DRE GROWS ON US
Rap master spotlights a mature outlook with ‘Compton’
Eventually, even gangstas grow up.
It may have taken Dr. Dre 50 years, but at his half-century mark he has created the most mature — and some of the most bracing — music of his career.
“Compton” — Dre’s first full album in 16 years, which came out Friday — finds one of the architects of ’80s gangsta rap looking back on his life with more perspective than he ever had back in the day. Over the course of its 16 tracks, Dre alludes to his N.W.A. days with pride and righteousness, gives several sincere shoutouts to his late group-mate (and one-time rival) Eazy-E, and frames the entire enterprise with elegiac odes that fully contextualize his roots in the L.A. ghetto.
The album also boasts smart cameos for old allies Ice Cube and Snoop Dogg, giving them parallel chances to act as hip-hop sages.
Dre’s renewed interest in his history stems from his involvement in the movie about N.W.A., “Straight Outta Compton,” which opens next Friday.
Yet the new “Compton” album doesn’t recycle either that group’s sound or that of Dre’s classic G-funk style in the ’90s. The deep bass lines, and cinematic soundscapes, have their own funk.
In “Genocide,” Dre creates a beat that’s by turns dreamy and driving. In “Issues,” he spikes hip hop with the roiling force of psychedelic rock, while “It’s All on Me” pivots on a descending bass line that manages to be both cool and wise. Several songs make moving use of the elegant jazz trumpet of Dontae Winslow. As always, Dre gives free reign to many guests who rap over his beats, and flesh out his vision. Three tracks feature Kendrick Lamar, Dre’s natural heir from Compton. Lamar brings his politicized edge. To boot, there are cameos from newer rappers like Justus and King Mez.
While N.W.A.’s anthems, like “F--- Tha Police,” spewed their message, Dre and his guests now choose to ruminate on their allusions to the police killings of Michael Brown (in “Animals”) and Eric Garner (“Deep Water”).
In the process of owning up to his age, Dre can be funny. “I want it all/goddamn it, I’m too old/I forgot I have it all,” raps the man who became a self-proclaimed billionaire with his Beats headphones company. Given that status, Dre might have sounded fat and smug at this point. The good news is that, instead, he sounds hungry.