootlegging). It eventually went on to sell nearly 5,000,000 copies in the U.S alone, and went on to become the second highest-selling album of 2005 (it was initially declared the highest selling, however, singer Mariah Carey's 2005 release The Emancipation of Mimi continued to chart throughout early 2006 and eventually outstripped it by a small margin).
However, a falling-out between The Game and 50 Cent apparently created a rift at Aftermath. After being kicked out of 50 Cent's G-Unit group on-air during a February 2005 interview on Hot 97 (see references for details), The Game famously waged the G-Unot campaign against his Aftermath labelmate 50 Cent's group and subsidiary label G-Unit. To date, Dr.Dre has not spokenly publicly about this matter, but for whatever reason, The Game's second album, released November 14, 2006, and ironically titled "The Doctor's Advocate", was released on Geffen Records rather than on Dr.Dre's label Aftermath, and does not feature any production from him (in a recent XXL interview, The Game states that his public attacks and criticisms against Aftermath labelmate 50 Cent went against Dr. Dre's wishes, and is what led to the falling out). On the title track, The Game emotionally apologizes to Dr.Dre for disobeying his word. In a recent (November 2006) interview with the website Allhiphop.com, The Game states that he recently spoke with Dr.Dre via telephone, and that Dre congratulated him on his new album and wished him the best. He has also vowed that he will work with his mentor Dr.Dre again, although to date there are no quotes available from Dr.Dre himself that confirm either of these claims (see references).
Dr. Dre has also appeared in the movies Set It Off, The Wash and Training Day, though he later stated that he does not intend to pursue a career in acting. A song of his, "Bad Intentions" (featuring Knoc-Turn'Al) and produced by Mahogany, was featured on The Wash soundtrack. Dre also appeared on two other songs "On the Blvd." and "The Wash" along with his co-star Snoop Dogg.
Present day and future projects
Dr. Dre is considered a perfectionist by many who have worked with him, and while some projects he has worked on have come together relatively quickly (ie. 50 Cent's debut album, which was recorded and released within a year of his signing to Shady/Aftermath), he is often notoriously slow releasing announced albums. Among planned but never released albums are a full length reunion with Snoop Dogg titled Breakup to Makeup, an album with fellow former N.W.A member Ice Cube which was to be titled Heltah Skeltah, an N.W.A reunion album, and a joint album with fellow producer Timbaland to be titled Chairmen of the Board. To date, none of these albums have come to fruition (see interviews with Snoop Dogg, the D.O.C., and Dr.Dre with Scratch magazine listed below in references respectively).
Perhaps the best-known of these delayed releases is that of his planned final solo album, Detox, which was first announced around 2000. The project was pushed back to the summer of 2007, as he decided to put all his effort into producing the artists on his Aftermath label, including Eminem, 50 Cent, Eve, Stat Quo and Busta Rhymes. However, in November 2004, Dr. Dre and Interscope confirmed that Detox was still in the works and is currently scheduled to be released in the summer of 2007. On Eminem's song "(song)|Encore", which features Dr. Dre, he says "Aftermath... 2006...and don't worry about that Detox-album...we gon' make Dre do it." Also, in The Game's 2005 song "Higher", Dr. Dre makes a brief appearance to announce, "Look out for Detox."
Currently, Dre is also working on Raekwon's Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II. Other albums Dre is reported to be working on are Young Buck's Buck The World, Nas' Hip-Hop Is Dead, Bishop Lamont's The Reformation, Chauncey Black's Church Boy, Common's Finding Forever and albums for Eve, G.A.G.E., Chamillionare, and Ice Cube.
Trivia
He has also appeared in a Coors Light advertisement with Pharrell Williams.
Dr. Dre has two sons, Curtis (born on December 15, 1981), and Marcel (born in 1990). Curtis seems to be following in his father's footsteps, and is rapping under the name Hood Surgeon.
Dr. Dre can be seen at the end of the video "I Love My Bitch [Chick]" by Busta Rhymes.
Dr. Dre is seen on 50 Cent: Bulletproof as a war veteran, and sells 50 guns and body armour from his truck.
Dr. Dre has 5 Songs on Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas Express Yourself (Performed By N.W.A.) Always Into Somethin (Performed By N.W.A.) Dre Day (Performed By Dr.Dre) Deep Cover (performed By Dr. Dre & Snoop Doggy Dogg) Nuthin' But A "G" Thang (performed By Dr. Dre).
Music
Musical Influences and Production style
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Dr. Dre has said that his primary instrument in the studio is the MPC3000, a drum machine and sampler, and that he uses as many as four or five to produce a single recording. He cites George Clinton, Isaac Hayes and Curtis Mayfield as primary musical influences. Unlike most rap producers, he tries to avoid samples as much as possible, preferring to have studio musicians re-create and replay pieces of music he wants to use, because it allows him more flexibility to change the pieces in rhythm and tempo (see references for details).
When he does sample older records -usually for vocals- he tends to blend the samples with live guitars, bass, synthesizers, and on the Chronic track "Lil' Ghetto Boy," jazz flute, creating a soundscape where it often becomes difficult to tell where the original music stops and the sample begins. Dr. Dre's blend of hard rap beats combined with synthesizers and soul samples is known as G-Funk.
After founding Aftermath Records in 1996, Dr. Dre took on producer Mel-Man as a co-producer, and his music took on a more synthesizer-based sound, relying less on vocal samples.
