Former Aftermath producer Dawaun Parker hits the Cosmic Zoo and discusses Dre’s much romanticized forthcoming album, Detox. Speaking on the archives of songs and beats waiting to be unearthed, he also goes into the actual title of the album, which may or may not be what you’re thinking.

Maybe with Dr. Dre’s sale of Beats Electronics to Apple, we may finally see a release date for his final album, Detox. Fans have been waiting for it for so long, that they’ve taken matters into their own hands. Yes, the innanet has decided that if Dre won’t finish Detox, then they will finish it for him! Here are 10, terribly Photoshopped fake Detox album covers from the deepest corners of the internet. Viewer Discretion Advised: you will not be able to unsee some of these images.

10. Detox: What Could Have Been: Ah yes, if only. Feast your eyes upon this beautifully rendered, imaginary cover by Trid Tha Kid, giving only a fleeting glimpse of what could have been the album cover for Detox. Can’t you see, Dr. Dre? Can’t you see what could have been!?! THIS!

9. “The Walking Detox” – What will happen first, the undead apocalypse, or Detox? Be it the former, Zombie Dr. Dre will attempt to market and release Detox to the hordes of Z-Day, without worry of anyone leaking it to the now offline internet. Dre’s looking a little long in the tooth here.

8. Generic Detox – This one follows the post-millennial tradition of the “photo-of-artist-plus-fonts” album cover, used on best-selling magnum opuses like Mase’s  Welcome Back and Ja Rule’s Pain Is Love. Oh look, they used the 2001 font. Surely this is real.

7. “Xerox Detox” – Washed out photo of Dr. Dre, with slightly arched, crackling “Detox” text in red, and photocopied image of Southern California restaurant for the background. Platinum, bitch.

6. D.E.T.O.X.: The Acronym - How huge is Dr. Dre now? Everything black in this photo is his T-shirt.

5. Impact Detox – Whoa, Dre looks like he needs a detox for real here. Lay off the sticky-icky, greeny green. Doc’s orders.

4. SJoynson Presents…. Detox – We have to say, it’s a good thing that SJoynson watermarked the shit out of this potential Detox album cover. This way, Interscope can’t use it without his permission. Great thinking buddy.

3. Detox: Gateway Drug Edition – Ah that makes sense. The natural progression from Dre’s past weed smoking days would be to move on to heroin. Explains the delay, too.

2. Detox Is Eminem’s Album Now: Yo, what the hell is going on here? Seriously, look at this shit. Drug dealing goblins with backwards baseball caps. This is the internet clearly not giving a fuck at all.

1. Detox: Art Director Versus Artist – Imagine, if you will, that this were the real cover for Detox. The job-description handed down to the graphic artist might have read something like this: “We want a huge picture of the Dre’s face. HUGE. We want it so close, that the top of his head is cropped off. And really dark. So you can’t really see it, in a way. Then really big, we want the title of the album, which is DETOX: 2011: The Mixtape. But we want it in separate corners. Maybe the “Detox” part goes over his forehead, then the “2011″ part goes on his face, a little. Don’t even put Dr. Dre’s name on there. He’s a fucking icon, you peon. He doesn’t need his name on the cover. People know who the fuck he is! Jesus. Okay, then we want A LOT of marijuana leaves. A ton. I want a fucking Gucci Bag pattern of marijuana leaves on this thing. Just put them all over the place. Everywhere! Brilliant…. Oh, also, checks will be delayed 3 weeks. Sorry.”

This Parisian interviewer is beside himself with excitement in this interview with 50 Cent, about his line of SMS Headphones. While this awkward interview could have been edited down a bit, it does have some key reveals. Fif mentions that the Street King Immortal has been pushed back again from it’s release date of Nov. 13th, of which 50 suggests is “as good, if not better” than Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ and The Massacre.

Around the seven minute mark, 50 also speaks briefly about Detox, suggesting that a track called “My Life” was originally recorded for it, but will be used for Street King Immortal instead. While he is unsure of what the status is, 50 suggests that it could be “an EP, 5 or 6 songs”.

Jake One sits down with HipHopSite.Com to speak on his just released LP with Brother Ali, Mourning In America & Dreaming In Color, working with Dr. Dre on Detox, Freeway’s next album, working with MF Doom, and much more.

HipHopSite.Com: First off, what are you using to produce?

Jake One: Pretty much, the foundation of it is the ASR-10. Then I got a bunch of vintage keyboards and other gear, I used protools as well, but mostly the ASR-10.

HipHopSite.Com: I was kind of joking with you on Twitter about Detox, because there are a few tracks on Brother Ali’s Mourning In America, Dreaming In Color that kind of had that big, apocalyptic Dr. Dre sound, which got me thinking, “Damn, he had to have played these for Dre, like ‘yo, do you want this?’”

