A nu-metal band stole Dr. Dre’s crown. When 2001 landed on November 16, 1999, it sold 516,000 copies in its opening week and still came in second, because Korn’s Issues moved 575,000 that same week. The gap was 59,000 records.
It hardly mattered. The Compton producer’s second solo album went on to sell 7.8 million copies in the US by August 2015, more than double the triple-platinum run of his 1992 debut, The Chronic. It turns 27 on Monday.
The album that could not be called The Chronic 2
The title was a fight before it was a record. Dre’s first attempt at a sequel, planned in 1995 as The Chronic II: A New World Odor, was shelved when he left Death Row Records. Back on his own Aftermath label, he settled on Chronic 2000, only for Death Row and its distributor Priority to put out their own compilation under that exact name.
Interscope pivoted to Chronic 2001: No Seeds and printed teaser posters promising a summer 1999 release. Then Priority threatened to sue over any use of the Chronic trademark at all. Dre dropped the word and shipped the album as plain 2001, but left a small cannabis leaf beside the numbers on the cover as a wink to the name he lost.
A comeback built like a film
Dre had not put out a solo studio album in seven years, and he said the talk that he had lost his touch was his fuel. He described the sequencing in cinematic terms: “Everything you hear is planned. It’s a movie, with different varieties of situations.”
The cast was huge: 18 guest contributors, led by Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Xzibit, Kurupt, Nate Dogg and Hittman, with Mary J. Blige singing on the closing track, “The Message,” a song dedicated to Dre’s late brother. The credits also hide a twist: “Still D.R.E.,” the lead single, was written by Jay-Z.
Keyboardist Scott Storch, who had worked with The Roots, joined the sessions here and went on to become a hit producer in his own right. Production was handled mainly by Dre and Mel-Man, with Lord Finesse producing “The Message.”
The singles, by the numbers
- “Still D.R.E.” with Snoop Dogg: No. 93 in the US, No. 6 in the UK
- “Forgot About Dre” with Eminem: No. 25 in the US, No. 7 in the UK, and a Grammy for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group
- “The Next Episode” with Snoop Dogg: No. 23 in the US, No. 3 in the UK
Look at that list again. The lead single was the weakest US chart performer of the three at No. 93. The album sold on its own weight, not on one hit.
Kanye West has credited one deep cut, “Xxplosive,” with shaping his whole early sound, and said his beat for Jay-Z’s “This Can’t Be Life” was “a direct bite” of it.
Still on stage 27 years later
The songs never left the setlist. Dre and Snoop turned up at Jay-Z’s SoFi Stadium closing shows with Scarface this fall, weeks after Snoop Dogg turned 55 with a 22nd album out. Eminem, whose verse made “Forgot About Dre,” has his own anniversary this month: 8 Mile turned 24 after winning hip hop’s first Oscar for Best Original Song.
The RIAA certified 2001 six times platinum on November 21, 2000, barely a year after release. Its 27th birthday falls on November 16.
Further reading
Image: David Hwang, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
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