Today, while studying, I accidentally clicked on “Still Dre” by Dr. Dre in iTunes and it got me thinking. The song is now fifteen years old and it is basically as hot today as it was back then. More interestingly still, the song does not have tremendous lyricism, and it’s beat is just a simple two or three chord piano loop with background strings and a bass clap for balance. Yet this simple beat has endured iconically. It’s minimalism and oscillation fosters a state of mind in the listener. Rap songs today I find foster a sort of situational participation, rather than a state of mind, because the rhythms tend to be more finite and climactic. But there was something else that struck me about “Still Dre.” After “The Chronic” came out in the early nineties, Dr. Dre was essentially silent. He would have been one of those guys dismissed as a “had been.” Dr. Dre even notes the general public’s dismay in the song: “…but haters say Dre fell off…they want to know if he still got it. They say raps changed, they want to know how I feel about it!” I am impressed that this never phased Dr. Dre. How many artists do you know who have succumbed to this pressure and changed who they were to their detriment? Not Dr. Dre. He kept working; he kept dreaming; he kept producing. And nearly a decade later he drops a record that was the equivalent of King Arthur returning to his court. You rarely see this: to be out of the game for that long and come back so strong. I went to the Dave Chappelle show at Radio City Music Hall earlier this year and even he was still warming back up to his old self after such an absence. For Dr. Dre to re-appear with a song that would knock everything else off the radio for months is just stunning. And oddly enough we now find ourselves in a similar time. Subpar rappers dominate the airwaves. The hip-hop community asks, “Will Kendrick save us?” The fans search desperately, hungrily for an answer. And Dr. Dre’s anticipated album gets delayed and delayed and delayed. And some say it will never come out. And some wonder if Dr. Dre is still relevant. And some ask if he is stepping away from music and focusing on merchandise. In other words, they wonder if he is “still Dre?” Eerily enough, the stage is thus set for an album in the way that it was set at the turn of the century. I can only wonder what will come next… youtube/watch?v=_CL6n0FJZpk
Posted on: Sun, 21 Sep 2014 06:01:28 +0000
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