ThaFormula.com - First off, I just wanna say that this is an honor, and that in my opinion if it weren't for your tragic accident, you would have been the greatest MC of all time...

D.O.C. - Now wait a minute, what's up with this would have been shit? Don't count me out like that!

ThaFormula.com - Nah man, I'm sayin' at this point in time I feel you would have been the best and I say that only because you and Dre were one of the greatest combinations of all time...

D.O.C. - Ok, well thank you brother, and you know what I think man? I think you are exactly right, and I don't mean any disrespect to nobody, but I think you are absolutely, exactly right, and when I say don't count me out yet, don't let it be because my voice is gone that that takes that marquee away from my name.  We still working on me being the greatest of all time. It just may take a little while.

ThaFormula.com - I always thought that you wrote a lot of the material from the early Death Row days. Did you have a lot of input when it came to that?

D.O.C. - Well what I did was the same thing I do with these young guys now, which is that I don't persay write the shit, but I don't allow them to write bullshit. I listen with a loving ear, that means I want you to be the shit and everything less just ain't civilized.

ThaFormula.com - I always tell people that I felt the biggest tragedy in hip-hop, was the day you got in that accident and lost your voice. Hip-hop was robbed of what would have been one of, if not the greatest MC of all time?

D.O.C. - Well god works in his own time and he works in mysterious ways, so it must have been meant for me not to say nothing for these ten years, but for some reason I feel like talkin' now.  So I'm ready to talk, and I can rap a little bit. It may not be what it once was but these words still sting pretty heavily.  Although the vocal power ain't what it once was, it's still a lot of power in this raspy voice I got.

ThaFormula.com - I'd like to start from the beginning Doc, let's go back to the early years and let all those that don't know, exactly how it all started?

D.O.C. - Well N.W.A. hadn't really got together yet.  At least the group that the world knows as N.W.A. hadn't really all come together yet. When I got there everybody started finding there places. Everybody had their own individual skills, but Cube belonged to another group called C.I.A. at the time. Eazy was doing his own records at that time. Dre was just a producer, Ren was around and Dre worked with Yella.  There was another dude around called Arabian Prince. All those guys was working with each other. Everybody was doing they own shit, but they all worked together.  By the time I got there, guys really started taking that shit serious and they stopped fucking with Arabian Prince. Cube came from C.I.A. and left his other group alone. That's when we started doing work all together, but N.W.A. hadn't even really started working on it's material. We all spent all our time trying to put Eazy's record together.

ThaFormula.com - What did you do for the Eazy-E album "Eazy Duz It?"

D.O.C.- I wrote about maybe 30 or 40 percent of that record.  I wrote "Still Talkin Shit," I wrote "We Want Eazy," and more.

ThaFormula.com - You came from the South, how did you and Dre hook up?

D.O.C. - Well there was this dude named Dr. Rock who used to DJ with Dre at a club called the "Eve After Dark."  Well, Dre came down to visit this dude Dr. Rock because Dr. Rock had moved from Compton and came down here and got a gig on the radio. Well, when this rap shit started happening, Rock tried to put him a group together.  I was in the group Fila Fresh Crew.  Dre  came down and was visiting with this dude and ended up doing some beats at this dudes crib for us, and once me and Dre started coming together, dude was like "nigga you the shit," "If you come out to the West Coast, I guarantee you we will be rich." Well later on I found out this dude Rock was taking money, so I gave Dre a call.  To me it was all about the music. I've never been a really a street kind of dude.  I'm more of a thinker.

ThaFormula.com - And at that time it was all about the music and nobody was really thinkin' about being rich were they?

D.O.C. - Shit nah.  I think what Dre saw was my ability to help him make great records. Making a hit song for Eazy-E wasn't the easiest thing in the world. Eazy didn't have any rhythm, so it was hard to cross and besides I think Dre wanted to cross over his music so he could get it played on the radio. At that time they wasn't playin that gangsta shit on the radio. They wasn't trying to hear that, but if I could write songs for Eric that were gangsta, but not "gangsta," uh , I could have Eazy talkin' about all the gangsta shit in the world, but use words that don't scare white people. That's really all it was.

ThaFormula.com - Looking back, you had a hell of a vocabulary for coming out of a gangsta rap camp like N.W.A.?

D.O.C. - Sure, but I was a reader. I was always a reader as a young kid. I was never outside in the streets sellin' this doing that. I used to read books, that's what I did. I actually read books so that I could trick my parents into thinkin' that I was going to school and shit. But once I got to the West Coast, it was just such a thrill to be in California.  I had been to L.A. as a kid or young child, but as an adult I had never been to L.A., so my vibe was so great I was putting songs together in fuckin' 5 minutes back then. I can't remember one rap I wrote that Eazy didn't love, and muthafuckas in L.A. from Dre's relatives to Eazy's relatives to Cube's friends didn't love. Muthafuckas were like, "Doc you the shit!"  Once they came in like that it was hard for me to come back to Texas because Texas never showed me that kind of love, but from the time I got off the plane in California, them muthafuckas was like, "nigga you the shit."

ThaFormula.com - What happened after that?

D.O.C. - Well I was just a part of the team at that time.  See, to me there was no difference between Eazy-E, N.W.A. or D.O.C. There was just titles that you put on a record. Like in my heart of hearts, you can't have an N.W.A. record without me, but anytime you see anything about N.W.A. in magazines they will never mention my name, but I was a pivotal part of that scene.

ThaFormula.com - You had the dopest intro on the "Straight Outta Compton" LP, which was for the track "Parental Discretion is Advised." What type of input other than track that did you have on that album?

D.O.C. - Well whenever you heard Eazy rappin', that was me, and then I stuck my own shit in like when Dre was doing the court room shit before "Fuck the Police," I was in there at the end. But to me it was more about making Eazy sound like he the shit. That was my job, and I took that shit serious. After the N.W.A. record it was just my turn.

ThaFormula.com - Was there a problem with that? I always wondered if that wasn't one of the reasons that Cube left, other then money?

D.O.C. - Nah, Cube just had problems with Eazy and the money, and Jerry Heller was really Eazy's downfall in the business world.

ThaFormula.com - Was Jerry Heller really as bad as they made him out to be?

D.O.C. - Well I don't know if he was as bad as muthafuckas claim, but he was just a Jewish guy that was in a position of power as far as Eazy was concerned.  Eazy still had to sign the paper.  He still had to sign the check, but Jerry would convince this guy that this is the best move or that it is the best move, no matter what any of us said, Eazy was gonna do what the fuck Jerry said because he felt that the guy was right. He had taken him from just makin' money on the street doing what he was doing, to being a serious businessman and making great music. I mean he wasn't really controlling shit, but he was in Eazy's ear so tuff and Eazy had so much faith in him that I guess you could really say that to a certain extent, yeah he was. He had a lot of control over Ruthless, a lot more then any of us had. So when you think about when the money started coming and I'm sure it was more money and faster then Eazy had ever made working on the streets, but Eazy chose not to share it with those guys the way they wanted it to be shared. The way they wanted to be compensated for their hard work. So instead of this dude saying "well let me take a step back and try and fix this shit because this is my business," he took the street stance of, "nigga this is my shit, fuck you," "you can beat it if you want to." So that's what the fuck Cube did.

ThaFormula.com - Did this problem start before or after your album was gonna drop?

D.O.C. - Yeah, the problem happened before we even got off into my record.

ThaFormula.com - So when did the decision to do your record come?

D.O.C. - It was just a natural process. We'll do Eazy's then well do N.W.A.'s, then I'm next.

ThaFormula.com - Why wasn't Cube next, because it always seemed like he would be the next one with the solo album?

D.O.C. - Well, N.W.A. had music out. I don't think Cube was really trippin' on a solo album at that time. He wasn't sayin, "I want an Ice Cube record." He wasn't trippin' like that. He was happy in N.W.A. He just wasnt getting paid.

ThaFormula.com - Now I wanna speak on a rumor that has been going around for years. Is it true that you sold your publishing for a...

D.O.C. - for a watch and a gold chain?

ThaFormula.com - Yeah, was that true?

D.O.C. - Sure it was. I mean I didn't know what I was doing. I was a fucking 19-year-old kid. I didn't know shit about no fucking publishing and this and that.

