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Warren G
Growing up in East Long Beach, Warren played ball with his homey, Snoopy (yes, the very same) and rhymed with friends on the corner of 21st and Lewis. Later, he and Snoop hustled drugs together. But Warren’s arrest at 17 and Snoop’s stint in the pen served as a wake up call -- enlisting their buddy, Nate Dogg, they began focusing on making music under the name, 213. Warren laid the tracks, Snoop did the rapping, and Nate chimed in with his choir-trained singing voice. One of their demo tapes ultimately reached the ears of Warren's older half-brother, Dr. Dre. From there, things just took off.
Warren introduced Snoop to Dre; made an appearance on Dre's landmark album, The Chronic; penned and produced Mista Grimm's mega-hit, "Indo Smoke"; signed a recording and production deal with Def Jam subsidiary, Violator/RAL; and self-produced and released his own multiplatinum effort, Regulate...The G-Funk Era. The hip hop style that fueled that record's string of hit singles -- "Regulate," "This D.J." and "Do You See" --- is, of course, "g-funk": a cooled out fusion of street beats and sweet, '70s R&B harmonies, introduced by Dre on The Chronic, and further popularized by Warren, Snoop, Domino and others.
Warren’s subsequent releases have been unable to match the success of Regulate, but he continues to pump out an occasional radio hit like the Bob Marley-indebted “I Shot The Sheriff” and the recent “I Want It All.” He’s also taken a number of up-and-comers under his wing, introducing the world to Dove Shack, The Twinz, Neb Love and Da Five Footaz. |