Dubcnn: What are some of the earliest memories you have of yourself and Nate when you were growing up?

Warren G: Me and Nate had been around each other for years as kids, hanging around King Park, through summer programs and church and stuff like that. As we got older, I'd say around '88 or '89, that's when we really started hanging out real tough, me him and Snoop. We just started going hard as 213, as a group, around that time. That's when we really started being a group rather than just homeboys.

Dubcnn: Some footage leaked online of you, Nate and a few others in a car, freestyling to the "Regulate" beat in the early 90's (watch here). Was that done before the actual song was recorded?

Warren G: *laughs* When we was in the car? Yeah, I'm trying to think whether we recorded "Regulate" before or after that… Actually, that was before we put it together actually, I think we were on our way to go do a show with Mista Grimm for "Indo Smoke" and I was letting them hear the beat. That shit was dope. We got back to my studio probably the next day and we did "Regulate". It turned out to be a classic.

Dubcnn: How did you put together the song? Did you each write your parts or did you sit and plan it out together?

Warren G: We did the song right there, together, I was like "Okay I'll start it off", and I did my 8 bars, then he'd go with his part, then me again and we'd just feed off each other. That's how it built up to become what it was. He would feed off of what I was saying and vice versa. So by us doing that, it made it connect better. We ended up with a classic and 20 years later it's still in heavy rotation.

Dubcnn: Once the song was done, when you heard the finished version for the first time, did you realize what kind of impact it would have?

Warren G: I didn't know it was going to blow up as big as it did. I was just doing music to let people hear us, because we was just trying to come up and do our thang. We didn't understand, we just wanted to make music man, that's all we wanted. We didn't realize how big it was, until I took it to Lyor Cohen and played it for Russel Simmons and Mike Lynn and Dre at the studio and Mike Lynn was like "Let me play this again!" So he played it for Jimmy and Jimmy was like "Shit, let's use this for the "Above The Rim" soundtrack!" I gave them the song for the soundtrack and next thing you know, boom! The shit blew up.

We still wasn't tripping until it hit the billboard charts and it was playing all over the country. At that point we were like "Wow… We got something here." It was just a good feeling to know that our music was playing all across the country in heavy rotation. That meant the world to us. That was incredible. But as far as Gold and Platinum and all of that, we wasn't even on that page. We wasn't even tripping off that. We just wanted to do music, that was it!

Dubcnn: What was the typical atmosphere and creative process like with Nate in the studio? He came across as a very private person who didn't show too many emotions.

Warren G: Usually we'd just sit down in the studio, talk about different things and then just start doing the music! When we were in the studio, we'd come up with a cool concept, or he might just hum a melody and then put some words to it, so I could feed off of him. But Nate, his thang was… he really loved women! *laughs* That was just his thing. As soon as you had a bunch of pretty girls up in the studio, it's going down!

That's how we made "Yo Sassy Ways". I had called Snoop and Nate, told them about this song I wanted to do. So I was in the studio with a few cats, but we ain't have no women up in that muthafucka. Snoop came through and next thing you know, here comes Nate - with about 9 girls! *laughs* That's how we liked to work, that atmosphere, cause it makes you feel good to have women in the studio, just listening and being around you.

So Nate came up there and sat down all the way across the studio on the speaker, looking straight across the room at this one girl. He would look at her and then start writing, then look again and continue writing. Next thing you know, he says "Let me in the vocal booth". He got up in there and sang the hook to "Yo Sassy Ways". Me and Snoop fed off of that and it just came together.

Dubcnn: Did your relationship have any ups and downs? I remember fans wondering why you were not featured on his "Music & Me" album.

Warren G: We ain't never had no ups and downs, ever. We probably just didn't get around to it, but we never had any problems like that. That's my dogg, Anything he needed from me, he'd get it.

Dubcnn: Was it difficult to sit down and put everything that you're going through into one song, "This Is Dedicated To You", which is dropping on April 26th?

Warren G: Yeah. It's real difficult, cause it's so much stuff that I wanted to talk about. I tried to sum it up in a couple of verses, but it's a lot of stuff I wanted to talk about. We had some fun times together, we really had some fun times, doing our music, traveling and being on the road… As a group, as a group, as homeboys, it was fun to be with your friends and you guys are working together, having a ball.

Dubcnn: Ever since Nate had his first stroke, a lot of fans were constantly trying to find out what was going on with him, what his current health status was, and it was hard to get concrete information on what was going on. Was that a specific request from Nate's family, not to divulge any information?

Warren G: Nah… I mean it wasn't that bad… Of course just having a stroke is bad, but he had recovered real fast and he was doing good. He was getting his stuff back together and the shit just happened again… It was crazy, like damn, he was just getting up, going around, getting back up on his feet.

Dubcnn: Lil Half Dead mentioned that Nate's grandma passed away a few weeks before him passing…

Warren G: Yeah. Just going through what he was going through, I think her passing really hurt him. It really hurt him and I think that broke his heart. It broke his heart. He just didn't want to be in that place anymore. He was tired of it. I mean he was starting to progress a lot too, he was starting to be able to tell you "Yes" or "No", laugh and talk with you… We'd cry together, talk, he would laugh…

It was real heavy. I would play music for him, I'd play "Regulate", play "Ain't No Fun" and a lot of the stuff that we did… He would just laugh and be happy, just to see me come in there, visit him and help out, wiping him off, helping him with his therapy and just telling him that we were going to get him through this thing. I kept telling him "We're gonna get you through it." Him passing away hurt like a muthafucka… It's just crazy. That nigga is my brother…

It's just fucked up not to have him here, that's my dogg, like what the fuck am I gonna do now? I've lost one of my closest homeboys and I just felt like "Fuck! I don't even wanna do this shit no more. Fuck it." But I can't go out like that, he would want me to stand up and ride for him and continue to carry his legacy on and to take care of his family and his kids. That's what we're doing, like with this song, that's going to be for his mother to take care of them kids. I'ma carry on his legacy also. I'ma spit about him and keep him a part of what I do, still. We actually did a lot of records together, we got a whole album that we did together that nobody ever heard.

Dubcnn: Can we expect to hear some of that music in the future?

Warren G: I'm thinking about doing a Nate Dogg & Warren G EP and I talked to a few cats out there in the industry to get on and support. I've gotten some confirmations and stuff from some of the artists who wanna rock with us on that. I just want to let people hear that we still had hit records lined up, ready to go. It don't stop. We still do this. Rest in peace Nate Dogg.

Missed Dubcnn's "Remembering Nate Dogg" series? Click Here to catch up!