ThaFormula.com - Did you sell it to Eazy or Jerry?

D.O.C. - I sold it to Eazy.  He took advantage.

ThaFormula.com - Do you think that he did that, or do you think that Jerry Heller was behind that?

D.O.C. - Nah, I think Eazy did that.  Eazy was always a money-hungry muthafucka. Eazy was a greedy one, and I was a perfect match for him because I'm a giving person.  Money don't mean nothing to me because I make great music.  Its in my heart and you can't keep that shit down forever.  I kept saying to myself, one day it will be my turn.

ThaFormula.com - So now comes your album. What I want to know is how was it recording "No One Can Do It Better" because that was the only album that I can remember where Dre produced it all by himself, without the help of any other co-producer or whatever. It was just you and Dre. This is the album I always tell people to explain to me when they say Dre can't produce by himself or that he jacks everybody's beats. There was no one to jack for your album right?

D.O.C. - Well, let me explain something to you and you can print this so your people will understand. I went through this shit with Daz and now they're going through this shit with Mel-Man. Let me tell you something. What Dr. Dre gives those young men, they can't give you enough money for, what that guy gives these young producers that are trying to come up. The only reason Dre even has anybody else in there fucking with him is because he's lazy. That's the only reason. When Dre is in the studio, that shit is coming out of his mind and none of these other guys are responsible for it and I was there from day 1, 'till fuckin' '94 or '95 when I had to leave. Then I came back because doing records with Dre is like going to school, because if you sit and you watch, and you look and you learn, the guy is teaching you how to make great records. Now with this new record I made, I'm only doing what Dre would have did, and I used my own judgment.  The one thing that Dr. Dre is missing now is D.O.C. and that's the same way that I would tell those young guys, hey that sucks!  I would tell Dre's big ass the same shit. Hey, I love you, and your the greatest of all time, but that's bullshit!

ThaFormula.com - So at this point in time there is nobody in there to tell him, "Hey Dre, I don't know about that beat right there?"

D.O.C. - That's right. Number one, there is nobody there that I think, and this is just my own personal humble opinion, there's nobody there that I think knows the difference between a hit record, or not, and even if they knew, they're going to get paid so they're not gonna tell him. Me, I never gave a fuck. You muthafuckas ain't payin' me anyway, so I might as well tell you your shit stinks.

ThaFormula.com - Now let's get back to your first album Doc, what was it like recording that album?

D.O.C. - Just fun man. That's the only word I got for that. The shit was so much fun because at that time when I moved to California, I moved at Dr. Dre's urging. Once I got there I had to stay with this dudes brother by Centenial High School for like a month or 2, and then Dre got his own apartment. Him and Yella got an apartment, so I spent all day everyday with Dre for those first 3 or 4 years, I was with this guy all day everyday. We slept in the same house, we ate at the same time.  We drove to work together in the same beat up little Toyota Corrolla.  It was the closest thing that you could have to a brother because we fought and argued like family. That's the kind of person I am. I'm a real southern kind of person, so if I have love for you and if something's in my heart, then I'm gonna express myself. There ain't no gangsta shit. I don't wanna beat yo ass, I don't wanna shoot you in your ass, or none of that shit. I just want you to think about what I'm sayin' and try to do right. At the same time, show business was around us and everybody was just blowin' up in they're own way, and you know how show business can really get muthafuckas' heads fucked up.

ThaFormula.com - Did every song recorded for "No One Can Do It Better" make that album?

D.O.C. - Yep, every song, and the "No One Can Do It Better" album was just me being me, and Dre being Dre. We had no plans. We just had fun and did the shit, and when we felt like we had enough, we quit. "How many is that?," "17?," "Yeah that's enough, fuck it, let's move on." He was ready to get back into N.W.A. mode.

ThaFormula.com - What made you do the track, "Beautiful But Deadly" and go down that avenue?

D.O.C. - Oh, that was Dr. Dre's idea. Traditionally I'm a East Coast rapper, so he felt what Run and them was doing back then, uh, well we felt that I could do that kind of thing. Crossover into a Rock n' Roll kind of  theme and not reaqlly skip a beat or lose any of my hardcore audience doing it. Because of the type of rapper that I was.  But it really wasn't straight Rock n' Roll because that's a old parliament song, and Dre is a  Parliament freak.

ThaFormula.com - What was your favorite song off that album?

D.O.C. - As a young man, my favorite song was "Doc and the Doctor," because I used to love to be able to holla and do my Run DMC imitation. My favorite song now is "Tha Formula."

ThaFormula.com - Likewise, which is why we named the site "thaformula.com," because what you were spittin' on that track was the truth, and pretty much summed up the formula to making real hip-hop?

D.O.C. - Now I will tell you how that song came about.  It's a funny story. Dr. Dre and Michel'Le went somewhere and they didn't make it back home till about 1:30 or maybe 2 o'clock in the morning. Now me I'm straight outta Texas.  I ain't got a pot to piss in, or a window to throw it out of, so when they go out I'm just at the house on the floor. Well I was sleepin' when he came back in, and he said, "nigga, I was on my way home and I got caught up in a day dream, it was me and you was bustin' a song called "Tha Formula" to a Marvin Gaye beat!" He went in there and he got a tape and he played me the Marvin Gaye song and he went in there and went to sleep. Well me, I stayed up from about 2 o'clock till about 5:30 maybe finishing that song and we did that song the next day. That's what I mean, me and Dre were really in sync. Like I go good with his ear. Not just his beats, I can hear the kind of shit that he hears, but still I'm able to hear my own shit in it.

ThaFormula.com - Well, I never heard anyone flow over a Dre beat the way you did on "Tha Formula" and I really don't think anyone ever will.

D.O.C. - Well I remember Mel-Man telling me one time that he asked Dre who was the best  to rap on top of his beats and Mel-Man told me that Dre said it was me, and I can pretty much believe that because I am one of  the few muthafckas' that loved, and I don't mean I like it as in when I hear it I wanna dance, but I loved Dr. Dre's  production. So that means when it stinks we need to fix it, because I love it. Not in the terms where it's something that I like, but it's something that I want to be great and I wanted him to be great. I always wanted Dre to be Quincy Jones. At least in this hip-hop thing, I wanted him to be Russell Simmons. I didn't want him to just be satisfied with being Dr. Dre, hit maker or beat maker. The guy has the potential to be huge in this world. I mean he's a smart guy with a good heart, and I think he's got the best ears in the business today.

ThaFormula.com - How about "It's Funky Enough?" That was a different type track at that time. No one had really done anything like that in hip-hop at that time?

D.O.C. - Well that was me sittin' at the turntable listening to a song called "Misdemeanor" by The Silvers, and I loved it. It was a funky little thing. It was the shit, but Dr. Dre said there is nothing I can sample. I'm not fucking with it. A couple of days later I'm back in the studio and I pull that muthafucka back out and I'm listening to it, and I ask him again. He said, there is not enough space or some shit, and that he can't sample the record so he can't use it. I let it go again. Well we came back in there, and I think it was like a week later, and I got the record and I was playing with it, and I had to beg this guy to make the fuckin' beat. He says "okay fuck it, I'll make it." He put the shit down and I was gonna write another rap to it, but the way he was clowning me behind it I said, "fuck it, Ill just put this rap that I got on it, then we can work it out if it ain't right." I had been drinkin' some beer, and smokin' some weed with Laylaw on the other side of the studio. So that when I got back inside the studio I was feelin' kind of good and the beat sounded like some Jamaican shit to me after Dre finished fucking with it. That was the reason why I rapped it the way that I rapped it, because it wasn't designed to be like that. I did that muthafuckin' song one time through, thinkin' that we were gonna go back and do it over again, and Dre was like "fuck that, that was a one take willy."

ThaFormula.com - Why do you think that doesn't happen any more man?

D.O.C. - I don't know man, but I seen it with Snoop. Snoop's was a one take willy, but his shit was all freestyle. He hadn't written nothing down. He just came in and started busitin'.

ThaFormula.com - Wait a minute...what track are you talkin' about?

D.O.C. - The song was "The Shiznit".

ThaFormula.com - That was all freestyle?

