Is Dr. Dre at the root of all the destructive trends in rap? EDIT: Just the music, not the ills of the Black community

FeverPitch2

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Don't these execs have people in the street to inform them where the money is before they invest?
It's called sales and word of mouth.
They didn't have some white boy hiding in a dumpster in South Central eavesdropping on people's conversations.

As we've said a million times in this thread, Dre didn't start gangsta rap.
But once Dre refined the NWA concept after the NWA & The Posse album, HIS VERSION of gangsta rap set the streets on fire.
Back then, it was crazy for a rap album to go gold. SOC went platinum.

Dre is a visionary and was more musically sophisticated than his other LA production peers. His only competition is that regard was The Bomb Squad.
SOC was even more hardcore than Eazy Duz It which had a "Radio Side" with tame profanity free songs.
People had cursed on rap records but not that much.
Rappers had dissed women before, but SOC completely replaced "skeezer", "freak", and any other derogatory term for with with "bytch" wholesale.

SOC is not just about profane rhymes.
The musical arrangements are sophisticated and complex.

TIMESTAMPED


The skits outclassed its peers with cinematic realism and fine details.

TIMESTAMPED


The humor was the icing on the cake.

TIMESTAMPED


And that album is just funky dem a mf on top of everything.

SOC is in the damn Library of Congress because our federal government has deemed that album "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Dr. Dre's version of gangsta rap stood out from everyone else's
All the factors were pre-existing (gangsta rap, explicit lyrics, gang culture, west Coast hip-hop)
So the X factor in this is Andre Young.
 

skokiaan

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It's called sales and word of mouth.
They didn't have some white boy hiding in a dumpster in South Central eavesdropping on people's conversations.

As we've said a million times in this thread, Dre didn't start gangsta rap.
But once Dre refined the NWA concept after the NWA & The Posse album, HIS VERSION of gangsta rap set the streets on fire.
Back then, it was crazy for a rap album to go gold. SOC went platinum.

Dre is a visionary and was more musically sophisticated than his other LA production peers. His only competition is that regard was The Bomb Squad.
SOC was even more hardcore than Eazy Duz It which had a "Radio Side" with tame profanity free songs.
People had cursed on rap records but not that much.
Rappers had dissed women before, but SOC completely replaced "skeezer", "freak", and any other derogatory term for with with "bytch" wholesale.

SOC is not just about profane rhymes.
The musical arrangements are sophisticated and complex.

TIMESTAMPED


The skits outclassed its peers with cinematic realism and fine details.

TIMESTAMPED


The humor was the icing on the cake.

TIMESTAMPED


And that album is just funky dem a mf on top of everything.

SOC is in the damn Library of Congress because our federal government has deemed that album "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Dr. Dre's version of gangsta rap stood out from everyone else's
All the factors were pre-existing (gangsta rap, explicit lyrics, gang culture, west Coast hip-hop)
So the X factor in this is Andre Young.

No doubt about his talent in this music thing, but there had to be someone listening to the streets to convince money people to throw money at him..I think they used to be called A&R or something like that.

I mean, that's research and development etc
 

JamesJabdi

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I put it more on Tupac. Breh went from fun party, semi-conscious rapper to glorifying the thug life. He had a higher profile than Dre and had to try and fit in with the LA Crips and Bloods gang culture. Then I think he started the east-west coast beef which was perplexing since he was born and raised in the east. And he had a Black Panther background so he should have been pushing unity.
Just my thoughts that can be corrected.

The thing about Tupac is that he died at 25.....People looked old back then but lets no forget that he didn't really get a chance to grow up. Police tried to kill him, He was shot like 5 times in New York, grew up with a drug addicted mother and no father.....he was a young man trying to find his identity while the whole world was watching and vultures were around him.
 

Concerned Citizen

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Was about to post that this thread was some bullshyt but if you define “root” as early adopter + wide impact + actually knew better than to really live the life they’re rapping about and it’s not exclusive to just one person then I gotta say yes :lupe:
 

FeverPitch2

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No doubt about his talent in this music thing, but there had to be someone listening to the streets to convince money people to throw money at him..I think they used to be called A&R or something like that.

I mean, that's research and development etc
People were absolutely listening and constantly talking about this record.
The damn FBI was listening.
Newsweek wrote a cover story about this album.
Of course, the major labels were listening.
 

Jesus H. Christ

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Yes dre controls all record labels and had control for the most part of radio stations in the early 90s and so forth:beli: Brilliant.
 

ISO

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Not really. Gangsta rap was started by a Philly rapper name Schoolly D.
How popular was this record in real time?

At that time hip-hop wasn’t very popular even with black people that’s how you had people like Michael Jordan at that time who was a young man but didn’t listen to or know shyt about hip-hop.
 

Mac Ten

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NWA and Public Enemy made white folks very nervous with their music which is why Vanilla Ice, Young MC, Hammer, and Tone Loc came to the forefront...

Dre was a studio gangster, nikka wasnt beating up bloods like in SOC.


I'll blame Pac and 50 Cent though. Both of em are the reason why a rapper can talk shyt at the end of a song about their foes.
 
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