Dr. Dre

''', the 2003 major-label debut album by Queens, New York-based rapper 50 Cent. It featured the Dr. Dre-produced hit single "In da Club", a joint production between Aftermath, Eminem's boutique label Shady Records and Interscope. Eminem's fourth album since joining Aftermath, Encore, again saw Dre taking on the role of executive producer, and this time he was more actively involved in the music, producing or co-producing a total of eight tracks, including three singles. In November 2004, at the Vibe magazine awards show in Los Angeles, Dr. Dre was attacked by a fan named Jimmy James Johnson, who was supposedly asking for an autograph. In the resulting scuffle, then-G-Unit rapper Young Buck stabbed the man. Johnson claimed that Suge Knight, president of Death Row Records, paid him $5,000 to assault Dre in order to humiliate him before he received his Lifetime Achievement Award. Knight immediately went on CBS's The Late Late Show to deny involvement and insisted that he supported Dr. Dre and wanted Johnson charged. In September 2005, Johnson was sentenced to a year in prison and ordered to stay away from Dr. Dre until 2008.

Dr. Dre also produced "How We Do", a 2005 hit single from rapper The Game from his album The Documentary.first=Brendan I. For an issue of Rolling Stone magazine in April 2005, Kanye West reviewed Dr. Dre as 54th out of 100 artists for Rolling Stone magazine's list "The Immmortals: The Greatest Artists of All Time".

In November 2006 Dr. Dre began working with Raekwon on his album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II

. He also produced tracks for the rap albums Buck the World by Young Buck, Curtis by 50 Cent,, Tha Blue Carpet Treatment by Snoop Dogg, and Kingdom Come by Jay-Z. Dre also appeared onTimbaland's track "Bounce", from his 2007 solo album, Timbaland Presents Shock Value along side, Missy Elliott, and Justin Timberlake..

Planned but unreleased albums during Dr. Dre's tenure at Aftermath have included 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 titled Chairmen of the Board.first=Corey Other upcoming albums for which he will produce include The Reformation by Bishop Lamont, The Nacirema Dream by Papoose, Flirt by Eve, and an upcoming album by Queen Latifah.

Detox

Detox is to be Dr. Dre's final album.first=Hillary In 2002, Dre told Corey Moss of MTV News that he intended Detox to be a concept album. Work for the album dates back to early 2004, but later in that year he decided to stop working on the album to focus on producing for other artists, but then changed his mind; the album had initially been set for a fall 2005 release. After several delays, the album was finally scheduled to be released sometime in 2009 by Interscope Records, which has not set a firm release date for the album as of February 2009. Producers confirmed to work on the album include DJ Khalil, Nottz, Bernard "Focus" Edwards Jr.,first=Gil Hi-Tek, J.R. Rotem, RZA, Jay-Z, Warren G, and Boi-1da. Snoop Dogg claimed that Detox was finished, according to a June 2008 report by Rolling Stone magazine.

After another delay based on producing other artists' work, Detox is now scheduled for a 2009 release, coming after 50 Cent's Before I Self Destruct and Eminem's Relapse, an album for which Dr. Dre handled the bulk of production duties. Dre appeared in the remix of the song "Set It Off" by Canadian rapper Kardinal Offishall (also with Pusha T); the remix debuted on DJ Skee's radio show in December 2008. At the beginning of 2009, Dre produced, and made a guest vocal performance on, the single "Crack a Bottle" by Eminem and the single sold a record 418,000 downloads in its first week. and reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart on the week of February 12, 2009. In a Dr. Pepper commercial that debuted on May 28, 2009, he premiered the first official snippet of Detox. 50 Cent and Eminem asserted in an interview on BET's 106 & Park that Dr. Dre had around a dozen songs finished for Detox.

Film career

Dr. Dre made his first on screen appearance as a weapons dealer in the 1996 bank robbery movie Set It Off. In 2001, Dr. Dre also appeared in the movies The Wash and Training Day.first=Corey A song of his, "Bad Intentions" (featuring Knoc-Turn'Al) and produced by Mahogany, was featured on The Wash soundtrack. Dr. Dre also appeared on two other songs "On the Blvd." and "The Wash" along with his co-star Snoop Dogg. In February 2007 it was announced that Dr. Dre would produce dark comedies and horror films for New Line Cinema-owned company Crucial Films, along with longtime video director Phillip Atwell. Dr. Dre announced "This is a natural switch for me, since I've directed a lot of music videos, and I eventually want to get into directing." Along with fellow member Ice Cube, Dr. Dre will produce a biographical film about N.W.A.