D.O.C. - Yep. The guy came in and he started bustin' and then when we got to the break, Dre cut the machine off, did the chorus and told Snoop to come back in. He did that throughout the record. That's when Snoop was in the zone then.

ThaFormula.com - What happened to that Snoop?

D.O.C. - Show business man. Once you make it to the top, it's very hard unless you got people around you like me who are gonna tell you when you suck. That's the key. I don't want this to sound fucked up man, but nigga I'm the key. I am the key. I don't make beats and I don't really write raps for muthafuckas' no more, but I can tell you this. When it comes to making classic records, I was the key to that shit there.

ThaFormula.com - It was nice to see you, Dre, and Snoop together in the "Still Dre" video and at The Up In Smoke tour, because it just brought back a lot of memories?

D.O.C. - Well when you get this new album, "Deuce" there is a little piece by Snoop Dogg where he basically says the same thing you said. He says, if it wasn't for me, there wouldn't have been no Snoop. He said he got as good as he got because we wrote together and I criticized his shit and made him change this and change that. So really the shit that you feel, there is a lot of truth in it, and in a minute everybody is gonna know it, but my concern now is Six-Too, El Dorado, and Uptite. Those are my young soldiers down here, and Snoop Dogg is one of the great ones of all time. He used to hold the spot that Six-Too is coming for.

ThaFormula.com - No doubt, Six-Too has an incredible amount of talent. How do you look back at the Ruthless and Death Row days, because to a lot of people think those were the some of the greatest times in hip-hop?

D.O.C. - Those were seven of the most violent years of my life. I ain't lying to you either nigga. I seen and did cause I told you when I was a younger guy I was kind of church kid you know. I had never really been involved in that shit, and those, uh, man! I could remember one time in Hollywood at Snoop's apartment. Daz and Nate Dogg are downstairs about to get into it with some niggaz, and Daz yells upstairs for me to come down and to bring my shit. Because at that time I was packin' a gun, knowin' I'm not fittin' to shoot nobody, but I'm still packin' it because Suge gave it to me, we was close back then. So he told me to come downstairs with my girlfriend. I came down there and you have to picture this because it's the funniest shit you will ever wanna see. I'm downstairs with a gun in my waist trying to break up a fight? Whew! That was some backward shit man! But that's life and I wouldn't change none of that shit.

ThaFormula.com - Did you see everything coming as far as the break up of N.W.A. and everyone heading their separate ways after your album dropped?

D.O.C. - Hell nah! Back in those days, uh, see I was in L.A. because of Dre. Now they never reported this and nobody ever says this, but Dre didn't leave Ruthless because Suge went and found him and showed him some funny shit in his contract, he left Ruthless because I asked him to. He left Ruthless because I wanted us to go and make our own label. Mine and his because we were the ones putting in all the work.

ThaFormula.com - And at that time Suge was your bodyguard right?

D.O.C. - Well at that time Suge was a friend of mine and they said the guy was my bodyguard because I got a 300 pound plus muthafucka following me around. But I never paid this guy to fuckin' watch over me. He probably just smelled money like everybody else and was kickin' it.

ThaFormula.com - So you asked him to leave and you guys were supposed to start your own label right?

D.O.C. - That's what it was all about and Suge had a lot to do with it because I was trying to start a label with Suge Knight. I had an office in Beverly Hills, but I was going through issues after that car wreck. I was trying to find myself and we felt like we needed Dre in order to make that shit work.

ThaFormula.com - How bad did it get for you after that accident when you found out your voice was damaged like that?

D.O.C. - Well you know what's funny dog? I probably really couldn't answer that question because it took ten years for me to even be able to admit that that shit caused me pain. I wouldn't have admitted it to anybody. I was like "ahh we'll just keep it going. That's what I was saying in my mind, but my heart must have been going through some shit.

ThaFormula.com - I still remember the day I heard about your accident. I remember hoping it was just a rumor and then I remember sittin' at home and watching your new video for "Mind Blowin" and thinking to myself saying, "I know it's just a rumor." Because in that video you looked good and it didn't look like anything had happened to you. Plus the fact that you made that video after your accident and that it was a remix.

D.O.C.- But that was the tripped out part though, because in the "Mind Blowin" video I was trying to show muthafuckas that that's what happened. In that particular video I was supposed to have had a crash and they had me on a gurney, then my spirit came out and then it went back in and said, "Nah you can kick it." In laymen's terms to me, that's what happened. I was close to death and I made it. So after the accident Jerry Heller, Eazy and them all thought I should keep going. "Whatever you do, don't stop making records." They thought I should make another one. Well I asked Dre what he thought, and he said that if it was him, he wouldn't make another record. He said they think your the king right now and that's how I would go out. I had so much faith in Dre, that when Dre said that then that was it. There was no more rappin' for me. Now I'm gonna use my writing ability to help us be the shit because that's really what I always wanted. It wasn't about no money to me. I just wanted to be the greatest. I wasn't trying to get rich out there with these guys, even though I did. I mean I wanted the fame and the fortune and all that, but I wanted when muthafuckas said my name, I wanted it to be unequivocal that this guy D.O.C. is the greatest. Now I'm a lot more humble and ill be happy with "he may be the greatest of all time." (Laughs)

ThaFormula.com - Sometimes we sit around and think about what you and Dre would have come out with after "No One Can Do It Better" if it weren't for that damn accident...

D.O.C. - Ahh man, that would have been the shit! It would have been the shit, but I would have had to probably fight with Dre a lot because I don't think he was really interested in the direction that I wanted to go in. He was only interested in making party songs that muthafuckas wanna get drunk and dance to.

ThaFormula.com - What were you trying to get into?

D.O.C. - Well like I said, I used to be a church kid. Like when you get this record, you will feel it. It's god in my record and its a gang of nigga shit. It's a gang of old N.W.A. shit. When muthafuckas hear this record, their first comment is that they knew I was where all of the old N.W.A. shit came from. That's everybody's first word. So it's dirty in that sense, but there are bits and pieces where I'm rappin' myself for like little soliloquies and it's a trip. It will make you cry, it will make you laugh, it will make you mad, it will make you wanna drive fast and then it will make you wanna get drunk. This album is a trip.

ThaFormula.com - When you guys recorded the "Straight Outta Compton" LP, did you guys record any more tracks then what was laid down?

D.O.C. - Nah, there were other tracks of N.W.A. There was actually one more D.O.C. song called "Bridget" that i think came out a little later. There were more N.W.A. songs, but they sucked.

ThaFormula.com - Do you think those songs would still sound bad today?

D.O.C. - Sure they would. They sucked then, they would suck now. Either the song is good or it's not. There is really no two ways about it. I'll tell you the mistake that a lot of these people in the rap business make today. They think because they got Snoop, DJ Quik, Ice Cube, and Mack 10 on a song that that song is the shit. Well guess what. If one of those guys raps sounds like shit and the idea of the song sucks, then your gonna have a wack ass song. I wouldn't give a fuck who was on it. Now that was my job and I held my nuts and I stuck them to the plate because I knew that these muthafuckas had so much respect for me that when I said it they wouldn't say shit to me.

ThaFormula.com - Well if anybody could say it, it was you.

D.O.C. - I was one of the muthafuckas that set the blueprint. That's what it was, and if you work with one of the muthafuckas that built the mouse trap then you can't come in there trying to build some shit tellin' me it's right when I'm tellin' you it's wrong.

ThaFormula.com - So did you know Snoop would be the next big thing after N.W.A. and you?

D.O.C. - Shit, it took me about 5 minutes. When Snoop came in, he was great. He had all the tools in him to be what he is right now, but he didn't have the desire and nobody was there to push him. That was my job. You have to be able to communicate with everybody, not just muthafuckas in Long Beach, and not just muthafuckas in L.A. So that means your subject matter may have to switch, your wordplay may have to change a little bit. You know just give us all something that we can love on.

ThaFormula.com - So how did it happen Doc, to where you had no involvement in Death Row business wise?