Jake One: (Laughs) The only one Dre actually really recorded to was “Only Life I Know”, but a lot of those beats were made just for Ali, so he didn’t actually hear them. He might have heard the beat for “Mourning In America”, but it was a different beat at first, so maybe the first variation of it. “Only Life I Know” is definitely something he cut vocals to, but I guess he thought he didn’t like it, so… (laughs).

HipHopSite.Com: What has that process been like, working with Dre on Detox?

Jake One: It’s been dope. He heard some of my beats, probably in like 2009. He cut some songs to a couple of the beats, and he basically offered me a song deal, so I became in-house. So I would just kind of send him ideas that I was working on, and we’d go from there. I was only in the studio with him one time, mostly just dong it from home, so I’d hear what they came up with if I ever made it down to LA. He’s one my heroes, so him liking what I do is enough for me.

HipHopSite.Com: So you ended up producing this track for Rick Ross’ album, “3 Kings”, with Dr. Dre and Jay-Z. It’s definitely one of the most talked about hip-hop songs of the year. Tell us about how that all came about.

Jake One: It’s funny because, I made the beat after hearing Drake and Just Blaze’s “Lord Knows”. I just wanted to make something with that vibe. Every once in a while I hear something like that I like – and it was kind of bugged out, because I had been sitting on that sample for a minute – so I ended up making the beat, and sent it down there. I think it was going to be for Kendrick first, but Kendrick decided not to use it. So Dre went to Miami to work with Ross and then I got a call that Ross was going to put Jay on it. I wasn’t even privy to all that shit, it just happened. It was pretty crazy, it just dropped, it’s big record. It’s ill to just go to places and just hear your shit playing all the time. It’s not something I’m used to. I went to New York and I was just hearing it everywhere. There’s a couple of songs I did for 50 maybe, but not like this.

HipHopSite.Com: So originally “3 Kings” almost went to Kendrick, and you recently collaborated with Kendrick on this track with “Scoe”, “Thank You”, which is a tribute to Dr. Dre. What’s the story behind that?

Jake One: It’s kind of funny, because I made the beat and didn’t even think of that angle, I didn’t have Dre in mind. So I sent it to Dr. Dre’s A&R, and he didn’t take it, but he put it to the side. So he manages Scoe, and they came up with the record. And then Kendrick got on there. It was done a while ago.

HipHopSite.Com: Did you have any work on Kendrick’s Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City?

Jake One: Nah, I didn’t do anything for his album. Before Section 80 came out, I gave him some beats to mess with, but we just never all the way connected. He was just running around after that, I don’t think I ever sent him any more beats after that. It’s funny because I probably listen to his shit more than anything, but I’m not sure I had the right shit for what he’s trying to do. I’m going to be anticipating the album just like everyone else. I definitely would like to work with him in the future though.

HipHopSite.Com: So back to Brother Ali, you guys definitely had a chemistry on Mourning In America, Dreaming In Color. He kind of has a style where he just gets on a beat and just rides it, but I felt you two were really in-sync on this album. What is your creative process with him like?

Jake One: I’ve known him for a long time, but we never worked together this much. I would send him beats, and he would come out to Seattle, and we would kind of cut like a demo version of something, and then we would decide on what we wanted to make sound tighter. We had 60 ideas like that, he just kept recorded. We just narrowed it down – there were some songs that I liked that didn’t even make the album – better than some of the ones on it.

The thing about working with him – and I’ve never worked with someone like that before – he is so concerned with what he is saying, that the music is secondary. And that is what is important to me, so we had a little tug-of-war on that kind of shit. I haven’t worked with anyone that works that hard at what they do. I was also one the first times that I made beats specifically for somebody, rather than making beats just to shop, or whatever. I didn’t want it to just be hard beats, because thats not his strength – he’s got different styles. Something like “Letter To My Countrymen”, I made specifically for him. Normally, I wouldn’t make a beat without a snare, but that’s just what it seemed like it needed to be. A lot of stuff like that. We took probably way too much time to put it together.

HipHopSite.Com: So you said you did like 60 tracks. Do you think we’ll see those tracks end up on other projects?

Jake One: I don’t know. He put out that mixtape last Valentine’s Day with some of it – and some of those beats were sold to other people, but there’s still a lot of ideas and songs that might get resurrected for something. I think he wanted to make a statement on this album, and I think he wants to ride it out pretty hard, so I’m not sure what the next thing is. Whatever the next move is, he needs to move on it faster this time. It’s amazing how much he sold his first week, given how much time there was since the last record.

HipHopSite.Com: So, are working on Freeway’s next record?