In 2000 Dr. Dre began his long collaboration with Los Angeles based bassist, guitarist and keyboardist Mike Elizondo, who has also produced, written and played on records for female singers Poe, Fiona Apple and Alanis Morrisette. Elizondo's first major collaboration with Dr. Dre was for Eminem's single "The Real Slim Shady", and he went on to co-write Dr. Dre-produced hits such as "A Family Affair" for Mary J.Blige. His first credit as co-producer with Dre was on 50 Cent's "In Da Club". He has since been listed as a co-producer on the bulk of Dr. Dre's releases. (See references for details)
In 2004 Dr.Dre told Scratch Magazine that he has been studying piano and music theory formally, and that a major goal is to accumulate enough musical theory to score movies. In the same interview he stated that he has collaborated with famed 60's songwriter Burt Bacharach by sending him hip-hop beats to play over, and hopes to have an in-person collaboration with him in the future (see references). While Dr. Dre tracks remain drum machine-based and synthesizers remain an important part of his sound, in recent years his music has become more orchestral, sparse and featured more classical instruments such as piano and strings, examples being the 2006 song "Imagine," recorded for Snoop Dogg; and "Lost Ones," recorded for Jay-Z.
Work Ethic in the Studio
Dr.Dre has stated that he is a perfectionist, and is known to push the artists he records with to give flawless performances. As he told Scratch magazine in 2004, "You got to come in and go to work, man...you're not going to work harder than me. The harder you work, the harder I'm going to work". In 2006, Dubcnn.com mentioned during an interview with Snoop Dogg that Dre had made new artist Chauncey Black re-record a single bar of vocals 107 times. Snoop replied, "[T]hat's just how he gets down. I went and did a song with the nigga, the nigga made me do each word, word for word, until I got it right" (See references for details).
Dr.Dre has stated that his famous collaborator Eminem is a fellow perfectionist, and attributes his success on Aftemath to his like-minded work ethic. As he told Scratch in the same interview, "[H]e came in, and he works his ass off. Everybody that came in the studio and really put their thing down, and really put it together has been successful with me. Everybody else that I've worked with that's slacking ends up having to go to somewhere else to do their thing" (see references).
A consequence of this perfectionism is that some artists that initially sign deals with Dre's Aftermath label never release albums. In 2001 Aftermath released the soundtrack to the movie "The Wash". featuring a number of Aftermath acts such as Shaunta, Daks, Joe Beast and Toi. To date, none have released full-length albums on Aftermath and have apparently ended their relationships with the label and Dr.Dre. Other noteworthy acts to leave Aftermath without releasing albums include 2001 vocalist Hittman and 80's rap icon Rakim (see references for details).
Allegations of Ghost writers
Unlike the majority of hip-hop tracks even to this day, Dr.Dre's tracks have featured a large amount of live instrumentation, and he has often been praised for his musical ability. But since his earliest work in rap, Dr.Dre has produced records with the help of outside musicians, leading to allegations that he does not actually write a significant portion of the tracks that are credited to his name. To date, only 3 co-producers have shared production credits alongside Dre officially- DJ Yella on N.W.A albums, Mel-Man on Aftermath releases between the label's inception and until his departure in 2003, and most recently, Mike Elizondo, a Los Angeles-based bassist.
However, over the years word of other collaborators has surfaced. During his tenure at Death Row Records, it was alleged that Dre's half brother Warren G and Tha Dogg Pound member Daz made many uncredited contributions to songs on his solo album The Chronic and Snoop Doggy Dogg's album Doggystyle (Daz received production credits on Snoop's similar-sounding, albeit less successful follow up album "Tha Doggfather" after Dr.Dre left Death Row Records). It is now recognized that Scott Storch, now a respected record producer in his own right, worked with Dr.Dre on his hit album 2001. And in the September 2003 issue of The Source, a group of disgruntled former associates of Dre complained that they had not received their full due for work on the label. A producer named Neff-U claimed to have produced the songs "Say What you Say" and "My Dads Gone Crazy" on The Eminem Show, the songs "If I Can't" and "Back Down" on 50 Cent's Get Rich or Die Tryin', and the beat featured on Dr.Dre's commercial for Coors Beer.
Some of the controversy may stem from a dispute over what the term "producer" means in music. In hip-hop, the role of producer is generally understood to be the person who "creates the beat", be it through the use of a drum machine, keyboards, or even simply choosing samples and looping them. By this definition, allegations that Dre was not the "real" producer of some tracks credited to him could have merit. However, in most musical genres, the role of producer has generally been understood to mean controlling recording sessions, coaching and guiding performers, and supervising the recording, mixing and mastering processes. In this respect, Dr.Dre remains a producer, even in the face of these allegations.
In interviews, artists that have worked with Dr.Dre generally tend to credit him with bringing an overall artistic vision to projects. In a 2006 interview with Allhiphop.com, Snoop Dogg talked about re-writing his lyrics to the single "That's That" after receiving advice from Dre, and stating that his input is what made the song a hit. And though Snoop retains working relationships with Warren G and Daz, who are alleged to be uncredited contributors on the hit albums The Chronic and Doggystyle, he states that Dr.Dre is capable of making beats without the help of collaborators, and makes it clear where the credit for the success of his albums is due-
“Beatmakers make beats. A lot of niggas make beats. [Dre] produces tracks. So that ain’t disrespect what I’m saying. I’m just telling you what’s real. I seen him make tracks from scratch. My whole record the nigga made damn near everything from scratch. [For the song] ‘Ain’t No Fun’, Daz and Warren G brought him the little [sings melody], that’s all they had! Dre took that muthafucka to the next level! Warren G brought in the [sample of] Donny Hathaway [singing], “Little Ghetto Boy, laying in the ghetto streets.” Dre flipped it like “Hold on, gimme that!” Took that muthafucka and made it straight hit!... They made beats, Dre produced that record. Point blank, and I'd say it in they face...I can make a beat, but I can't produce! I can make a beat, but can I tell a nigga what to rap about, can I tell him when to come with the hook? Can you break the beat down? That's what producing is.”
Music samples
Discography
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Solo albums
Singles
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