October 31, 2020

Tha Dogg Pound "Dogg Food" (10/31/95)


Tha Dogg Pound -- a rap duo consisting of Dat Nigga Daz and Kurupt the Kingpin -- first made its mark as a guest on two hugely successful albums: Dre's "The Chronic" and Snoop Doggy Dogg's "Doggystyle." The pair also contributed to the platinum soundtracks of the films "Poetic Justice," "Murder Was the Case," "Above the Rim" and "Natural Born Killers." Snoop and Dre return the favor here, one rapping, the other providing brisk, clean mixes for production mostly done by Daz. Though their previous work has been readily available, Tha Dogg Pound suddenly discovered that its debut album was the bone of contention pitting Interscope (which distributed Death Row Records) against Time Warner (which until recently distributed Interscope). "Dogg Food" became the public issue in the messy divorce of Interscope and Time Warner, partly because Death Row refused to let Time Warner executives preview the album. Even before the album was completed, such pop culture critics as Bob Dole, William Bennett and, particularly, C. DeLores Tucker attacked "Dogg Food," which, of course, none of them had actually heard. Oddly enough, such criticism provided invaluable publicity that was quickly embraced by the group itself. "Anyone who got upset in the past over so-called gangsta rap is going to get real hot about the stuff we're about to put out," they promised in the Los Angeles Times.... Death Row courted the controversy and even created a prime-time television commercial that all but promised "Dogg Food" (which eventually found a distributor with another L.A. label, Priority) would be so bad to the bone it would change rap music forever.... - The Washington Post. This highly controversial album still gets a lil' burn, and I have a lot of respect for both Daz and Kurupt, but bare in mind, it was always East Coast all day, for me. Revisit it below...


Below is an original Dogg Pound sticker and the cassette...