His DNA is everywhere: from James Prince (Rap-A-Lot) and Brian “Baby” Williams (Cash Money Records) to Shawn “Jay Z” Carter (Roc-A-Fella), Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson (G-Unit) and Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith, founder and CEO of Top Dawg Entertainment, the label home of acclaimed hip-hop golden child and Compton native, Kendrick Lamar. Throughout rap’s 40-plus year run, no one else, for better or worse, personified the genre’s hustler-gone-legit trope more than Eric Wright.
He was the one in the group that really was driving the ‘64 and hustling drugs in the streets to survive.” you forget that Cube went to college and that Dre was in an electro funk band called World Class Wreckin’ Cru. “He never seemed like he was playing a role,” recounts Black Eyed Peas leader Will.i.am, who was discovered and signed to Ruthless Records by Eazy in 1992. But he had something else just as important: authenticity. And E was totally devoid of the peerless production genius of Dr. He didn’t write his own rhymes, still a cardinal sin within hip-hop–apparently unless your name is Drake. Jackson, Eazy had the lyrical prowess of a mischievous fifth grader who smirked incessantly after being sent to the corner for disrupting class. In fact, compared to the lyrically gifted Mr. Cube gets ample credit (and deservedly so) in Straight Outta Compton for being N.W.A.’s chief wordsmith. “At any moment I was ready to bounce because it was like, ‘Yo, if we can’t do this right we shouldn’t do it at all.’” Gary Gray, the Tinsel Town powerhouse is still getting used to the reality that the hell-raising story of N.W.A. A primary producer on Straight Outta Compton alongside Dre, Eazy’s widow Tomica Woods-Wright and the film’s veteran director F. He is holding court at the Beverly Hills’ regal Four Seasons Hotel during a manic press day. “I didn’t think a studio would have the courage to make … not the way I wanted it made,” admits an in-a-daze Cube to VIBE. Suddenly, damn near the entire world was put on to Compton, the small yet troubled Los Angeles suburb of which N.W.A. Dre” Young, the criminally underrated Lorenzo “MC Ren” Patterson, jovial Antoine “DJ Yella” Carraby and enterprising visionary Eazy-who in 1995, shockingly died of complications from AIDS-raised a conspicuous middle finger at Ronald Reagan’s conservative white America that definitely wasn’t of the belief that #BlackLivesMatter. Lead lyricist O’Shea “ Ice Cube” Jackson, groundbreaking producer, Andre “ Dr. in the big screen release of Straight Outta Compton, onlookers witnessed the former drug dealer/unlikely rapper and Ruthless Records impresario’s very same impish spirit in all its Jheri curl, Raiders hat glory.īut it was far from all smiles. Niether deal panned out. He’s still hard at work on his long awaited debut.When fanboys and girls, the curious and skeptics packed theaters to see legendary hip-hop outfit N.W.A. Lil Eazy-E was previously signed to Virgin Records in the mid-2000s, and later landed a deal with Blackground/Universal. Dre left Eazy’s label to launch Death Row with Suge Knight. Both record companies were locked in a rap fued during the 1990s, when Dr. Ironically, Death Row was the rival label of his father’s Ruthless Records.
And what better way to do that than through Lil Eazy-E.” Entertainment, bringing the fans what rap has been missing - real rap music. Entertainment, added, “I am excited about this possibility with Hoopla in bringing together this Death Row/Ruthless saga, which is known as the biggest beef in rap history, into a new era with N.W.A. “I’m excited to soon bring you a new generation of rap that will reign in and bring success like the old Ruthless/Death Row era.” family and I would like to give respect and love to Tupac Shakur and the Hoopla/WIDEawake/Death Row family,” said Lil Eazy. According to a press release, the Compton rapper is currently in talks with Canada-based WIDEAwake Entertainment, the company who currently owns/runs Death Row Records. Brought to the table by NWA Ent’s Lisa Marcum and Hoopla Worldwide, the deal would allow his long awaited project to be released through Death Row, via a Hoopla Worldwide imprint. Lil Eazy-E, son of gangsta rap pioneer Eazy-E, has been going through label issues for years, resulting in his long awaited Prince Of Compton debut sitting on the shelf. However, he may have found an answer: Death Row Records.