Following the release the Dr. Dre's 'The Chronic' album in 1992, he swiftly became one of the best-selling American artists of 1993, and so he could pretty much do what he liked without having to worry about the commercial consequences. This included producing Snoop Doggy Dogg's debut album 'Doggystyle' in 1993, and then directing the 1994 short film 'Murder Was The Case', in which Dogg acted and Dre wrote the soundtrack. The same year he announced that he was working with Ice Cube on an album to be called 'Helter Skelter', although that has yet to appear, but by 1995/1996 he was ready to release the follow-up to 'The Chronic'. However, in March 1996, just before the album was due to be issued, he left Death Row Records due to incessant infighting, and he formed his own label Aftermath Records, and 'The Chronic II: A New World Odor (Popps'a Got A Brand New Funk)' was cancelled. Instead of releasing it on his own label he issued some of the tracks as singles, but then scrapped the rest and recorded a brand new album, with '2001' coming out on Aftermath in 1999, and including none of the aborted 'The Chronic II' tracks. Of the singles which came out from 1994 onwards, 'Natural Born Killaz' was written for the soundtrack to the 'Murder Was The Case' film in 1994, and featured Ice Cube And Sam Sneed, while 'California Love' was credited to '2Pac featuring Dr. Dre and Roger Troutman'. 1997 saw the release of 'Game Over' from Scarface featuring Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, Too $hort & B Real, and while all of those songs appear on this album, these are the original versions, including 'California Love' without 2Pac, 'Zoom' with Snoop Doggy Dogg instead of LL Cool J, and 'Natural Born Killaz' with a verse by Sam Sneed. I've said before that I'm not the biggest fan of hip-hop, but since finding these albums from Dr. Dre, Snoop Doggy Dogg and MF DOOM/Ghostface Killah I've come to realise that I was missing out on something by ignoring them in the early 90's, and this album in particular is swiftly becoming one of my favourites.
Track listing
01 Intro (feat. George Clinton & Chris Tucker)
02 Da Godfather (feat. Baby S)
03 California Love (feat. Roger Troutman)
04 Split Personality (feat. E-A Ski)
05 My Life (Smokin' Weed 4 Hours)
06 It's Entertainment (Skit)
07 Monay (feat. King T. & Dawn Robinson)
08 Street Scholars (feat. J-Flexx & Sam Sneed)
09 Zoom (feat. Snoop Doggy Dogg)
10 211 (Skit) (feat. Nancy Fletcher & Fingas)
11 Natural Born Killaz (feat. Sam Sneed & Ice Cube)
12 Blueberry (feat. Snoop Doggy Dogg & Sam Sneed)
13 Game Over (feat. Scarface, Too $hort & Ice Cube)
14 House Calls (feat. Baby S & the Casino Crew)
Thank you for posting this. I've listened to other comps like this one, but none are as good as this one. This really has the flavor of an album from that era. Have you considered compiling a version of Detox? I've tried putting it together but I haven't found enough full versions of songs.
ReplyDeleteI can't take the credit for this one, as it was put together by Youtuber Tuff Gong, but of all the versions that I trawled through, I agree that this was the best of them.
DeleteOh, and 'Detox' is on the way.
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