D.O.C. - Shortly after I had that accident, I started fucking with drugs. That's when I first started doing ecstasy. That was way back in '89. I started trying other things and it got to be a way for me to escape that pain. The white people at the top in the big offices, the ones with all the money, they were really only interested in Dre and Snoop. That shit got to be sort of painful even though they needed me to come and sign papers to get things done. It just started to feel like I was slippin', so I started getting more fucked up. I still seemed to make it to the muthafuckin' studio everyday and put my work in, but the more I fell, the more I slipped into that hole. These other guys, the more they started to rise up, nobody reached down to pick me up you know.

ThaFormula.com - The way you would have reached down and picked them up?

D.O.C. - Sure and it's funny because that's the way me and Six-Too ended up hookin' up. He was out there in the world fuckin' up. I'm not gonna speak on what the fuck he was doing, but I was fuckin' up and I saw in him the world. This guy could have the world if he wanted it.

ThaFormula.com - I feel you on that, I really wish he would of had a bigger part in the Chronic 2001 album?

D.O.C. - Well, and there in you will come up with another one of Hollywood's or the music businesses big downfall. They knew what you knew. What you know about this guy Six-Too, they knew it too. So to have him too much is to take the shine away from other muthafuckas who needed it. Which was any of the muthafuckas on that record god dammit! I wouldn't give a fuck who it was.

ThaFormula.com - Personally I would have loved to have heard more Six-Too. In fact, I think Six-Too and Devin are the most impressive MC's I have heard come out of the South in years.

D.O.C. - You god damn right and I'll tell you why. Because you're going through almost 13 years of what we been doing. That shit is old soup. You can't come tell me you gonna kill a muthafucka no more and shock me! Let me say that 99.9% of these guys even though they think the shit that they saying is coming from them personally and is different from anybody else, it's not true. It all sounds the same. It all sounds like I smoke a gang of weed, I fuck hoes, I'm the shit, and I'll bust you in yo ass. Now Six-Too man, it's hard to put a thumb on this dude man because he's unorthodox with his delivery. I guess if you had to put BB King and Snoop Dogg together and mash out a little kid, it would sound like Six-Too. Anyway, after we all came together and started this Death Row shit, I started sinkin' and they started rising. I started losing control, and they started going to meetings without me. I got to give these guys credit to say that they had enough respect for me to where they thought that I was in complete control and knew what I was doing. I fucked up a lot of Dr. Dre's parties and business meetings that I would go to fucked up and nobody still wouldn't say shit to me. They wouldn't say, "Hey Doc, you can't do this or take this muthafucka home. None of that shit. I'd be the only muthafucka in there drunk, "walkin' around with a sawed off shot gun and no shirt on." Threatening everybody and would nobody say shit to me man. So I'm just out there and I can understand to a certain extent why they would be like, "man we gotta handle our business." I ain't fittin' to let this muthafucka fuck mine off. But when I first started making this attempt to come back, none of those guys reached out to really help me and they had their own issues at the time, and I don't look for no nigga to help me because I could make it happen. But none of those guys really felt bad about none of my situations, except for Nate Dogg, let me take that lie back. Nate Dogg was the one person who continually through those seven years, always had great empathy for my situation and always told me that.

ThaFormula.com - Wasn't Nate Dogg in the military or something coming up?

D.O.C. - Shit, we were all in churches as kids. Hell Snoop used to sing in the church quire. And even to this point all of those guys are great guys, even Suge Knight. You know Suge didn't have to come to my hospital bed everyday. I wasn't paying him. He didn't know at that time we were gonna go make Death Row.

ThaFormula.com - Now what about that D.O.C.? I got to speak to Suge once before he went to jail. He seemed like a great guy and showed a lot of love. So I have always wondered, was he as bad as he was made out to be?

D.O.C. - Sure he was. He was a ding a long, that's for damn sure. Suge is the kind of dude to piss on your leg and laugh because he's 350 pounds and he knows you ain't really fittin' to do shit. He got sort of a kick out of that kind of shit. So the more power he got, the more outrageous he got. I believe that he's at a point now where he can't turn around and go back because he put himself out there as this huge Mafioso figure, which these dudes will do because they don't know how to express themselves any other way. But he's put himself out there as such a mafioso type figure that if he turns around then there will be somebody in his own camp waiting to do something to him. As far as I can see it that's the way that game works.

ThaFormula.com - So basically you feel that even if he wanted to turn back and make peace, there is just no turning back for him anymore?

D.O.C. - He really can't. Take into consideration Al Capone, he was at the height of "gangsterism." If he could have had a change of heart, they would have put a bullet in his ass so quick, you couldn't have smelt it and that's probably the same position old boy's in. He really can't play any other role but the one that he has created for himself.

ThaFormula.com - The stories told about Death Row with all the Gangstas in the studio, and how Ruthless it was, was it all true?

D.O.C. - Most of it. It could be kind of cheesy for me to say that my view is the right one, but the only reason that I stand up for mine is that I can stand up to you face to face and man to man and tell you I was Fucked up.

ThaFormula.com - Well you were one of the only ones that were never really caught up in any of the major beefs.

D.O.C. - For what? What they gonna fuck with me for. I'm not talkin bad about nobody.

ThaFormula.com - Well you were there since day one and I believe that if anyone was tellin' the truth, it would be the one that was there since day one and was never really caught up in any beefs.

D.O.C. - Well I got a movie thing happening right now and it's gonna bug muthafuckas out because number one, I don't fear none of these guys you know, so I'm not worried about it. When I get ready to do this movie thing and you can believe what I will tell you is a hundred percent truth. I mean all the shit that they did and all the shit that I did. Oh it's gonna be some shit dawg. It's gonna be some shit! I'm gonna tell you what the name is, but maybe if I'm lucky late 2003 or 2004 I'm gonna be puttin' this movie out and it's gonna be based around my experiences from when I met Dr. Dre in Dallas Ft. Worth Texas, until today. Were actually doing the end right now. It's a great movie because coming from Dallas, being sort of a church kid and getting caught up in a world of gang bangon and I dun saw shit that I knew nothin of.

ThaFormula.com - What are you looking at doing with the movie as far as distribution?

D.O.C. - Well actually, were talkin' to a couple of different people to see how viable it is to get it to a big screen, but I really just wanna get this monkey off my back. To get the truth off my chest.

ThaFormula.com - I always wondered how a real N.W.A. movie would have done?

D.O.C. - Oh, we gone see, and you know what's funny? I'm not gonna have any problems getting any of those guys to be involved in it. Any of them! That's the cool part about the position I'm in now. If I call Dr. Dre and ask him for some help, he's gonna say yes.

ThaFormula.com - Why is it that you get this respect from these guys that's very rare to get?

D.O.C. - Well, they know me. Those guys know me like nobody ever will ever know me. They knew me when I was in the front. We could have all took pictures and I would have been the nigga standing in the front, but I was comfortable standing in the back because in my mind, when they won, I won. Now Cube is one of the realest muthafuckas I'll ever meet, I already know that to be the truth because he told me when we were on this "Up In Smoke" shit. "When you need me, call me," so that's what I did and the nigga came right away. I mean he didn't take 5 minutes. He had to leave his movie shoot to come to the studio and give me 30 minutes and got back to work. Now you tell another muthafucka, "Oh 'I'ma call Cube and he'll be over here in 30 minutes, bust his lyrics and go back to work. He wil say, "Nigga what!!" That's Ice Cube man!

ThaFormula.com - That's love and loyalty man.

D.O.C. - That's what I'm talkin' about, and that's what it's really all about. See I never got a chance to finish the lessons. It's not really all about shoot em' bang bang, kill a muthafucka. We do need soldiers. Soldiers are very necessary, but we have to think. We can't be dumb. Sellin' see that's what got everybody geeked up. Eazy-E sold dope. That made everything lovely because that's all that really niggas could do, so they got off into making records about sellin' dope. Now everybody is a dope seller. Now what we never got a chance to tell these kids is that sellin' dope ain't cool. Sellin' dope ain't the shit, don't get it twisted. Just because niggas is rappin' about this shit and it may even sound great, but that's a record. It's like going to the movies and you see Arnold Shwartzenegger bustin' somebody in the ass may have looked pretty good, but that will get you put in jail. Nobody gave these kids that lesson. See when I lost my voice, that was my next lesson dawg. Well now after ten years, I finally got enough air back in my balls where I feel like talkin' and trust me when you hear this record, your gonna be like man! Matter of fact there is shit on this record that is so dirty, I know these muthafuckas are gonna be comin at me like, "Nigga how you gonna say some shit like that, hell naw get that off the shelf. You're ruining our kids. When they come at me with that conversation, watch how cool, calm, and collective as I sit back and converse with these folks. Oh, I got they ass. They fucked up( Laughs).

