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DR DRE - COMPTON - AUGUST 7


bacardimayne

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Review at rollingstone.com: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/dr-dre-compton-20150806

"It's no Detox. It's something realer, and better."

4/5 stars

One of hip-hop's all-time greats sums up his legacy on a brilliant, confounding album

Who in the world has better ears than Andre Young? Throughout his many incarnations, the common thread in Dr. Dre's career has been his ability to hear things differently from everyone else, and his certitude that millions of paying customers will want to hear those things too. Paradoxically, he's been both prolific and patient: It doesn't seem like he's ever stopped working, and yet somehow 16 years have elapsed since his last solo LP.

For much of that time, he's said, he was working on a solo record to follow up 1992's landmark The Chronic and 1999's lushly raucous 2001. The project which grew increasingly mythical as time passed consisted of a title, Detox, and little else. Now, with scant warning, Dre's solo return is upon us, with the twist that it isn't Detox at all. Maybe it's marketing: How could anything meet the wild expectations tied to that name? Or maybe the dream of Detox paralyzed Dre, and the only way to free himself was to set his sights elsewhere.

So he set them on his past. Compton is a companion piece to the new N.W.A biopic, and the album's backward gaze is evident from the intro, where narration from an old TV documentary describes how Dre's California hometown went from black-middle-class idyll to a crime-ravaged "extension of the inner city." Dre reminisces over past indignities ("Face down on the pavement with the billy clubs . . .") and glories (". . . Now it's 'Fuck Tha Police' all up in the club") but this is no dusty museum tour. Compton contains some of his most ambitious, idea-stuffed production ever, combining the layered bombast and narcotic ooze of his catalog's peaks with a bunch of bold new tricks. On standouts like "Talk About It" and "Genocide," Dre and his co-producers manage insane juggling acts between throbbing funk bass, jazz trumpet, extended high-hat solos, acoustic guitars and irresistibly pounding drums. Lyrically, Compton is not only vibrant but full of an indignation that suggests world-beating success has done little to lessen the vitriol that fueled Dre back in N.W.A. On "Issues," co-starring Ice Cube, Dre declares, "Fuck money, that shit could never change me." The line seems at once boastful and true, for better and worse: The track ends with a jarring fantasy about a woman's violent murder.

Throughout, Dre's rhyming (aided as always by co-writers) is impressive. He trades his familiar stentorian boom for double-time syncopations, hoarse snarls and even bursts of song Eminem and Kendrick Lamar, both of whom cameo, clearly rubbed off on him. The latter in other ways, perhaps: This is Dre's most explicitly political album, featuring lines from him and guests that evoke police violence, particularly the killings of Michael Brown ("Blood on the cement, black folks grieving") and Eric Garner ("I can't breathe, I can't breathe"). He's still full of contradictions on "Animals," he calls himself a "product of the system, raised on government aid," but on "Darkside/Gone," he raps, with palpable disgust, that "anybody complaining about their circumstances lost me, homey." It adds up to an album by turns confounding and enthralling. It's no Detox. It's something realer, and better.

Jonah Weiner

That review says almost completely nothing.

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Im not enchanted generally but i'd still like to listen. All the genius bollocks is a bit off putting but a good album is a good album and Dre can manage a good album I'm sure.

Quite frankly genius is kinetic, genius is spontaeneous, genius can put out bangers every six months, if it takes decades, five years etc etc then it aint genius, its charlatanism, genius is The Beatles bangin' out classics over the weekend for fun, genius is Tupac goin' 'go in there, throw them n!ggas on the track and if these boys wanna stay up all night adding drums and shit thats on them', genius aint Axl and Dre having decade long wanks in million dollar studios because they're old and jaded and have no life.

So that aside, if its good then I'm in and on side and if it blows then it blows, i dont expect a classic one way or the other :shrugs:

Its obvious even from the weenie review, with that black concious shit (remember this guys arguments with Ra' were expressly to do with him wanting gangsta shit out of him) are obvious a result of having his shit stroken by Kendrick, other than that a bunch of hardcore shit, ghost-written by Em' in Dre costume, it is what it is, it'll live and die by the tracks laid, that other shit is just icing cuz we can all hear the real voice to it.

Edited by Len B'stard
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"darkside gone" and "medicine man" are my favorite. great album.

Notes:

"Darkside / Gone" contains a sample of the song "Spirits of Ancient Egypt" by Wings.

"Issues" contains a sample of the song "Ince Ince" by Selda.

"For the Love of Money" contains a sample of the song "Foe tha Love of $" by Bone Thugs-n-Harmony.

Edited by Roky
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It's good, even bordering on great at moments. I wouldn't give it a 4/5 though. Maybe 6.5-7 out of ten.

