Bush Snoop Dogg Doggystyle / I Am Other / Columbia Three stars
When we look back on 2015, one of this year’s musical milestones will be how the funk was put back into mainstream hip-hop.
Kendrick Lamar went for it hard on his stellar album To Pimp a Butterfly, inviting along George Clinton and updating the latter's p-funk sound. Now Snoop Dogg (aka Snoop Lion, Snoopzilla and, his real name, Calvin Broadus Jr) is getting in on the act.
Not that Snoop has ever been afraid of embracing his, ahem, more sensual side. He also dropped a major hint at this fresh direction two years ago with the album 7 Days of Funk, his collaboration with the Californian musician/producer Damon “Dâm-Funk” Riddick.
It makes sense that this record rekindles Snoop's previous marble-smooth link-ups with super-producer Pharrell Williams (Drop It Like It's Hot et al), but don't pick up Bush expecting to revel in lackadaisical rap flows – Snoop is straight-up singing here. Casual listeners might be surprised to learn that he's not half-bad at it, either, even when things get cheesier than a room full of fondue.
Funk has long been synonymous with, how shall we say ... "romantic" subject matter, which means quoting Bush's lyrics is hazardous territory in a family newspaper. R U A Freak contains more innuendoes than a Carry On movie, running the album's first single Peaches N Cream a close second.
It’s not all smut, however. Snoop pays timely tribute to some soulful forefathers, with guest appearances from Stevie Wonder and The Gap Band’s highly respected leader, Charlie Wilson, both of whom seamlessly blend into Snoop’s funky vision.
Elsewhere, Run Away is Gwen Stefani's most relevant cameo in recent memory, the whole thing bouncing off a beat that cries out for Justin Timberlake to schmooze all over it.
TI steps up to the mic on (the forgettable) Edibles, and he's not the only rapper invited to the funky party: Bush fittingly closes with a contribution from the aforementioned Lamar on I'm Ya Dogg, alongside Rick Ross, dispensing mouthfuls of canine wordplay and advising us to "freak like it's the '80s".
All great artists go through metamorphoses. And while so many of his hip-hop peers continue to plough the same old furrows, all credit to Snoop Dogg for refusing to rest on his laurels and blasting off in his funk spaceship.
aworkman@thenational.ae