Almost time again for my annual Daz RRGB appreciation thread...

[TraceOneInfinite]

It's almost that time of year again niccaz......  Daz, Revenge, Retaliation, and Get Back time of year!   One of the most under-rated albums of all time, and the last great Death Row album.  This album had everything, a Pac feature, Snoop feature, Nate appearance, Kurupt verses from his prime, bangin production, even a sure-fire single/video with "In California".  But ofcourse rap fans were too busy listening to ignorant South trash like No Limit to notice...  So the single barely got any play and sadly the album sold something like 300,000, and thus spelled the end of the greatest era in rap history and the greatest label in rap history, Death Row...

For those that remember, the album dropped just as spring was approaching and the weather starting to warm up.  It dropped some time in March of 98.  Daz had a feature article in the Source magazine, the same magazine in which Snoop snagged the cover for leaving Death Row.  Snoop had a hot single at the time with Kurupt for "Ride On" off the Caught Up soundtrack.  There was a little beef between Daz and Snoop, but they were still fam at the end of the day.

Anyway, I will save my annual review of the album for my Appreciation Thread next month, be on the lookout for that, once more, peace...

[Hack Wilson - real]

yeah it's not THAT great of an album.  def has a bunch of bangers on it but you make it sound like it's better than Doggystyle and the Chronic sometimes bruh.

[TraceOneInfinite]

yeah it's not THAT great of an album.  def has a bunch of bangers on it but you make it sound like it's better than Doggystyle and the Chronic sometimes bruh.

Calling it the last great Death Row album, and the end of a great era is actually paying homage to albums like Chronic and Doggystyle.  Get it right, my nicca...

Also, it's not a case of having a "bunch of bangers".  It's a full album, conceptually and musically and it has no filler.  There are no loose ends on this project, it was up to Death Row standard of quality control, in spite of not having Dre around, not have Pac around, not having Suge around, (not having Quik around who you guys seem to credit for everything from the sun shining in the morning to the postponement of Armageddon)-- Daz still came thru major.

[Hack Wilson - real]

i personally find some filler in it but everyone has their own ear.


it sure starts off well with those first couple of tracks...and I'll always maintain that Initiated is one of the top 3 best lyrical songs Death Row ever released  (Kurupt, Fatal and Pac killed it and then Daz, EDI and Kastro didn't fuck it up lol)

[adi760]

Dope album - Prince Ital Joe added some dark atmosphere. It didn't reach even gold cuz of video clips - Daz had only one. For example Chronic had 3 and one unused - the same with Doggystyle, Dogg Food etc.
I think that was a reason why Death Row didn't reach platinum after 97'. RRGB had a chance for gold, Chronic 2000 for platinum and Against the Grain for gold/platinum.

[Jimmy H.]

I'd say it was very good, not great. The last great Death Row album was Makaveli, in my opinion. I think Daz comes up with some great tracks but conceptually, it isn't on par with the classic material.  I don't think the guest list elevates it as "Gang Related" OST had all the people mentioned as well as I actually think it utilized them more thoroughly. If any album from this era is underrated, it's Rage's "Necessary Roughness".

Dope album - Prince Ital Joe added some dark atmosphere. It didn't reach even gold cuz of video clips - Daz had only one. For example Chronic had 3 and one unused - the same with Doggystyle, Dogg Food etc.
I think that was a reason why Death Row didn't reach platinum after 97'. RRGB had a chance for gold, Chronic 2000 for platinum and Against the Grain for gold/platinum.

I'm going to disagree. Death Row didn't reach platinum after 97' because Dre left then Pac died then Suge got locked up then Snoop jumped ship. Once the big names leave, all you have is the die-hard fans of the label and I've never seen a case where that is enough to maintain a platinum fan base. "Chronic 2000" had two things going for it --- its name and two unreleased Tupac songs.  If anything, I bet a lot of people bought it hoping that it was going to be something like "2001". "Against The Grain" also little chance.  They put it out after Kurupt left Death Row. 

[adi760]

Against the Grain reached #60 on Bilboard - with no video clips, cuts few tracks and Death Row was like "don't buy that album, this ain't our shit". Kurupt was best known artist in Death Row at the time (Dogg Pound, great solos) + escalation beef with DPG = succes and platinum. He could do that long before - with Streetz Iz a Mutha, but got fucked up distributor.

[bouli77]

not gonna discuss this album again, lmfao,

[Jimmy H.]

Against the Grain reached #60 on Bilboard - with no video clips, cuts few tracks and Death Row was like "don't buy that album, this ain't our shit". Kurupt was best known artist in Death Row at the time (Dogg Pound, great solos) + escalation beef with DPG = succes and platinum. He could do that long before - with Streetz Iz a Mutha, but got fucked up distributor.

#60 is not a promising chart spot for a first week release. His first two albums charted at #8 and #31 respectively. This was with magazine coverage, videos, promotion, radio play, production by Dr. Dre, appearances on "2001" and the Up In Smoke Tour, and the full promotional support of Kurupt as an artist. As it is, neither one, to my knowledge, went platinum, and that was when record sales were still going strong.

Kurupt had left Death Row in April 2005 before the album was scheduled to be released. The project came out so they could give Koch an album to sell. One can hold out hope that it somehow would have reached plaque status with the right promotion but what did they have to promote? The label hadn't had a major hit in years and there wasn't a huge opportunity in terms of promotional avenues for the label to go with anyway. Had Kurupt stayed on the label, the album would not have been released at that time.

