Today, Death Row Records is a cautionary tale of the meteoric rise and spectacular crash of one of the most profitable and successful record labels of the modern era. The name alone evokes images of a wildly dominant, formidable and equally sinister musical outfit headed up by a brazen and bombastic bully with gang ties and featuring a trio of Hall of Fame acts — Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg and Tupac Shakur — that spilled gangsta rap from the speakers on the regular.
But now that same gangsta rap label that sold more than 50 million records has been scooped up by a white “soccer mom,” and she plans to ride the back of its late-great megastar, 2Pac, back to glory and profitability, according to the The Wall Street Journal. But WIDEawake makes it clear: Suge Knight will have no part in the reincarnation of the legendary label. None whatsoever.
Lara Lavi, who heads up the Toronto-based WIDEawake Entertainment that now owns Death Row Records, is planning a number of high-profile releases in the coming months. Some of the acts never really got an opportunity to shine when Death Row was perched at the pinnacle of popular culture and initiated a music revolution.
The first release from the revamped label is Danny Boy’s It’s About Time. The Atlanta-based singer is remembered for recording classic tracks with 2Pac [“I Ain’t Mad At Cha,” “Picture Me Rollin’,” “Toss It Up”] after he joined Death Row as a fresh-faced 15-year-old.
“We are trying to do reach out to all the Death Row artists who never got their chance,” WIDEawake/Death Row President John Payne told Vibe. “A lot of people are not aware of Danny Boy beyond 2Pac. We have his participation, so that’s great.”
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| WIDEaweke’s Lara Lavi and John Payne |
But Payne, whose ties to Death Row go way back to when he was a studio engineer for Marion “Suge” Knight and Dr. Dre., says that’s just the beginning. In June, the Long Beach, Calif.-based rapper Crooked I, will drop his CD. Sam Sneed, the Dr. Dre collaborator on such classics as “Keep Their Heads Ringin’,” and “Natural Born Killaz.” is due out soon.
But the biggest bet is on the irreplaceable ultimate gangsta rapper with the revolutionary undertones in his rap reportoire, Tupac Amaru Shakur. Payne said he and his people found a shockingly high number of unreleased 2pac material and plan to release them in the fall.
Through all of that, there is the transcendent music that would be club-bangers if they were released today.
“The good thing about Death Row is the music has always stood the test of time,” Payne continues. “You can pick up albums like The Chronic and Doggystyle and still listen to them. But the problem with the label is people as well as the media have dwelled on the negative. It’s kept Death Row in a one-dimensional place. So in order to sell records, they pushed negativity when it wasn’t necessary because the artists were talented enough to let that speak for them. We would like to give Death Row its fair chance to be seen and heard correctly without the drama, murder or court cases.” –terry shropshire
