West Coast Connection Forum
DUBCC - Tha Connection => West Coast Classics => Topic started by: Lord Funk on May 12, 2007, 10:51:03 AM
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My God, the reviews were right - this is absolutely terrible. Allow me to vent about this shit.
First off, Ronin Ro is a HORRIBLE writer - I'm less than 50 pages in and this book is barely readable. The guy has done awful research, ripping off other writers' work and showing a complete lack of understanding of who and what he's writing about.
Here's just a few examples, looking at chapter 3 alone.
1. p32 - "Rapper Cli-N-Tel, however, shocked them all by leaving the [Wrecking Cru] for a solo career. Why he left is unknown."
- Are you telling me that NO ONE knows why the guy left? How about Lonzo or Cli-N-Tel themselves? Hey. here's an idea Ronin - why not fucking ASK THEM? What Ronin Ro shows here is that, after being paid an almost certainly handsome advance to write this book, he couldn't be bothered to interview anyone to write it - after all, it's much easier to use other people's interviews, as this next example shows.
2. p35 - "Whodini were performing a peaceful set when one gang member threw someone over a balcony onto the stage. Within minutes, Greg Mack told author Brian Cross, 'a whole section was running, gangs were hittin' people, grabbing gold chains, beating people.'"
- Terrible, terrible journalism. Instead of researching events and talking to sources himself, Ronin simply takes sections of another book on West Coast rap ('It's Not About A Salary' by Brian Cross) to make his point. I'm a journalist by trade and this shit is so fucking unprofessional it's amazing.
3. p30 - "Since reconnecting with Eric, also known as Eazy-E"... p37 - "Eric said he didn't even have a rap name. Cube quickly suggested Eazy-E."
- Which is it Ronin, was Eric known as Eazy-E when Dre met him or after he met Ice Cube? Can't be both, you dumb fuck.
I don't think I'll finish this book. If anyone here is thinking of buying it, DON'T. If I ws Dre I'd be fucking furious that someone was making money of my career with such a laze, unprofessional product.
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3. p30 - "Since reconnecting with Eric, also known as Eazy-E"... p37 - "Eric said he didn't even have a rap name. Cube quickly suggested Eazy-E."
- Which is it Ronin, was Eric known as Eazy-E when Dre met him or after he met Ice Cube? Can't be both, you dumb fuck.
No interest in the book but are you sure when he said 'Since reconnecting with Eric, also known as Eazy-E' he was talking to the reader. Letting the reader know when he said Eric, he was meaning Eazy E? :-\
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My God, the reviews were right - this is absolutely terrible. Allow me to vent about this shit.
First off, Ronin Ro is a HORRIBLE writer - I'm less than 50 pages in and this book is barely readable. The guy has done awful research, ripping off other writers' work and showing a complete lack of understanding of who and what he's writing about.
Here's just a few examples, looking at chapter 3 alone.
1. p32 - "Rapper Cli-N-Tel, however, shocked them all by leaving the [Wrecking Cru] for a solo career. Why he left is unknown."
- Are you telling me that NO ONE knows why the guy left? How about Lonzo or Cli-N-Tel themselves? Hey. here's an idea Ronin - why not fucking ASK THEM? What Ronin Ro shows here is that, after being paid an almost certainly handsome advance to write this book, he couldn't be bothered to interview anyone to write it - after all, it's much easier to use other people's interviews, as this next example shows.
2. p35 - "Whodini were performing a peaceful set when one gang member threw someone over a balcony onto the stage. Within minutes, Greg Mack told author Brian Cross, 'a whole section was running, gangs were hittin' people, grabbing gold chains, beating people.'"
- Terrible, terrible journalism. Instead of researching events and talking to sources himself, Ronin simply takes sections of another book on West Coast rap ('It's Not About A Salary' by Brian Cross) to make his point. I'm a journalist by trade and this shit is so fucking unprofessional it's amazing.
3. p30 - "Since reconnecting with Eric, also known as Eazy-E"... p37 - "Eric said he didn't even have a rap name. Cube quickly suggested Eazy-E."
- Which is it Ronin, was Eric known as Eazy-E when Dre met him or after he met Ice Cube? Can't be both, you dumb fuck.
I don't think I'll finish this book. If anyone here is thinking of buying it, DON'T. If I ws Dre I'd be fucking furious that someone was making money of my career with such a laze, unprofessional product.