Jake One: Yeah, I think it’s being mixed in the next couple of days. I have like 8 tracks on there. He’s got some shit on there. Just Blaze is on it, Bink – pretty much what we want him to do.

HipHopSite.Com: One of our forum users, Freshman_Woes, asks “A few years ago, Jake One mentioned that he was working on an album with Vitamin D. Is that still in the works?”

Jake One: As with all things with Vitamin, we never finished. Some of those beats turned into other people’s songs. Like Freeway’s “She Makes Me Feel Alright” was for that. Also, we were just super-flagrant with what we were sampling, and he’s getting turned up on that shit, which makes me kind of scared to do it. We kind of had to go on the back-burner a little bit. A lot of it was taking real obvious shit.

HipHopSite.Com: Machiventa asks if there is a record with MF Doom still in the works?

Jake One: I’d love to, he’s just real elusive. Beyond elusive. He’s stuck over in the UK, I guess. He’s not even around America these days. I actually did a couple of joints with him, so we’ll see where those end up, but as far as a whole album, I can’t say.

HipHopSite.Com: Where do you expect those tracks to surface?

Jake One: I will probably use those for my album.

HipHopSite.Com: Tell us a little bit about that.

Jake One: Well, I’m maybe halfway done on that. Just waiting on people to send stuff back and that’s taking a long time. So I have so many other things that I am working on, so I can’t say when to expect that. The problem with me working on an album like that, is that I send someone a beat for my album, and then they want to end up using it for their project. And so then they are paying me, so how can I argue with that? So that’s happened a couple of times.

HipHopSite.Com: So who is on the album?

It’s the same cast of characters, and a couple of people you would not expect to be on my album at all. A little bit of everything. But like I said, I can’t even see the finish line. It was supposed to be out last year, but it just wasn’t coming together. I didn’t want to do another album with the same people, and I like a lot of these new rappers, and I want to have a lot of them on it, because that’s what I’ve been listening to. I’ve reached out to a ton of people that were excited to do it, we just didn’t do it. Part of that is being out in Seattle. I can’t just go down to the studio like, “let’s go to the studio tonight”, whereas if you are in NY or LA, people just fall through and you get shit done.

HipHopSite.Com: What else can we expect from you in the near future?

Jake One: There’s a couple of big ones, but I don’t want to jinx them quite yet. But I did a song for Game’s album that’s real dope, did something on Wiz’s new album, 50′s new album, Pusha T’s album. And I produced a lot of the new Mayer Hawthorne album, but that won’t be coming out for a minute.

HipHopSite.Com: Wrapping up, anything you want to add?

Jake One: I just appreciate all of the support on the Brother Ali album. Thanks for everyone who is supporting it.

Brother Ali’s album, ‘Mourning In America & Dreaming In Color’, produced by Jake One, is in stores now.

This may just be a ploy to drum up hype for Detox. Let’s hope.
]]> http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/11/17/slim-the-mobster-confirms-dr-dre-break-detox-release/feed/ 0 http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/08/12/nas-on-amy-winehouse-detox-video/ http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/08/12/nas-on-amy-winehouse-detox-video/#comments Fri, 12 Aug 2011 15:42:28 +0000 http://www.hiphopsite.com/?p=37349

Game delivers an alternate remix to Dre and Snoop’s Detox banger.

LISTEN: Game – “Kush (Lost Verse)”
]]> http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/06/03/game-kush-lost-verse/feed/ 0 http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/02/14/dr-dre-snoop-akon-perform-kush-grammy-afterparty/ http://www.hiphopsite.com/2011/02/14/dr-dre-snoop-akon-perform-kush-grammy-afterparty/#comments Mon, 14 Feb 2011 15:00:42 +0000 http://www.hiphopsite.com/?p=30570

Interscope’s after-party for the Grammy’s saw a performance of “Kush” with Dre and Snoop reuniting on stage. Expect a release date for Detox any day now.

In a recent interview with Conspiracy Worldwide Radio, Nottz opened up about his work with Dr. Dre on Detox. He speaks of a previously “finished” shelved version of the album, as well as in depth descriptions of songs recorded with Jake One, Busta Rhymes, and Game. Eight minutes of detail heavy info in the clip below.

LISTEN: Nottz on Conspiracy Worldwide Radio

Kendrick gives his account on what it’s like to work with the good DR. and how he found out the Dre wanted to work with him. Nick Huff Barili also asks Kendrick if he is going to sign to Aftermath and if he has any concerns about not being able to release his albums through Aftermath like a lot of previous artists not named Snoop, Emimem and Game.