Entrepreneur

Beats By Dr. Dre Logo
In July 2008, Dr. Dre released his high-performance brand of headphones, Beats by Dr. Dre. The line consists of Beats Studio, a circumaural headphone, Beats Tour, an in-ear headphone, Beats Solo, a supra-aural headphone, and Heartbeats by Lady Gaga, also an in-ear headphone. The headphones are made by Monster. He is also planning to release an "Aftermath Cognac and vodka" at around the same time he releases Detox. For the 2009 Fall season, HP and Dr. Dre are teaming up to release Beats By Dr. Dre with the sale of all HP laptops and headsets.HP and Dr. Dre announced the deal on October 9, 2009, at a press event in Santa Monica, California. The new laptop, known as HP ENVY 15 Beats limited edition, will be available for sale October 22 and be priced around $2,299. Besides the laptop, the PC comes with Dr. Dre's signature headphones.

Personal life

Marriages and family

He had a second son, Andre Young Jr, with then-girlfriend Jenita Porter. Andre Young Jr. died at the age of 20 on August 23, 2008 at his Woodland Hills home. The coroner determined that he died from an overdose of heroin and morphine.

From 1990 to 1996 Dr. Dre dated singer Michel'le, who frequently contributed vocals to Death Row Records albums. In 1991 the couple had a son, Marcel. In May 1996 Dr. Dre married Nicole Threatt, the ex-wife of NBA player Sedale Threatt. Dr. Dre and Nicole have two children together: a son named Truth (born 1997) and a daughter named Truly (born 2001).

Income

In 2001, Dr. Dre earned a total of about $52 million from selling part of his share of Aftermath Entertainment to Interscope Records and his production of such hit songs that year as "Family Affair" by Mary J. Blige. Rolling Stone magazine thus named him the second highest-paid artist of the year. Dr. Dre was ranked 44th in 2004 from earnings of $11.4 million, primarily from production royalties from such projects as albums from G-Unit and D12 and the single "Rich Girl" by singer Gwen Stefani and rapper Eve. He was ranked 9th in 2008 from earnings of $15 million. earn

Musical influences and style

Dr. Dre has said that his primary instrument in the studio is the Akai 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-play pieces of music he wants to use, because it allows him more flexibility to change the pieces in rhythm and tempo.url=www.dr-dre.com/info/interview_scratch_dr_dre.php In 2001 he told Time magazine, "I may hear something I like on an old record that may inspire me, but I'd rather use musicians to re-create the sound or elaborate on it. I can control it better."first=Josh Other equipment he uses include the E-mu SP-1200 drum machine and other keyboards from such manufacturers as Korg, Rhodes, Wurlitzer, Moog, and Roland.

After founding Aftermath Entertainment in 1996, Dr. Dre took on producer Mel-Man as a co-producer, and his music took on a more synthesizer-based sound, using fewer vocal samples (as he had used on "Lil' Ghetto Boy" and "Let Me Ride" on The Chronic, for example). Mel-Man has not shared co-production credits with Dr. Dre since approximately 2002, but fellow Aftermath producer Focus has credited Mel-Man as a key architect of the signature Aftermath sound. About.com ranked Dr. Dre #2 (tied with Pete Rock) on their "Top 50 Hip-Hop Producers" list.

In 1999 Dr. Dre started working with Mike Elizondo, a bassist, guitarist, and keyboardist who has also produced, written and played on records for female singers such as Poe, Fiona Apple and Alanis Morissette, In the past few years Elizondo has since worked for many of Dr. Dre's productions.first=Jonathanfirst=Dale Dr. Dre also told Scratch magazine in a 2004 interview 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 1960s 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.

Work ethic

Dr. Dre has stated that he is a perfectionist and is known to pressure the artists with whom he records to give flawless performances. In 2006 Snoop Dogg told the website Dubcnn.com that Dr. Dre had made new artist Bishop Lamont re-record a single bar of vocals 107 times. Dr. Dre has also stated that Eminem is a fellow perfectionist, and attributes his success on Aftermath to his like-minded work ethic.