Still, pretty fucking impressive

How is it stacked up against 2001?
I'd rate Compton as dead even, just above, or just below honestly.

Compton has better guests and some better verses but 2001 is more consistent.

They're about dead even in terms of production IMO. If there's one thing I can say about Dre it's that he can make production interesting and fresh without resorting to full on artistic grandiosity like Kanye. The samples and beats are well placed and interesting, but very tasteful and build up a nice atmosphere

This is coming from a big Kendrick Lamar fan though, it's great having his presence all over the album :)

Edited by Dan H.
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Damn, so it kinda lives or dies on Kendrick? Not the best of news for a man unconvinced on Kendrick but nevertheless, based on respect for your opinion the dead even bit certainly is high praise. I guess i been asking yous all for someone to get me interested and that assessment certainly has me interested, thank you :)

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Damn, so it kinda lives or dies on Kendrick? Not the best of news for a man unconvinced on Kendrick but nevertheless, based on respect for your opinion the dead even bit certainly is high praise. I guess i been asking yous all for someone to get me interested and that assessment certainly has me interested, thank you :)

I didn't mean it like that, I just mean that I personally have a huge bias for Kendrick, and I also have very different tastes in rap music than you. So I could be missing some things on my first listen while being so eager to jump into Kendrick's moments.

He has a big presence on the album but I wouldn't say it hinges on him what so ever.

I think you'll enjoy it, my only micro criticism is that at some points it feels like it's a revolving door compilation, but not so much so that it's off putting.

Edited by Dan H.
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Damn, so it kinda lives or dies on Kendrick? Not the best of news for a man unconvinced on Kendrick but nevertheless, based on respect for your opinion the dead even bit certainly is high praise. I guess i been asking yous all for someone to get me interested and that assessment certainly has me interested, thank you :)

I didn't mean it like that, I just mean that I personally have a huge bias for Kendrick, and I also have very different tastes in rap music than you.

I think you'll enjoy it, my only micro criticism is that at some points it feels like it's a revolving door compilation, but not so much so that it's off putting.

Whats the production like? Is it G Funk, is it guitarey, is it minimal, whats going on in there? :) Edited by Len B'stard
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Damn, so it kinda lives or dies on Kendrick? Not the best of news for a man unconvinced on Kendrick but nevertheless, based on respect for your opinion the dead even bit certainly is high praise. I guess i been asking yous all for someone to get me interested and that assessment certainly has me interested, thank you :)

I didn't mean it like that, I just mean that I personally have a huge bias for Kendrick, and I also have very different tastes in rap music than you.

I think you'll enjoy it, my only micro criticism is that at some points it feels like it's a revolving door compilation, but not so much so that it's off putting.

Whats the production like? Is it G Funk, is it guitarey, is it minimal, whats going on in there? :)
It's a little all over the place. It's kinda similar to Kendricks newest album. It definitely feels a little more minimal than I expected. It doesn't really take too much from the 90s gangsta funk/guitar driven production, but on certain songs the drums really knock with an old school "tinny" sound that reminds me of Straight Outta Compton.

A lot of sampling but like I said in my other post, it's very tasteful and creative, but it never feels out of place or trying to be overly "artsy"(like Kanye or Kendrick's albums).

It's very atmospheric and textured, it's very well mixed and drags you in with how "full" it sounds. Best listened to with headphones for sure.

Dre is a very interesting producer in that he still manages to surprise me and escape cliches in rap production, while also staying well grounded and down to Earth. The production takes turns on each track, sometimes clearly being the centerpiece, sometimes taking a back seat to the verses and the flows.

I'll have to give it a few more listens today and write a more coherent review

Edited by Dan H.
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Good Lord man, just listen to it!! :lol: :lol:

See there's this thing called working for a living and it's impeding my ability to do so, at least for the next hour or so :lol:

I sent him the link several hours ago...

Yeah which led to a website that gives you free storage and gets you to download an app and fuck all else, had your link worked these questions would not be being asked, instead you'd be getting a big know-it-all diatribe about how good it is or isn't by the supreme pontiff of my musical taste, me :D

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I found the album solid. There's only a couple songs I want to listen to again. Only a few realllll standout beats, the true highlights of the album were Kendrick's verses. Some of the production I found sorta cheesy and fit for a stadium.

Edited by Jakey Styley
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Listened to first two songs, pretty shite, not so interested anymore, i'll probably listen to the rest some point.

It ain't bad. I just don't like how he's changed his style to adapt to the times. It sure as fuck ain't 2001, but by the third listen, I'm getting into it a bit..

Edited by drtydane
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