ThaFormula.com - Now let's get into the Chronic. You were in the "Nuthin' but a G Thang" video and everything seemed great at Death Row. Was it?

D.O.C. - Yeah, everything was great at that time.  I still didn't have anything of my own but I was staying at Dre's house and I had no money of my own, but I could ask Dre for 5 grand at any time and get it.  Matter of fact, I used to ask Dre for 5 grand every 3 or 4 days for about 2 years and would get it and then go spend it up on dope.  I don't know if Dre knew, but how could you not know?

ThaFormula.com - So how was it recording the first Chronic during that time?

D.O.C. - Man, "The Chronic" was the most fun that I have ever had on a record.  Snoop brought a vibe to the music that wasn't there before.  If there was levels to the game, let's say NWA stayed intact and I never had the accident.  The next level would be Snoop.  That was the only way you could come and totally fuck everybody up because when you the youngest you always gonna fuck it up, and he was the young one at the time.  Now let me get this point straight first.  I would have forever been Marvin Gaye god dammit.  When I opened up my mouth, it would have been nothing but jewelry, but when Snoop came, me being the type of person that I am I would have had so much love for him and put so much energy into his shit the same way I did that he would have had no choice but to be the shit. The same thing with this guy 6'-2".  6'-2" really has no choice but to be the shit because I'm right behind him and I'm not allowing anything else.  Any song 6'-2" does, I'm producing it.  All of the shit that you have heard.  I went here and grabbed a beat from this person and that person, then I brought the beat back home and I got in the studio with this dude and we started punching out songs.  6'-2" is not allowed to be fucked up right now. I'll give him a good 5 or 6 years and then when he gets ready to make his own records.  If he hasn't learned how to make great songs by then, then you will start hearing some shit where it ain't as good.  Same thing with these other guys. I mean I'm not gonna say nobody's names and put them out there like that, but you know who I'm talkin' about and what I'm talkin' about.  There is a difference between what you were doing at this time and what you doing at this time and it ain't just skill level.  Your skill ain't went no where.

ThaFormula.com - Well as a fan, I do have to admit that I miss the old Dre and the old Snoop.

D.O.C. - That's right, I miss the old Snoop too, but in Snoop's defense, your music is a reflection of what's going on in your world.  So if your congested and there is a lot of shit around you and it's hard for you to get together and really make that magic then it's gonna be hard to do, and Snoop when he made magic, he had me and Dre.  So it's gonna be hard for Snoop to go and make that magic without me and Dre and it's really gonna be hard for Snoop to make that magic even if he had Dre without me there because there is always gonna be a piece missing.

ThaFormula.com - During the making of the first Chronic, who all was in the studio at that time?

D.O.C. - Oh, we all were man.  We were there everyday and there is no better place to be than the studio.  That's where all the weed at.  That's where the drinks is at, and niggaz is doing they thang.  Besides, I took it very personal that these guys wouldn't make bullshit around me.  I remember when Dre first started making the beat to "Dre Day."  He had a lot of shit missing and it was certain things that he was doing and I was like, "that sounds like a load of shit."  He says "OK we'll wait till' tomorrow." By the time I got to the studio the next day that muthafucka was bangin.'

ThaFormula.com - Alright I got a good one for you.  Explain the reasons behind the Jimmy Z album, and the Tairrie B album?

D.O.C. - Ahhaha!!  That was Jerry Heller's great idea along with Eazy -E's futuristic sort of vision I guess.  But really that was probably Jerry's attempt at getting Eazy to put his money behind crossover acts that could make him money.  Knowing Jerry Heller, he probably had a piece of each of those acts.

ThaFormula.com - Did Dre want to do those projects?

D.O.C. - Hell Nah, man.  Dr. Dre didn't wanna do any of that.  Well, let me take Jimmy Z back.  Dre is a musician so he may have wanted do get in there, but I couldn't see so I spent very little time around him when he was doing that stuff.  Tairrie B? Nah! She was sorta a primadona in the rap world but Dre is not into working with muthafuckaz that ain't good. If you will notice, Dre has done 2 albums on very few people.  I think he did 2 on Eminem, I think he did 2 Chronics and 2 NWA records.  Everybody else only got one.

ThaFormula.com - Is that by choice?

D.O.C. - Sure it is, and this is Dre talkin' when I talk.  He said to me the hardest thing to do in the world is to make a second album on a muthafucka because once you make a platinum album on somebody then they get full of they own oats.  Then it's all about they wanna do this and they wanna do that.  But like I said before, when you're in the studio with Dre, that shit that's on tape is what's in his mind, and that shit used to piss me off. I'm talking about ferociously when these guys would come and tell me Dre's stealing beats. As a matter of fact, I remember when I went to do this Shyne video in New York for "That's Gangsta."  Puffy was having a meeting with all his people, which is something that Dre didn't do, which I thought was the shit on Puffy's part lending an ear to people around him and giving them a forum to speak to see what they thought.  Anyway, it was they're understanding that Mel-Man was behind a lot of the shit going on over there.

ThaFormula.com - Yeah, that's what a lot of people seem to think.

D.O.C.- Well, me being me, and me having a couple of little drinks in me at the time Ha Ha!  I felt it necessary for me to break up there little meeting and tell them no that's not the truth.  If you wanna know what's popping, ask me I was there.  Dr. Dre does that.  Anything you hear over there is Dr. Dre.  Even if Dr. Dre left the studio and allowed those guys to make their own records, part of that shit would still be Dr. Dre and believe me that's only the good part.  These guys know nothing about making great beats and have very little idea about making a great song and wouldn't know a hit if you took "Thriller" before it came out and smacked them with it.

ThaFormula.com - So tell me what exactly did Yella do for NWA?

D.O.C. - Yella was sorta the technical kind of dude.  He understood the machines that these guys worked on.  He knew them backwards and forwards. He was great with the tape machines, drum machines, and boards.  I'll put it to you like this. I considered myself to be another pair of ears in the studio when Dre was working.  Well, if I was another pair of ears, then Yella was another pair of hands. It's hard to make a great record by yourself man.  There will always be at least 5 great musicians together to make a classic record. That's what we had with NWA's records, that's what we had with the first Chronic record.

ThaFormula.com - Then what about the first D.O.C. album?

D.O.C. - Well, me and Dr. Dre, were an anomaly.  Like Dre could have made a whole beat record with no guitars, no bass, and I could have made raps for all those beats and still would have made a great record. What Dre does is make shit that you could see in your head when it's playing.  He knows how to bring drama.  He knows how to take it away and leave it all up to the artist.  He knows how to sometimes just make it quiet.  I mean that dudes pretty god damn good.

ThaFormula.com - After the first Chronic dropped, did you see things starting to come to an end or not?

D.O.C. - Oh sure I did.  See the shit that they were doing was unnecessary and sooner or later that shit is gonna catch up.  The drug shit had started to get kind of old.  In '94, I asked Dre what's up with me rappin'. I had written a song and he said you should let me put that on this next record and it really pissed me off because nobody was really givin' a fuck about me.  I told him what about me muthafucka, I wanna rap to.  I wanted to do something, but they had regulated me to comic relief.  I'm a damn fool anyway.  I'm a natural comedian so that's what I had been regulated to.  I was the comic relief on the album.  

ThaFormula.com - So Dre said no about you rappin then?

D.O.C. - He didn't think that you could make a good record with this voice.  So that's when I left out of there.  See me and Dre is like a big brother, little brother thing and when the big brother piss his little brother off, then his little brother is gonna number one, take his shit and run with it, which I did.  "Heltah Skeltah" was really a Dr. Dre record that he was starting to plan on working on that I had actually already started writing lyrics for, and one of the songs that he was trying to takeaway from me was a song that he wanted to put on "Heltah Skeltah."  So I was like "fuck this shit," went to Atlanta and recorded the album.

ThaFormula.com - When you look back at that album now, what are your thoughts on it?