[Hack Wilson - real]

death row had the music to drop plat compilations but released the wrong songs..... ie. how can you release "get off the blocc" by Crooked and NOT release "bang on em"?

[Black Excellence]

death row had the music to drop plat compilations but released the wrong songs..... ie. how can you release "get off the blocc" by Crooked and NOT release "bang on em"?

they knew niggas didn't want to hear that.

[GARDENA.GANGSTA]

Oh yea!!! @Infinite I Remember this album i was fresh out of juvenile hall camp, camp rocky for u lames that aint from L.A.  but that was a sick ass album i remember bumpin this album when we had house parties and i would put on "It Might Sound Crazy" the bitches would be on it,yeah good memories from this album and i still bump it till this day,but my favorite track was Ridin High Feat.WC

[Jimmy H.]

death row had the music to drop plat compilations but released the wrong songs..... ie. how can you release "get off the blocc" by Crooked and NOT release "bang on em"?

I don't think it matters that much. They could have had the dopest music you or I has ever heard on these projects but they also need to create the platform to expose it to the public and the resources weren't there. For instance, in my opinion, "So Damn Hood" was hit single material, but where was the project built around that?  It never surfaced.

Now, no fanbase I have ever seen or heard, has this ability to cherry-pick the label they like into relevance, like Death Row fans. They think because someone has a couple or even a half-dozen "name" features, that all they need is to shine a light spotlight over there and it's platinum plaques for the next year.  If that were case, we would still be talking about Joe Budden's debut off the strength of "Pump It Up". Think about that one. The guy had arguably one of the hottest records out, that summer, and his album tanked. It wasn't lack of promotional push or exposure. But fact is everything has to be in the right spot, for anything to happen at all. You don't bring back a label into prominence off guests. You can't even break solo acts, that way.

When it comes down to it. From 1998 until the label went under, what was the story at Death Row? Suge Knight. Crooked I could have a catalog of hot music but when it comes to interview time, people are going to want to talk to Suge over him because Suge will say something people want to read or listen to. 50 Cent, Eminem, and Game all had great music behind them but that didn't matter a lick until Dre left the room and the interviewer was still interested in talking to them about subjects that didn't involve Dr. Dre. That's when it mattered.

When Death Row got started, it was from the ashes of the N.W.A. fallout so Dre was a topic of conversation that they could build off, he had his controversies with Eazy, with Dee Barnes, with starting a new label, and "Oh!  While you're here, here's this new song I got with my new artist coming out". Once The Chronic was done, Snoop was the guy people wanted to talk to. The general public didn't even know who Suge Knight was yet.  By the time, Pac got out? Game over. Suge was in the spotlight but Pac was still the story. They had so many stories to give the media and so much music to pump off it.

Any ways, kind of started with a quick reply there and went off on a whole bunch of other topics but this whole "Death Row could have stayed going if they only did this" debate still seems to linger on, these days.

[doggfather]

not gonna discuss this album again, lmfao,

[Hack Wilson - real]

death row had the music to drop plat compilations but released the wrong songs..... ie. how can you release "get off the blocc" by Crooked and NOT release "bang on em"?

I don't think it matters that much. They could have had the dopest music you or I has ever heard on these projects but they also need to create the platform to expose it to the public and the resources weren't there. For instance, in my opinion, "So Damn Hood" was hit single material, but where was the project built around that?  It never surfaced.

Now, no fanbase I have ever seen or heard, has this ability to cherry-pick the label they like into relevance, like Death Row fans. They think because someone has a couple or even a half-dozen "name" features, that all they need is to shine a light spotlight over there and it's platinum plaques for the next year.  If that were case, we would still be talking about Joe Budden's debut off the strength of "Pump It Up". Think about that one. The guy had arguably one of the hottest records out, that summer, and his album tanked. It wasn't lack of promotional push or exposure. But fact is everything has to be in the right spot, for anything to happen at all. You don't bring back a label into prominence off guests. You can't even break solo acts, that way.

When it comes down to it. From 1998 until the label went under, what was the story at Death Row? Suge Knight. Crooked I could have a catalog of hot music but when it comes to interview time, people are going to want to talk to Suge over him because Suge will say something people want to read or listen to. 50 Cent, Eminem, and Game all had great music behind them but that didn't matter a lick until Dre left the room and the interviewer was still interested in talking to them about subjects that didn't involve Dr. Dre. That's when it mattered.

When Death Row got started, it was from the ashes of the N.W.A. fallout so Dre was a topic of conversation that they could build off, he had his controversies with Eazy, with Dee Barnes, with starting a new label, and "Oh!  While you're here, here's this new song I got with my new artist coming out". Once The Chronic was done, Snoop was the guy people wanted to talk to. The general public didn't even know who Suge Knight was yet.  By the time, Pac got out? Game over. Suge was in the spotlight but Pac was still the story. They had so many stories to give the media and so much music to pump off it.

Any ways, kind of started with a quick reply there and went off on a whole bunch of other topics but this whole "Death Row could have stayed going if they only did this" debate still seems to linger on, these days.

which "So damn hood"?

the only version i care for is the one with Crooked doing all the rapping and hooks.......i don't care for any version with Juvenile or Sisqo hahaha