'The Chronic' 10 years later

But I think what I should probably note here is that saying hip-hop reached adulthood with The Chronic is like saying rock reached adulthood with, say, Led Zeppelin II- and while I'm not going to pass judgement on the actual musical merit of respective albums, I will say that there's not much "adult" about them, except those things which seem adult to the general teenage mindset- sex, drugs, and rocknroll/rap. There's a niche for that sort of stuff and it can be great, but it's not really a real complete way of going about things- and considering what came since that has a lot more depth and scope, you could make better arguments for Enter the Wu-Tang, the last two Outkast records and Illmatic (to say nothing of underground/club crossover records like Dr. Octagon, Funcrusher Plus, Entroducing or various Ninja Tune material) to better represent rap actually becoming fully matured (for better and worse).

Ergo, The Chronic is its reckless teenage years, and thus a big dumb party album and there's nothing really wrong with that (so long as it's not the work of- well, I'm not naming names, but the operative word here is "party"). That said, how many great albums have followed in the "smokin' grass and pimpin' ass" vein? Doggystyle? OK, that's one (well, at least some people think it's great). Now name me another. Preferably one not produced by Dr. Dre. And before you say Stankonia, stop for a sec and ask yourself if something like "Toilet Tisha" or "Humble Mumble" would actually fit on The Chronic.

Also, I'll be serious when you are. "HUR HUR I WISH THERE WUZ NO NATE"? Person of unknown ethnicity PLEASE.

(NOTE: I'm starting to believe that the above sentence is probably the best way to deal with anything Ethan posts.)

But there was a sequel!

death row compilation - "chronic 2000 : still smokin"

dre album - "2001"

How many great rap albums have there ever been? Calling the Chronic a great album is like calling Pyromania or Thriller a great album -- perhaps true but entirely besides the point and definitely misleading if you're not careful. Thank god E-40 isn't wasting studio time making "albums".

Now it really is time for the doctor to check your ass.

sounds really old too

i don't think this album has held up well at all

Not enough lesbian disses iirc

man there's many opinions I can get with but "this album has not held up well at all", geezus you're talking about this like it's a Young MC album...

Good grief, 'The Cold Vein' is turning 10 next year!

Cold Vein sounds about a hundred years older than The Chronic, ironically.

Now it really is time for the doctor to check your ass.

― Let me tell you something about that song. (Eazy), Wednesday, June 22, 2011 7:23 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I loled

"let me know when you guys are done with this room - i'm gonna go get high in the parking lot."
this pretty much sums up me and this album. I can't believe it's 20 years old. I wonder what my long lost high school stoner friend is up these days. The last time I listen to The Chronic was with him, doing donuts in some farmer's pasture our senior year at 3 in the morning.

"The Chronic" was never a great album - this record and "Straight Outta Compton" are the Terrible Twins of overrated West Coast/Gangsta rap (by no means am I implying that all West Coast and gangsta rap records are overrated, but these ones are beyond belief - influence outweighing artistic merit enormously). I loved the three singles as a kid, and the rest of the record is at least thematically if not musically consistent (unlike S.O.C.), but content-wise it's both half-assed and noxious. At least Ghostface's "Wildflower" or Ice Cube's "You Can't Fade Me" or any given Geto Boys pack a punch and sometimes even a storyline alongside the bitch-dissing; Snoop and Dre's misogyny isn't laconic, it's rote. Sharper rappers know how to make the offensive stuff signify; "Bitches Ain't Shit" is just gross. And as for the music, it sure sounded nice to virgin ears weaned on rock and roll - and to a teenager to green to appreciate Public Enemy just yet - but once I heard real P-Funk, not to mention Digital Underground, I found out those liquid basslines and buzzing high synths had been put to much better use elsewhere. "I thought I was sleazy," the Doctor proclaims on "Dre Day." You are sleazy, Andre - even (shit, especially) with Suge Knight (later Jimmy Iovine) writing your checks instead of Jerry and Eazy. The real problem is you don't have anything to say about it - unlike B.A O'Shea, whose "No Vaseline," despite or maybe because of its unchecked bigotry/brutalism, is a better diss record than you or Snoop will ever write.

Yeah, I know Dre doesn't write his lyrics, but at least he could find better ghostwriters - on "2001," which has better beats overall, the rhymes (save for "Forgot About Dre," "Still D.R.E." and "The Watcher" - not incidentally among the few ghosted by proven greats) are even worse. And sure, Dre's got some of the sharpest ears in the business, but without a good mouthpiece or a sample worth salvaging he's like a hip-hop Tom Scholz - immaculate craft in the service of schlock. "California Love" is his triumph, not Tupac's. "Nuthin' But A G Thang" is still genius even though it's mostly Snoop and it jacks Leon Heywood wholesale. And a couple dozen other beats half-justify his inflated, already-depreciating rep (including 3 focus cuts on Straight Outta Compton that belong just as much to Ice Cube and demolish everything else on the record). But overall dude has done way more harm than good.

ehh, I would say early Geto Boys was extreeeeeeeeeeemely similar to N.W.A. in lyrical scope early on. Yea, Willie D was political, but no more than Ice Cube, and for fuck's sake, "Read These Nikes!".

most of the additional depth the Geto Boys added started on We Can't Be Stopped

regarding Chronic, I just think you're flat out RONG, you tend to assign 'faults' to those people who rate it so highly (i.e., insinuating everyone who worshipped it so must have been a rock 'n roll fan new to rap or hadn't heard Public Enemy).

lyrics on Chronic are extremely catchy, and probably stuck in my head the easiest of rap from that era.