D.O.C. - I think that the album was as far as hip-hop records are concerned not a great record.  There is merit to the record because of who it is and because of the shit the dude done went through trying to get his shit done, but I didn't go buy it.  I'll put it to you like that and if I wouldn't go buy it then it ain't really happening.

ThaFormula.com - Do you think it was a mistake when you look back at it now?

D.O.C. - Hell nah, I needed money.  I had no money.

ThaFormula.com - So did the album end up doing alright?

D.O.C. - I think it ended up selling 290,000 copies.  I had some real strong D.O.C. fans out there that I hated to bug and jack them out of their 16 dollars like that.

ThaFormula.com - You know what Doc, even if you were to do a show and you were lip synching, I would pay for that shit.

D.O.C. - Well I'll put it to you like this.  I haven't tried it yet.

ThaFormula.com - Man I would pay just to see you on stage perform the songs I never got to see you do as a kid?

D.O.C. - No shit!  You know what that really fucks me up, but I am gonna trip you out.  You just gave me one of the dopest ideas I ever had.  I gotta do it man.  I know it would be the shit.  That's great, thanks a lot man.

ThaFormula.com - Now back to the first Chronic LP.  How do rate that album?

D.O.C. - The dopest hip-hop record of all time.  "Straight Outta Compton" could have been the greatest, but it was so raw and hard that it didn't give you no time to fuckin' party and shit.  With "The Chronic" that's all you did and you never knew what was coming next.  With all the NWA records, after a while you kind of got an idea of what was gonna happen next.   

D.O.C. - The same as always. I wrote the songs that made those niggaz sing. That's what I did. Also Kokane had started coming around then. Above the Law was real deep into everything at that point and I started writing more for Dre and Ren, but I wrote everybody's shit by then.

ThaFormula.com - What album do you think was more enjoyable to record, "Straight Outta Compton" or "Niggaz4Life?"

D.O.C. – “Sraight Outta Compton.” “Niggaz4Life” wasn't as much fun because they was to busy trying to prove that they were just as good without Cube and that took a lot of the fun out of the shit and the money was all fucked up. Some people had money, some didn't. Once Cube left really the energy was gone.

ThaFormula.com - Do you remember a few years ago when you were on Eazy-E's radio show with the Dogg Pound?

D.O.C. - Yep, I remember that. They was on the radio talkin’ shit and Eazy said something that was a lie and I was sitting right there listening to the shit so they handed me the phone and I let him have it which is what I do, but it was just really fun to me. It was no big deal, I wasn't really trippin’ with the muthafucka, I was just jokin’ and laughin’.

ThaFormula.com - How serious was the beef between Death Row and Ruthless?

D.O.C. - Wasn't very serious to me. It was pretty funny if you ask me. But just like any other saga, these guys they started believin’ the hype. They wanna gangbang on records and all that old kind of dumb shit and at that time I couldn't really say nothin’ cause I was probably doing the same shit.

ThaFormula.com - How many songs did you guys record for the first “Chronic” that didn't make the album?

D.O.C. - Shit, maybe 2 or 3. Sometimes niggaz would record a whole bunch of songs and record the best ones. It used to be like that early in the days, but if you were gonna do 19 songs on a record and by the time we get to 21 we pretty much done figured it out.

ThaFormula.com - When exactly did the drama start to kick in?

D.O.C.- Well there was always drama around our house, but the bigger that people started to get the more the money started coming into the picture that's when shit started getting fucked up. None of those guys really knew what they were doing. They didn't know how to accept the money. They didn't know what to do with it when they got it. Suge's wife was Snoop's manager. She was probably taking the guys money and it was just all kinds of crazy shit going on. The bigger Snoop got and when muthafuckaz started losin’ control of Snoop, then you could see it wasn't gonna last that long. After so long Snoop would be like “man fuck this shit and I'm not havin’ this shit,” cause he's the star and he was tired of being told what to do, where to go and shit like that. It's hard to have a company run by a bunch of young cats who don't know shit about business. You will have a lot of muthafuckaz just trying to grab they balls. You can't have a great business if all of your business practices are gangbang oriented because there is no loyalty among street niggaz like that. I wouldn't give a damn what they told you.

ThaFormula.com - So during all this what were you and Dre doing?

D.O.C. - Well Dre was living good. Dre was the shit. He was bringing all the shit to the table so he's getting all the pussy, he's getting all the money and he's getting the 5 mics. Me, I'm with Dre. Wherever he was at, that's probably where I was at.

ThaFormula.com - Were you still fucked up on drugs at that time?

D.O.C. - Pretty much and that lasted from about 1990 to 1997…

ThaFormula.com - Wow! 7 years man?

D.O.C. - Yep, and I'm not your classic dope fiend muthafucka. It's like drinkin’ man. I don't have an off switch. Like some muthafuckas can drink and they get a buzz and they cool. Me, Im gonna drink until the bar is closed. There is no good way to put it. I’ma be in that muthafucka drinkin ’ till either I pass out, there's no more liquor or I ran out of money or some kind of goofy ass reason like that, and that went for anything else. It wasn't that I was addicted to it. It was just shit that I did to get away from feelin’ fucked up and I didn't have a stop switch. So it was off and on for about 7 years. Playin’ games here, playin’ games there, and I met 6’-2” in 97 and that's when I started making sort of a turnaround.

ThaFormula.com - When exactly did you leave to do “Heltah Skeltah?”

D.O.C. - I left L.A. at the end of ‘94 because I wanted to rap and Dre didn't see it.

ThaFormula.com - Do you agree with Dre now when you look back at how things turned out with that project?

D.O.C. - Well that's a yes and a no answer, because if you’re Dr. Dre you can take “twiddle dee” and make a hit record. You’re Dr. Dre god dammit! There’s nothing that you can't do in a studio, so if it was in your heart to make a hit record on me, you would have done it. You would have found some kind of way to do it. When you think of the old D.O.C., it's probably best to leave it like that, but you know when you think about D.O.C. the person, the man that's still breathin’ right now, still has music in his soul that he has to get up out of him, then you want him to get that shit out.

ThaFormula.com - So you made the move in ‘94 and went where?

D.O.C. - I went to Atlanta Georgia. I started staying in the house of my homeboy MC Breed and I started helping him work on a record. The record was called “The New Breed.”

ThaFormula.com - It's funny how that album turned out to be the best album he ever recorded and had a sound similar to the Chronic.

D.O.C. - Yep. I mean the formula goes where I go. You took 2 of the major components from the Chronic days with me and Colin Wolfe, and moved them over here and that's really what it was. Colin was a musician so Dre would say play, and Colin would play. Sooner or later he would come up on a couple of chords that we all liked so, uh, I'll give you a perfect example. “Deep Cover,” the guy was just playin’ the 4 notes and Dre said “wait a minute keep playin’ that.” That baseline was Colin Wolfe's shit. Dre added the drum the piano hit and that was it, that was the song.

ThaFormula.com - You know I remember that "Gotta Get Mine" video with 2pac. That was a classic Breed track right there?

D.O.C. - Yeah that was a good song. I was in that video too. That was at Andre Rison's house before it got burnt up. The dude had a good record man. Now MC Breed who was a good friend of mine, has the ability to make classic rap records, but chooses not to.

ThaFormula.com - Why is that?

D.O.C. - Breed is just one of those dudes man that no matter what you tell him, he is gonna do whatever the fuck he wants to do and it's hard to make a classic record when what's going on in your head is the only thing that's coming out on record. You have to be able to be flexible and know that the hardest thing for an artist to ever do is to listen to his own shit objectively because it's his shit and he's gonna love it no matter what. He's gonna want it to be good, no matter what, when in actuality it could sound like a load of shit. Breed is probably the closest thing I got outside of Dre to a brother with me, where me and this guy will argue and I mean argue even to the point where he thought Pac was the coldest and I thought Biggie was the coldest.

ThaFormula.com - How do you feel about the hip-hop being done by artists nowadays?

D.O.C. - Most of the hip-hop I hear now sounds like it's been dipped in shit. It used to be that there was some dope rappers, a good amount of cool rappers, and a little bit of garbage. Now all there is, is a bunch of cool rappers and a shit load of garbage.

ThaFormula.com - When do you feel this change came about?