We’re finally getting somewhere with Detox‘s release date, as a tentative date of February 2011 has been announced, NME reports. January is usually a dry month for new releases, and the 2010 year end is always cluttered with big name projects, so it’s highly likely that Dre will stick to the mellow late winter release schedule for the long-awaited LP. A video is currently being finished up for “Kush”, as seen above, which was just released on ITunes this weekend. NME also states that confirmed guests include Eminem, Snoop Dogg, Akon, Jay-Z, La Roux and The Game.

Damn, The Real kinda got in Dre’s ass on this one, no homo.

Here we are on the (supposed) eve of the release of Dr. Dre’s first single from his third and apparent final album, Detox, aptly titled “Under Pressure”, a collaborative track with Jay-Z. The internet has been ablaze the last few weeks with talk of the single, with everyone wondering what exactly it will sound like. Akon suggested that Dre would actually be going straight for the dancefloor with an uptempo club record, in a recent interview with the Associated Press.

“You’ve got some straight hardcore hip-hop guys actually moving into the dance realm,” Akon told the A.P. “And that’s shocking. When you’ve got someone like Dr. Dre about to do a dance record … that’s crazy. “It actually sounds great. He played it for me. I was shocked. So I was like ‘Wow, that’s dope. When the world hears this, they might go crazy.’ … When you’ve got the two worlds mixed together, clashing, it’s going to be a monster.”

But this is just one of many rumors surrounding the sound of Detox, and there is no proof that this is actually what “Under Pressure” is, or if the “dance record” Akon mentioned will even make the album. This is standard practice for Dr. Dre, who throughout his career has worked with numerous collaborators to help him construct the perfect LP. While he does use ghostwriters and co-producers, he also is a “producer” in the truest sense of the word, or even better, a composer. Other musicians and collaborators bring him the raw materials, and like James Cameron in the director’s seat, he arranges it all perfectly, and brings it together like no one else can.

So who is involved with Detox? Just about everyone. Naturally, we can expect to see the usual list of collaborators making definite appearances on the record – Eminem, 50 Cent, Snoop Dogg, possibly Game, and the already confirmed Jay-Z. Other artists that are rumored to have recorded for Detox include: (take a deep breath) D12, Knoc-Turn’al, G-Unit, Mary J. Blige, Devin The Dude, Marsha Ambrosious, Busta Rhymes, Warren G, Nas, Bishop Lamont, Ice Cube, Fergie (?) while each Ludacris, T.I., Drake, Lil Wayne, and Ester Dean have apparently helped out on writing duties. And let’s not forget co-production from No I.D., Mel-Man, Scoop DeVille, Boi-1da, J.R. Rotem, Scott Storch, Dawaun Parker, Hi-Tek, DJ Khalil, Focus, Mike Elizondo, RZA, and Mel-Man. And this is just what we have heard about – most of these collaborators won’t even make the final cut.

However, this begs the question, how can this possibly be good? Many of these artists had nothing to do with 2001 or The Chronic, so how can they make music that respects their legacies and doesn’t sound like every other record on the radio? Take for example, if Ludacris’s new rhyme style emulates Young Money (…punchline!), will Dr. Dre’s rapping sound like Young Money by way of Ludacris, complete with Conjure shout-outs? Scary thought.

Furthermore, with the current state of the music industry, Detox has to satisfy on all levels, with the new business model to create as many potential “singles” from an album as possible. We’ve seen artists like Flo-Rida and Lady Gaga murder it off the strength of one album, releasing 4 to 6 huge hit singles, which translates to endless single track and ringtone sales, something that will last years beyond the shelf space of the album itself. Best believe this has definitely been taken into consideration with Detox, which is one of the most important albums ever for Interscope, not to mention the music industry itself. Naturally, it would only make sense for Jimmy and company to make sure the most hit-making, sure shot people are somehow involved with this record, Fergie not withstanding. The single is called “Under Pressure” for a reason.

So how can it possibly be good? Because it’s Dr. Dre, and he’s a perfectionist. This album was announced in 2003, and scheduled for release in 2004. It’s 2010, and we still don’t have a street date. DJ Quik is quoted as saying that Dr. Dre has recorded over 400 songs for the album. Who else in this industry takes this kind of care when recoding an LP, not to mention keeping all the table scraps in the vault, rather than shitting them out for a mixtape? And while we have all been disappointed with Dre for pulling out of projects from Rakim, King Tee, Game, Joell Ortiz, Eve, and others, it says something about his obsession with quality. Obviously he felt these projects were not strong enough to see release, which speaks volumes about his artistic integrity. (Shit, and we loved the unreleased Aftermath King Tee album).

That being said, while Dre might be under an extreme amount of pressure to create the perfect album, we’re sure he’ll come through in the end. The Chronic proved this, 2001 proved this, and it’s likely that Detox will as well.