Snoop Dogg announced on social media that he has kept his promise to release the catalog of Death Row Records to streaming services. The albums include some of the classics made by artists, including 2Pac, Dr. Dre, and Snoop himself.
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Updated By: Kendall Parks (3/10/23 at 6:20 pm)
The “Beautiful” artist announced on Twitter that he has officially brought the Death Row Records music catalog back to streaming services which include Spotify, Apple, and more.
The albums will include fan-favorite classics such as Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, 2Pac’s All Eyez On Me, Snoop’s debut album Doggystyle, and many more. The Long Beach native and Gamma owner Larry Jackson candidly discussed returning these albums to platforms.
“I bought my first album at 11 years old, with my allowance money,” Larry Jackson said. “That album was Doggystyle. I was so worried about how explicit the cover was, that I hid it in my bedroom so my parents wouldn’t see it.”
“The album’s music and its provocative cover left an indelible stamp on I view hip hop,” Jackson continued. “It is with profound pleasure that we are now partnering with Death Row Records, the greatest hip-hop catalog of all time, and with my dear friend Snoop.”
Snoop also said it was “only right to bring the Death Row Records catalog back.”
“Especially [since] it’s the 30th anniversary of Doggystyle,” Snoop Dogg said. “It was important for me to get the business of the music right and take care of the creative forces behind it, before making it public again. The music we created is timeless and as relevant today as it was when we released it, and now the world is going to enjoy it for years to come, Death Row Back.”
The partnership also includes upcoming new albums from Snoop, and the new artists he will be signing to the Death Row Records label.
Snoop also announced he and Wiz Khalifa would do live shows headlining together on the “High School Reunion” tour coming later this summer.
Snoop Dogg has announced he would add Death Row’s music catalog to streaming services. In fact, TikTok and its distribution platform SoundOn recently launched its exclusive partnership with the “Beautiful” rapper as the first catalog reissue.
Updated By: Kendall Parks (2/15/23 at 5:25 pm)
Long Beach, Calif. native, Snoop Dogg, is now integrating the Death Row music catalog into the social media platform TikTok and its distribution platform SoundOn.
Last year, Snoop also said the catalog would be back on streaming platforms after he removed it.
“Since I took Death Row off of streaming almost a year ago, not a day goes by without people asking me to put it back up,” the rap superstar explained his decision to bring the music to TikTok in a statement.
“As the Super Bowl rolled around I knew fans would be looking for the music from our iconic performance in 2022. So I wanted to reintroduce the most historic catalog to the people. I reached out to TikTok to make more history, enjoy yall.”
The “Drop It Like It’s Hot” rapper was referring to the 2022 Super Bowl performance in his hometown Los Angeles where he performed alongside fellow icons such as Dr. Dre, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, and 50 Cent. The performance boosted the viewership by double digits.
Tha Doggfather artist concluded by saying he will also bring the music back to streaming services.
“And for the fans wondering, Death Row Records catalog will be back on streaming services real soon.”
Some of the albums from the label include Snoop’s own Doggystyle album, along with Tupac’s double disc album All Eyez On Me, the late Nate Dogg’s G-Funk Volume 1 and 2, and Dr. Dre’s The Chronic returned to streaming services on Feb. 1.
This also follows other records he sold included in the collection.
Snoop Dogg has plans to make his recently acquired Death Row Records the first NFT record label. He believes that the blockchain has the power to change the game in favor of the artists and fans. But there are serious questions as to the validity of that claim.
Snoop Dogg announced that he is the new owner of Death Row Records after acquiring the infamous record label in an undisclosed deal. He dropped the news to his fans during a live session on the app Clubhouse, saying that he would be revolutionizing the game in favor of the artist and the people who support their music.
Snoop revealed plans to make Death Row Records the first record label to release music directly to fans via NFTs on the blockchain, saying, “We will be putting out artists through the metaverse. Just like we broke the industry when we was the first independent to be major, I want to be the first major in the metaverse.”
Additionally, Snoop also teamed up with the blockchain gaming company, Gala Games, for the release of his new album B.O.D.R. (Bacc on Death Row), which was released on the blockchain as a stash box of NFTs in the Gala Music store. The album went for $5,000 on the metaverse— it featured one of the LP’s 17 songs as an NFT, as well as three exclusive bonus tracks.
“If anything is constant, it’s that the music industry will always be changing,” Snoop said in a press release. “Blockchain tech has the power to change everything again and tip the table in favor of the artists and the fans, and we’re going to be right at the front of the pack with this Gala Music deal.”
More and more hip-hop artists have joined the NFT craze, most recently Lupe Fiasco with his new NFT platform and Gunna who dropped $300K on a trendy Bored Ape NFT. With the growing push for more mediums of media to be put up on the blockchain and minted as NFTs, the question arises: When media is hosted on the blockchain, who really owns it?
And with Snoop’s new move to deliver Death Row releases as NFTs, new questions arise for fans and artists. When a record label or corporation hosts media on the blockchain, is it your media to consume and is it still the artist’s media that they’ve spent time and energy making?
The question of permanent-ability arises as any form of media that is on a blockchain is only there as long as that blockchain is up. If anything happens to that blockchain resulting in it being taken down permanently or temporarily, an “owner” no longer has access to that media or the blockchain.
Owning an NFT on the blockchain is similar to how we “own” music on Spotify or movies on Netflix – a subscriber-only has access to Netflix as long as they continue paying for that access and the Netflix licensing rights and technology servers are viable.
When a record label is housing and distributing its music as an NFT, the same logic can be applied and new questions arise. Who does the music creative belong to? Who gets the right to mint the music and who gets the profits when they’re sold? How will the creative properties be preserved when they’re put on the blockchain or will they only be hosted on the blockchain?
How will the rigging need to host the servers for the blockchain be maintained and what will the environmental or financial impact be for those who are not benefitting from the NFT collection, such as the astronomical load on the electrical grid from the mining and minting process? There are too many questions with not enough answers.
As hip-hop artists join the NFT craze, it appears that digital ownership is could tip in favor of the corporation or the owner of the collection — not the fan or necessarily the artist, as Snoop suggests.
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