D.O.C. - When Death Row exploded it was dead. When Dr. Dre left Death Row it died. It may have died even before that. It may have died shortly after Snoop Dogg's first record came out. In all fairness I have to say after the “Above the Rim” record, that was probably the last little bit of last “G-Funk” shit. When you got to the Dogg Pound record, it had started changing again. He started leaving the streets even more then.

ThaFormula.com - Did Dre have any input on the Dogg Pound album?

D.O.C. - Sure, you could hear it in the music. You have to make a record on them. There not gonna come to the table with songs that you could use, so you have to manufacture records with these guys, and Dre was probably tired of dealin’ with all them muthafuckas and tired of coming to work with 50,000 gang bangers in the studio. He was probably sick and tired of that shit, so you can tell the music stopped being hard and started being softer. He started having pretty singin’ in every piece of the shit. Even though niggaz was talkin’ about murderin’ muthafuckas, the music sort of made you wanna go to sleep.

ThaFormula.com - What are your thoughts on someone like Devin the Dude, ‘cause he reminds me a lot of 6’-2”?

D.O.C. - Devin is a 6’-2” guy, which means his talent is so genuine it would be hard for you not to like Devin. I cannot wait until I can get this “Deuce” project up & runnin’ so that I could get back to finishing 6’-2”'s album so I could put him and Devin on a song together. I can't wait for that shit, and I just wanna talk on that record shit! Like when Snoop was writing “G Thang,” I asked him “whatever you do, just pick a rhyme in that muthafucka, and make sure it's at a place where it will have a great impact and put my name in that muthafucka.” That's my way to keep myself up in the game. See this is how you know that Dre has real love for me because he finds me and tells me, “you know you gotta come do this.” He told me that. “You gonna have to ride out in the back seat with us when you get in the car, you know that right?” I was like, “yeah, I know, I'll be there.”

ThaFormula.com - See and that's what's killin’ the game now also DOC. There’ s no more loyalty in this game anymore…

D.O.C. - You just said a mouthful just then. I used to always wanna be part of a group like Wu Tang, and then I found out that those don't exist. It's always one muthafucka making money and everybody else is figuring out how they can be like the muthafucka making the money and you can't win like that. Animosity, greed and envy will destroy any relationship. But I'm glad all of them are making money.

ThaFormula.com - What was your relationship with 2Pac like if there was one?

D.O.C. – Well, and I got to be honest cause that's the way I do it. In the beginning back when the guy was with Digital Underground, he was a very quiet dude. He never really spoke. I saw him a couple of times and I thought he was a cool young guy. The last couple of times that I saw 2pac, we weren't on great terms at all. Him and Breed was the shit, so when I was at Breeds house and he came to visit Breed especially for this record and shit. The guy was clownin’ me. He was I guess trying to make me feel that I was weak by tellin’ me that those guys in Los Angeles had ran me out of town and things like that. I think the guy was just 2Pac’n it at that time. I like to tell muthafuckas that I was 2pac before 2pac was 2pac, meaning I went through a period shortly after my record was released and shortly after that accident where I would go into a club be drunk push bitches down, slap them in front of their niggaz. You know I had a big ass 300 pound plus nigga with me. What the fuck is you gonna do. I did that for attention, but that wasn't my personality but I felt like I needed to do that for a while. I think 2pac had started to get into his character after that movie that he had did. I think that that started to play a little bit on his psyche and the deeper he got off into that character the harder it was for him to get up out of it. Now that's my humble opinion because I can't see why a guy in his position would wanna go to a club and just start pushin’ muthafuckas down out of the blue. I like to call it Mr. entertainment. When Mr. Entertainment get on your back, you will do things that you had no idea you would do. It's enough to fuck a young black man up!

ThaFormula.com - I always thought the way you would flow over a beat was incredible man, I mean you rode that beat like no MC I had ever heard before. The way you would start and stop and cut the corners on the beat at the drop of a dime was crazy...

D.O.C. - That's right brother. Timing is everything and it was a lot of hard work. I really, really loved to write as a young guy. I'll tell you when I knew I was the shit. When I went to California and we were doing NWA's record and I used to rap for these guys all the time. You know that little fast pace thing I used to do when I would speed up slow it down and speed it up. I used to call that stutter steppin’. Well I knew I was the shit when I heard Cube use that in a rap. It was on “Parental Discretion.” When Cube did that I knew I had to be the shit. Cube just took my definition and applied it.

ThaFormula.com - When you look back at all the great times you have had, do you ever see times like that happening again?

D.O.C. - Sure man. Those kinds of things never go away. Those are youthful times. I don't see them happening more or less for me in those terms, but I see them with these young guys. The cool thing about when you’re working with me is that I have a complete understanding of what the formula is of great records. I know what it's gonna take and usually a big portion of that is having fun. A lot of muthafuckas don't know that. That havin’ fun is probably one of the biggest parts of making a classic record. Being able to sit in that muthafucka stress free and just get fucked up and kick it. Shit tends to usually just come out. Let these guys have their fun and find themselves, and I'll sit back and be the guru now.

ThaFormula.com - What were your thoughts on the Snoop album "Doggystyle"?

D.O.C. - Well by that time Snoop was coastin’. Snoop was on cruise control, all cylinders were clicking and you knew what it was gonna be. If I remember right, they were playing this guys album on the radio way before it came out. That's how bad muthafuckas wanted it. Playing it will all the curses and finding ways to bleep that shit out. I remember the night that that niggaz shit came on sale. There was lines around the block in Century City. It was a great follow up to “The Chronic.” It was a classic follow up to a classic record.

ThaFormula.com - What were your thoughts on the way the Source seemed to be hating on the West Coast at the time by giving that album 4 mics?

D.O.C. - Well let me tell you something man. They gonna always hate on the West Coast. That magazine is an East Coast based magazine, so that's like askin’ the kids at North Hollywood High School what's the best High School in the city. You already know what they are gonna say. So you can't really look that deep off into it. They can't give it 5 mics. I remember not too far before that they had just given 5 mics to “Illmatic” and they gave 4 1/2 to “The Chronic.” I remember what they said too. They said they liked every song, but “Little Ghetto Boy” and they said that that song could go but everything else was cool. So we weren't trippin’ off of none of these publications, if the street knows what' happening. But you will probably never get a New York based magazine to say that anybody but a New York artist could ever be the best, and anybody but a New York artist makes the best music.

ThaFormula.com - Did you ever hit the streets with Death Row when they would go out to spots like The Source Awards?

D.O.C. - Whenever those guys hit the road I was at home because I didn't feel comfortable. These are guys going out in groups. Snoops got his group of gangbangers, Suge always had his group of gangbangers, and Dre always had his group of security muthafuckas. I didn't have the avenues or the money to be able to have muthafuckas with me to make me feel secure, so I never went. Anytime you put Suge's group of niggaz and Snoopy's group of niggaz together, it's gonna be some shit.

ThaFormula.com - So was there a lot of in fighting between Suge's people and Snoop's people?

D.O.C. - It was just a lot of fighting period. It was just whoever was around and whatever made it to the table that day.

ThaFormula.com - What happened after the release of “Doggystyle?”

D.O.C. - I left not too long after that. I signed with Giant off of some stuff they heard that I did. They were convinced that I could make a record. Though he was convinced, I wasn't. I took the money and did a half assed record. Spent a gang a money getting’ smoked out and blown out in the studio everyday in Atlanta, Georgia payin’ them strippin’ bitches. So when the record came out, uh, that was a hard ass records for me to make. I had lost all my tools. I didn't have Dre's ears, I didn't have a voice. I didn't have anybody with me that really had any kind of skills along those lines. I really had to put that fuckin’ record together just as best as I could. All I had was me, a name, and I knew Erotic D could produce records, but I knew it was gonna be hard for us to produce a record with me cause I didn't know how to do it. If you listen to “Heltah Skeltah,” it's still me trying to rap like the “No One Can Do It Better” Doc. Trying to push those words out with force and energy and power and with this voice you can't do it like that. With this voice you have to be really cool and you have to rap more like snoop.

ThaFormula.com - Why did you use “Heltah Skeltah” as the title of your LP when you knew that Dre & Cube were gonna use that on their collabo album that was supposed to drop?

