I can still remember the first tapes I ever purchased. When I was 8 or 9, my neighbor and best friend played me a tape of NWA’s Straight Outta Compton, and later that day I was at the record store purchasing that tape and it’s predecessor, NWA and the Posse. These became the only music I listened to for months. Besides the obvious classics on both these albums I began to like the songs featuring a rapper by the name of the DOC. I would follow my older friends to the record store and check only the Eazy-E and NWA sections. On one of my browsing adventures I saw a new single by none other than the DOC. I quickly grabbed this gem and headed home to hear it.
When I did hear it I thought it was the best thing since the Ewoks. The song was of course, “It’s Funky Enough,” with its harsh guitar riff coupled with DOC’s volatile delivery and vicious voice, the song became my number 1 joint for the better part of a year. I was no more than 10 and, much to my mother’s chagrin, I could recite the song backwards and forwards. When I finally saved up, and snuck off to the record store, I bought DOC’s classic debut LP No One Can Do It Better. The album was filled with classic material like, “Let The Bass Go,” “The DOC And The Doctor,” “The Formula” and the West Coast equivalent of Marley Marl’s Symphony, “The Grand Finale.” This album along with the Eazy-E’s first album and the NWA albums made up a great portion of my pre-pubescent youth.
As I matured my tastes did as well. By the time I was a junior in high school I had lost nearly all of my interest in the gangsta, West Coast sound which provided my initiation to the culture. I still occasionally bumped NWA or some Bay Area underground shit, but I was your basic east coast lyrical snob, thinking that if you didn’t spit 15 similes a verse you were wack. I had seen DOC in some videos but the only thing I had heard about him was that he had been in tragic car accident. While I felt very sorry for him I didn’t really give it a second thought.
Luckily one of my boys bought a used copy of No One Can Do It Better out of a bargain bin. When he began to play it and get into it I fell in love again. This time the album appealed to on an entirely new level. “The Grand Finale” was full of the dope one-liners I was now trying to write and it was now almost a decade old. Also Dre’s production was ill as ever, utilizing a more abrasive sound than we typically associate him with. The album surprised me with innovation, and it’s relatively current sound. DOC’s delivery, and voice create a unique style that could never really sound dated because it is not typical of any era of hip-hop. I was proud of my youthful taste and would soon buy myself a copy of the CD to replace my long lost tape.
Looking at DOC’s career, the resume is quite daunting. Though his second solo, is held back by his brutally damaged vocal chords, (Want proof? That is him saying “Serial Killa” on the Doggystyle track) he showed that he was capable of succeeding without Dre’s production. Nonetheless he has been in the studio for some the best albums in the history of the West Coast. He has worked on all four NWA albums, Eazy-E’s debut, Chronic, Doggystyle, and most recently on 2001. His main contribution to 2001 was an MC whom he discovered named 6’2’’, who to my ear was the most intriguing newcomer on the album. It is sad to think of what might have been if the accident did not take place, a second solo amidst the craze surrounding Doggystyle and Chronic would have been very interesting to hear. However I’d rather highlight what the man has done and give props to one of the men responsible for my passion for this culture.
-Sayre Piotrkowski