A consequence of this perfectionism is that some artists that initially sign deals with Dr. 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 King Tee, 2001 vocalist Hittman, Joell Ortiz, and Rakim.newspaper=The Source

However, over the years word of other collaborators has surfaced. During his tenure at Death Row Records, it was alleged that Dr. Dre's stepbrother 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 album Tha Doggfather after Young left Death Row Records). Tha Dogg Pound. (2005). DPG Eulogy [1]. Innovative Distribution Network. Accessed April 27, 2008.

It is known that Scott Storch, who has since gone on to become a successful producer in his own right, contributed to Dr. Dre's second album 2001; Storch is credited as a songwriter on several songs and played keyboards on several tracks. In 2006 he told Rolling Stone:

"At the time, I saw Dr. Dre desperately needed something," Storch says. "He needed a fuel injection, and Dr. Dre utilized me as the nitrous oxide. He threw me into the mix, and I sort of tapped on a new flavor with my whole piano sound and the strings and orchestration. So I'd be on the keyboards, and Mike [2] was on the bass guitar, and Dr. Dre was on the drum machine".

Current collaborator Mike Elizondo, when speaking about his work with Young, describes their recording process as a collaborative effort involving several musicians. In 2004 he claimed to Songwriter Universe magazine that he had written the foundations of the hit Eminem song "The Real Slim Shady", stating, "I initially played a bass line on the song, and Dr. Dre, Tommy Coster Jr. and I built the track from there. Eminem then heard the track, and he wrote the rap to it." This account is essentially confirmed by Eminem in his book Angry Blonde, stating that the tune for the song was composed by a studio bassist and keyboardist while Dr. Dre was out of the studio but later programmed the song's beat after returning.

Furthermore, in the September 2003 issue of The Source, a group of disgruntled former associates of Dr. 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 Dad's 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.

Although Young studies piano and musical theory, he serves as more of a conductor than a musician himself, as Josh Tyrangiel of Time magazine has noted:

Every Dre track begins the same way, with Dre behind a drum machine in a room full of trusted musicians. (They carry beepers. When he wants to work, they work.) He'll program a beat, then ask the musicians to play along; when Dre hears something he likes, he isolates the player and tells him how to refine the sound. "My greatest talent," Dre says, "is knowing exactly what I want to hear."

Although Snoop Dogg 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 that he is responsible for the success of his numerous albums. It should be noted that Dr. Dre's prominent studio collaborators, including Scott Storch, Elizondo, Mark Batson and Dawaun Parker, have shared co-writing, instrumental, and more recently co-production credits on the songs where he is credited as the producer.

It is also widely acknowledged that most of Dr. Dre's raps are written for him by others, though he retains ultimate control over his lyrics and the themes of his songs. As Aftermath Producer Mahogany told Scratch: "It's like a class room in booth. He'll have three writers in there. They'll bring in something, he'll recite it, then he'll say. 'Change this line, change this word,' like he's grading papers."first=Jerry L.
As seen in the credits for tracks Young has appeared on, there are often multiple people who contribute to his songs (although it should be noted that often in hip hop many people are officially credited as a writer for a song, even the producer). As a member of N.W.A, The D.O.C. wrote lyrics for him while he stuck with producing. Popular New York City rapper Jay-Z ghostwrote lyrics for the single "Still D.R.E." from Dr. Dre's album 2001.first=John

Discography

Dr. Dre production discography
*The Chronic (1992), Death Row

2001 (1999), Aftermath
Detox (2010), Aftermath

Awards and nominations

"Let Me Ride"—Grammy Award for Best Rap Solo Performance - 1994
"California Love"—Grammy Award Nomination as Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group (with 2Pac and Roger Troutman) - 1997.
"No Diggity"—Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals (with Blackstreet and Queen Pen) - 1998
"Forgot About Dre"—Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group - 2001 | (with Eminem)
"Still D.R.E."—Grammy Award Nomination Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group (with Snoop Dogg) and The Source Awards Nomination Single of the year (2000)
The Marshall Mathers LP—Grammy Award for Best Rap Album - 2001 (with Eminem)
Various Production—Grammy Award for Producer of the Year - 2001