The year Nate Dogg stood accused of robbing our favorite Taco Bell, he signed a Bible for my little brother.
It was a very strange time.
We grew up in San Pedro, across the Vincent Thomas Bridge from the soon-to-be fascinating city of Long Beach. We loved hip-hop, but it felt very far away, because San Pedro is a town made up largely of Latino, Croatian and Italian immigrants, and hip-hop, in the early 90s, wasn't the melting pot of people talking about champagne that it has become today.
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We had been to Compton, home to gangsta rap, a couple of times when we took the wrong bus to the Del Amo Mall. But mostly we stayed in our quiet, boring seaside town, appreciating hip-hop from afar. Until something bizarre happened in 1992:
A bunch of really good hip-hop artists appeared in Long Beach, the next town over. Bigger, industrial, and scary, Long Beach felt like a real city.
Of all the new rappers, Snoop Dogg made by far the biggest impression. Impossibly tall and skinny, with a face that switched between a puppy's (his dad nicknamed him after Snoopy) and a look of total disgust with whoever he was threatening to kill (this was when he still rapped about killing people), he conveyed a charisma unlike anyone else.
As an added bonus, he had talented friends.
He and Warren G and Nate Dogg had started out together in a group called 213 that Warren G got his stepbrother, Dr. Dre, to listen to. Dr. Dre, as responsible as anyone for all that gangsta rap coming out of Compton, was impressed. He made Snoop his chief vocal collaborator on "The Chronic."
As Snoop put it on "Nuthin' But a G Thang," the album's biggest single: "Compton and Long Beach together, now you know you in trouble."
Snoop was an amazing rapper; Warren G was a solid producer; and Nate Dogg did something that no one else in hip-hop did credibly at the time. He sang.
For nearly the next two decades, he would be the go-to guy for artists ranging from Snoop to Dr. Dre to Eminem, when they needed a deep, catchy hook on a song that would also be smooth, solid, and a little chilling. Like a church baritone, not showy, just assured.
Sometimes he would sing hilariously filthy things that were delightfully at odds with that tone.
The year I went to college, 1993, Snoop Dogg released his solo album, "Doggystyle."
It turned out a whole lot of other clueless white kids liked Snoop Dogg, too -- especially the songs with Nate Dogg.
I remember dancing at a party with a very progressive, liberal-type fellow freshman girl I was incredibly psyched to be dancing with -- until "Ain't No Fun" came over the speakers.