Those are some affirming arguments.
Obviously, just quoting/summarizing/referring to/paraphrasing other people's texts isn't how you write a fucking book.
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is their anything about the game situation in the book?
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3. example sucks.. I'm with QT on that one
I can feel the 2 others :P
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That's some lousy writing indeed. Like you said, when you want to write a credible biography you simply have to do some research on the person you're writing about. And that research includes checking past interviews, other books and doing interviews. Hell, even I interviewed some people (including R-Tistic) for my thesis on the evolution of hip-hop culture.
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Damn everyone has been saying how great this book was, so i place my order it arrives today and then i come on here and see this......typical ;D
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I started reading it this morning and thought it was OK so far (about 40 pages in).
However it does seem like a collection of quotes from magazine articles woven together with some gossip and hearsay. It's readable, but that's probably because I'm a Dre fan.
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damn, thanks for the heads up, I was gonna buy this shit
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Aynone who has read Have Gun or Bad Boy should have known Ro is no good at writing a decent book.
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damn, thanks for the heads up, I was gonna buy this shit
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If you go in there trying to journalistically discredit someone I'm sure you'll have no problems doing it, but I guarantee ANYONE that is a fan of west coast rap would be VERY entertained and satisfied by this book. I was.
-T
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I don't buy hip hop biographies/autobiographies for the simple fact that most of the authors have no clue on how to write readable text. VH1 could give you more insight about hip hop even though they hate it. At least they do their homework. Being in the media trade myself, I know where Ron is coming from.
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never heard about the other book you mentioned.is it any good?
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I'm 13 chapters deep and although there's some nice anecdotes in there, they're held together by some very bad writing.
Some of the info is a bit shaky (2001's The Watcher is a Jay-Z collabo?) and he's not too complimentary towards Daz and Quik.
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If you go in there trying to journalistically discredit someone I'm sure you'll have no problems doing it, but I guarantee ANYONE that is a fan of west coast rap would be VERY entertained and satisfied by this book. I was.
-T
I don't know. I disagree that "ANYONE that is a fan of west coast rap would be VERY entertained and satisfied" - you're suggesting that all a fan is after is gossip and unsubstaniated rumours (which much of this book is) rather than a well-researched, illuminating and above all original book. It's not a case of trying to discredit, it's just making the blatant point that this book is badly written and contains many, MANY factual inaccuracies. (Another just off the top of my head - he claims 'Gin and Juice' was Snoop's first single. It's a small point, but all these small points add up to a very unsatisfying read to me)
I admit, there are some interesting anecdotes here and fun bits of gossip. But that's the kind of thing I expect from magazine articles and websites. This guy was doing PR for his book suggesting it gave some amazing insight into one of the greatest producers of our time. Instead we've been sold a hurriedly put together, badly written book that suggests to me in many places its author isn't very interested in Dre, his music or his career at all. It just annoys me that the writer will probably make a lot of money off Dre's fans by writing something that doesn't make the effort a Dre biography deserves. But props for arguing your point dude.
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Ive never read the Dre book but I did read Have Gun Will Travel and to me that is the worst book I've ever read. It's filled with contradictions, sloppy writing, countless errors and facts being twisted.
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Ive never read the Dre book but I did read Have Gun Will Travel and to me that is the worst book I've ever read. It's filled with contradictions, sloppy writing, countless errors and facts being twisted.
Yep... there's a pattern emerging here.
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and he's not too complimentary towards Daz and Quik.
Are you saying Dre isn't complimentary or Ronin isn't? And what does it say about them?
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Yeah there are inaccuracies, but the meat of the book gives me the basic gist of the shit I wanted to know. i suppose given that I already knew a grip about Dre, the little things that were off didn't bother me because the majority of the shit (especially from eminem and beyond) was entertaining and/or filling in some informational gap that I may have had before. If you're someone that's clueless about Dre, then this book ain't a good idea, but if you're (like alot of us here in this board) already know about him, it's cool cause you can add it to what you already know. i guess that's how I took it. I was very satisfied by this book and it doesn't surprise me at all that there's a bunch of rap fans in here jumping on the bandwagon so that they have yet another excuse to NOT read a book. it's such a tempting thing for humans to be able to start dissing some shit.
props to you though Ron, peace-T
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Dre is the best fuccin producer in music history and the world deserves a good biography on that motherfucca. this ronin ro shit is embarrasing for someone like Dre. They done a million bios on Mozart and Beethoven, but there ain't shit on Dre out there. And theres a gang of shit I don't like about Dre but he's a genius producer and nobody can take that away from him.