(also your post seems quite revisionist)

Actually in the part about Public Enemy I was referring explicitly to my teenaged self.

I'm arguing here that one of the reasons "The Chronic" was overrated was that white rock fans (like my teenaged self) "got" it more than they did with a lot of other hip hop, at least initially.

that really only tackles the commercial response and not the critical love it got, though...

I never listen to it, and never did really. Singles were obviously ubiquitous/unavoidable. I went back to it last year and was very put-off by the majority of it tbh, but then it doesn't have any nostalgic appeal for me. I do get why it's canonical and how influential it was, but it's not my favorite work from the Dr.

RE Neanderthal - I will have to read more of the reviews from that era. I'm going partly on gut feeling from personal experience here, which could be total bullshit. Also, Geto Boys were a bad example upthread. Nevertheless, I stand by what I wrote about why "The Chronic" just isn't that great.

i'm kinda with thewufs on this one. i don't think The Chronic is a bad album or whatever, yeah it's overrated but only in the way that every billion-seller in the 90's is. i just don't like where it led hip-hop afterwards. ultimately if I have to consider "why is mainstream hip-hop so damn boring" I always trace it back to this album.

you know what is REALLY bad is EFIL4ZAGGIN

ultimately if I have to consider "why is mainstream hip-hop so damn boring" I always trace it back to this album.

nah think you can post-date that a little later to the appearance of a little guy named Puffy

xpost I like that album. clearly missing Cube, but the production was only a step away from what came later on The Chronic.

And my thoughts about Dre's legacy are admittedly conflicted - someday I'll write something clearer and more extensive. He has produced some undeniably great records, though.

Production-wise, "EFIL4ZAGGIN" might actually be solider than "The Chronic." Lyrically - well, let's just pretend it's horrorcore and leave it at that.

thewufs mostly otm in his original post. Ghostface's "Wildflower" is a good counter-example.

wow when did this thread turn into the island of lost SBs?

Wow horrible discussion itt

Nice try neanderthal but bail imo

The Chronic [Interscope, 1992]

The crucial innovation of this benchmark album isn't its conscienceless naturalization of casual violence. It's Dre's escape from sampling. Other rappers, as they are called, have promised to create their own musical environments, usually without revealing how much art and how much publishing fuels their creative resolve. But Dre is the first to make the fantasy pay out big-time. The world he hears in his head isn't the up-to-date P-Funk fools say they hear--that would be too hard. Instead he lays bassline readymades under simulations of Bernie Worrell's high keyb sustain, a basically irritating sound that in context always signified fantasy, not reality--stoned self-loss or, at a best Dre never approaches, grandiose jive. This is bell-bottoms-and-Afros music, its spiritual source the blaxploitation soundtrack, and what it promises above all is boom times for third-rate flautists--sociopathic easy-listening. Even if it's "just pop music," as some rationalize, it's bad pop music. C+

ultimately if I have to consider "why is mainstream hip-hop so damn boring" I always trace it back to this album.

nah think you can post-date that a little later to the appearance of a little guy named Puffy

― winoa ryder sexes creatures of the night (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, June 23, 2011 10:03 PM (46 minutes ago) Bookmark

well, I guess it all comes down to when you think hip-hop got boring. but if you're talking about what's on the radio right now, by and large, I don't think it has much to do with either of these guys.

what it promises above all is boom times for third-rate flautists--sociopathic easy-listening

lol this guy

if you're talking about what's on the radio right now, by and large, I don't think it has much to do with either of these guys.

sure. as noted this shit is super old

gotcha.

I don't mind "sociopathic easy listening" as nomenclature to describe lots of Wu-Tang and Mobb Deep tbh.

Unlike Christgau I don't hate Dre (and even he gave it up for "California Love," Eminem and a handful of other productions), but when I read that review on Xgau's site for the first time about a decade ago I realized that it pretty much nailed all of my issues with the album quite succinctly. And even though I never loved "The Chronic" to begin with, I never heard it the same way again. So yeah, I bit some of his rhetoric in my long post, though I didn't put it across quite so succinctly.

Erm, didn't mean to use the same adv/adv combination to end two sentences in a row, but that's posting-without-reviewing for you. You get my drift.

hey y'all

deeeeeez nuuuuuuts

otm

a little guy named Puffy

― winoa ryder sexes creatures of the night (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, June 23, 2011 10:03 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

aw that lil guy

rev otm

HELL NO BITCH YOU'D HAVE A DICK IN YOUR MOUTH

you's a penguin lookin muthafucka

classic, though i tend to skip nigga with a gun and ratatattat. and better than EFIL, which felt hollow if perfectly executed like a big hollywood action flick or something. 100 miles... was the last great NWA release.

chronic - also the last time dre had good/well suited ghostwriters working for him.

kind of hilarious to think of this album as hip hop reaching maturity though, in any way apart from - maybe- musically, though even then, thats only if you think rap producers hiring musicians = maturity, which i dont really agree with

Youse a penguin lookin' motherfucker

How many great rap albums have there ever been? Calling the Chronic a great album is like calling Pyromania or Thriller a great album -- perhaps true but entirely besides the point and definitely misleading if you're not careful. Thank god E-40 isn't wasting studio time making "albums".

― Kris, Wednesday, May 1, 2002 8:00 PM bookmarkflaglink

most wtf post itt

leaving everything else aside, e-40 has recorded something like 50 albums lol (many before 2008)

not all genres are album genres?

hip-hop isn't one anymore, but at the time, it definitely was, and The Chronic is definitely an album of repute.

and E-40 not being an album artist is o_O.

I like the idea of "misleading if you're not careful"--like you need to put these records' greatness in the proper context otherwise people will think you like popular music.