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damn where you been Tanj? ???
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i can't get on dubcc from work anymore, and that's when I did most of my posting, also I've been working the renaissance faire during the last 6 weekends (this weekend is the last weekend) AND I'm in the middle of midterms at Cal State San bernardino, so not quite as much time but
everything dr.dre ever produced for 2pac-hitting the hookup spot soon
my daz discography review/discussion thread-hitting the west coast connection board soon
peace-T
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i can't get on dubcc from work anymore, and that's when I did most of my posting, also I've been working the renaissance faire during the last 6 weekends (this weekend is the last weekend) AND I'm in the middle of midterms at Cal State San bernardino, so not quite as much time but
everything dr.dre ever produced for 2pac-hitting the hookup spot soon
my daz discography review/discussion thread-hitting the west coast connection board soon
peace-T
oo real talk
lookin forward to your full fledged return ;)
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i can't get on dubcc from work anymore, and that's when I did most of my posting, also I've been working the renaissance faire during the last 6 weekends (this weekend is the last weekend) AND I'm in the middle of midterms at Cal State San bernardino, so not quite as much time but
everything dr.dre ever produced for 2pac-hitting the hookup spot soon
my daz discography review/discussion thread-hitting the west coast connection board soon
peace-T
+1
-T
oo real talk
lookin forward to your full fledged return ;)
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it doesn't surprise me at all that there's a bunch of rap fans in here jumping on the bandwagon so that they have yet another excuse to NOT read a book.
LOL - cold, but probably fair.
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Finished the book last night - it's sloppily written with so many glaring factual inaccuracies it makes me mad.
This book is probably best for those who only have a passing interest in Dr. Dre. All the fans (most of us on here) will know a lot of the anecdotes and spot the errors a mile off.
BTW, did Ronin Ro use a fucking proofreader?
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This bit's brilliant - Dr Dre expert Ronin Ro claims that Dre produced tracks for Snoop's first album since joining No Limit; and that 'Zoom' was meant for that album and was recorded in the same session as 'Bitch Please' but Snoop wasn't good enough on it, so he got LL Cool J instead. I swear I'm not making this up.
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Apparently, the Still DRE vid had Hittman rapping Last Dayz at the end and Snoop's Last Meal was released in late 2001.
::)
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Apparently, the Still DRE vid had Hittman rapping Last Dayz at the end and Snoop's Last Meal was released in late 2001.
::)
lmao, seriously?
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Apparently, the Still DRE vid had Hittman rapping Last Dayz at the end and Snoop's Last Meal was released in late 2001.
::)
lmao, seriously?
Those are just the ones I remember.......there's a few errors like that on every other page.
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And Em and Dre's exchange that begins "Stop the beat a minute, I want to say something to you right now, while this fucking weed is in me..." is apparently in 'Forgot About Dre'.
Put it in this context - if a 'respected' music writer wrote a book all about The Beatles with this many errors in, they'd be laughed out of the industry.
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And Em and Dre's exchange that begins "Stop the beat a minute, I want to say something to you right now, while this fucking weed is in me..." is apparently in 'Forgot About Dre'.
Put it in this context - if a 'respected' music writer wrote a book all about The Beatles with this many errors in, they'd be laughed out of the industry.
So freakin true
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well i got this and jerry hellers book ruthless, is that any better ?
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did dre give him premission for this shit? i mean he must have, but damn.
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well i got this and jerry hellers book ruthless, is that any better ?
Not sure contentwise, but I'm sure Jerry Heller's book is written 500x better with no inaccuraties.
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This bit's brilliant - Dr Dre expert Ronin Ro claims that Dre produced tracks for Snoop's first album since joining No Limit; and that 'Zoom' was meant for that album and was recorded in the same session as 'Bitch Please' but Snoop wasn't good enough on it, so he got LL Cool J instead. I swear I'm not making this up.
well there is a unfinished version of zoom on the net with snoop on it.......so thats possible, but they werent for snoop's first album on no limit, because that was game is to be sold not told, bitch please appeared on top dogg.