D.O.C. - Well that's why I used it. Because Dre pissed me off, that and just some fighting shit. If you go back to a couple of those magazines, he called me a “punk ass nigga” and I probably called him a “bitch ass nigga.” Wait a minute this is the funny shit. First the guy says, “man that's some punk ass shit he did, he a bitch ass nigga but I love him. I'll never do records with him again but I love my nigga.” I remember back in the past I did a couple of little shady things that niggas do to they niggaz. Probably trying to chase behind bitches he done fucked and rub on they booties, but other than that I never did anything but love that guy like a brother.

ThaFormula.com - Did you see him leaving Death Row when you left?

D.O.C. - Oh sure man, c’mon. It had to happen because they had no control. Suge had all the control and knowing Suge, Suge is a good divide and conquer guy. He's gonna get everybody talkin’ shit about everybody else and he talkin’ shit about everybody (Laughs). He's gonna be in your ear sayin’, "yeah that muthafucka ain't shit" then he gonna go over there and be like, “yeah that muthafucka ain’t shit.” Then, he's not gonna be afraid to get in front of both of you muthafuckas and say the shit to either of you.

ThaFormula.com - A guy that seemed to never get caught up in all this drama was RBX. Other then a few little things here and there you never really heard RBX talkin’ any kind of shit?

D.O.C. - RBX slept all the time literally. I think he was a narcoleptic. The guy would fall asleep any muthafuckin’ where. In the hallway on the floor, in the hotel, that muthafucka would be knocked out, but he was one of the great ones. When he first came around he had a real Muslim kind of vibe to his music. You could tell he had been studying, but as that shit and time went on he totally lost that. He probably should have kept it cause it probably would have helped him maintain his focus and maintain himself really. The first time I heard RBX rap I was high on mushrooms and the first time I heard this dude, it was like havin’ your eyes closed and havin’ muthafuckas hit you with rocks from all different directions and I loved him for that and I pushed him too. I pushed them all. I wanted them all to be great and they were. If only for that one record (The Chronic) they was all great that day and they can't take that away from none of us.

ThaFormula.com - Snoop, DPG, Dre, and all these guys were once incredible artists and seemed to have lost that focus they had back then. Do you think that they can ever get back what they once had seeing that they still have the voice to make it happen, unlike you who doesn't have the voice any longer to try to reclaim what you once had?

D.O.C. - Well everybody has got their own paths to take, but I don't doubt that this record that I'm doing right now is gonna push all those guys to do better records. Then you gonna get some shit from them niggaz that is gonna fuck everybody's head up, including mine and what its gonna do is fuel me and give me ideas. That's the way the game goes. You have to work hard man. You can't just master your own style. It's like Kung-Fu movies. You can't just master your own technique. In order to be the greatest you have to master everybody's. That's what made me great. See I had no one particular style. I could transform the way I did to match anybody's flow and you would never be able to tell. There's only a couple of muthafuckas that have ever written raps that I couldn't mimic, and that was Method Man and Eminem. Those are the only guys and that may have been, ‘cause I’m getting’ old and I don't want it as much as I did as a young dude, but that's what made me cold. I took bits and pieces of everybody else’s shit and stirred it into my shit. That's how you get to be great man. Get all the great ingredients and make you a pie and it's gonna be the best pie you ever ate.

ThaFormula.com - With all this drama going on with you and Dre, how did you guys get back to speaking terms?

D.O.C. - When I sued him. You know it wasn't even really me. It was this guy who sued him and my name was in the lawsuit so when the lawyers started chasing me they were like “hey come on in over here you gonna get paid,” and really that's where the money came for me to start doing this record Deuce.

ThaFormula.com - What exactly did you sue Dre for?

D.O.C. - Because I never got no money from the Death Row shit and you know I used to own a portion of that muthafucka. In the long run I didn't get not one dime, not from one record, so I settled for a comfortable sum. Dre called me one day and said, "hey look it's time to quit this shit,” which I'm thinkin’ maybe Jimmy Iovine induced. I think Jimmy might have told Dre, “hey call your boy, tell him to get off my nuts and come on over and have a drink with you and you all get back together.” But once he got the green light to start fuckin’ with me again, he gave me a call. He was real big on whether or not he could trust me. He was like, "can I trust you nigga?" I was like yeah you can trust me. Because when I left to go to Atlanta, Georgia a couple of Dr. Dre's reels miraculously came up missing (Laughs), and he said “man what happened to my beats?” I had a couple of his beats in my possession when I left and I just kept them. They were songs that I did and I wouldn't let nobody else have them. I think that was on his mind more then anything else like, “are you gonna come back up and take anymore of my reels?” But I assured him you know. We went to that seafood place on PCH right on the beach there. It's one of those places where the “WP's” go all the time. When I say “WP,” I mean white people. That's where the “WP's” go eat. But he took me in there and we had a couple of drinks, buried the hatchet and he told me he was getting ready to start on “2001” and he wanted my help. I told him shit it's not a thang. But even at that time writing songs was hard to do for those guys.

ThaFormula.com - What was the reason for him wanting to do the “2001” album?

D.O.C. - I thought the reason for the 2001 record was that he wanted to get back together with Snoop. He felt like he couldn't make the records that he wanted to make without that dude and so I guess in his mind's eye, he wanted a second “Chronic” record so he tried to put all the original pieces back together, but the vibe was fucked up. I mean we weren't all equals anymore. I was a piece of shit on the ground at that time because all of these guys had money and I didn't have shit, still after all this time, so if anybody was doing any outside shit talkin’ about me, there was no reason to really stop. I was right back up in the mix but I was workin’ my way back on a different program. Even at that time my mind was on 6’-2”.

ThaFormula.com - How did 6’-2” end up getting involved in the Chronic?

D.O.C. - He came with me. I brought him with me to number one, keep him out of trouble down there in Dallas, keep him off the gang shit and the street shit. Bring him around so that he could spend time around Dre, Snoop, and these guys and he could see the things that he could have if he chose to do the right thing.

ThaFormula.com - Had Dre and Snoop heard anything from him when you brought him in?

D.O.C. - Yeah, Dre had already heard him and he agreed with me that he was the truth.

ThaFormula.com - What was the response to 6’-2” in the studio from everybody that was there?

D.O.C. - I never heard anybody tell me they don't like 6’-2”. Nobody! I never heard anybody say that 6’-2” wasn't the shit.

ThaFormula.com - Did Dre ever want him on Aftermath?

D.O.C. - Well, Dre wouldn't have allowed 6’-2” to be on Aftermath cause he would have had to have fucked me to do it, and I don't believe that Dre would do anything to fuck me no matter what anybody else may say, I don't think that Dre would ever do anything to fuck me. Plus, I had already started working on the “Deuce” album. I had about 2 or 3 songs. I just didn't have any money. Then when that money came in from that lawsuit, I started working on it. I started snatchin’ beats from Dre's closet. I'd ask him, “hey can I go in and pick me out a couple for the 6’-2" shit?” He would be like “I don't give a fuck,” but none of those beats made it to this “Deuce” album. I still got all of those beats sittin’ there in my closet.

ThaFormula.com - How many Dre beats are we talkin’ about?

D.O.C. - 10! So I got 10 songs on the 6’-2” album all ready and all of the songs are Dre beats. So I'm gonna go get me a couple of more. Maybe a Devin and 6’-2” song, maybe a DJ Quik and 6’-2” record and a 6’-2” record with Outkast.

ThaFormula.com - So why aren't any of those beats on the Deuce album?

D.O.C. - Because it's a personal thing. I want muthafuckas to know it's me. I mean of course when Dr. Dre makes a beat you'll probably never find nothin ’ as good, but all of the songs on this deuce album on a scale of 1-10 all of these songs are 9 pluses. The Dr. Dre beats are 10's. So it don't matter if I would have had them all on this one or some on that. They are all great songs. But I wanted no Dr. Dre beats on my album because I wanted everybody to know that I did this shit. I don't want anybody to have anyway of squeezin’ the Dr. Dre clutches on my shit this time.

ThaFormula.com - So the production on this “Deuce” album, is all done by you?

D.O.C. - In a matter of speakin’. The same way that I told you that I snatched skeleton tracks from Dre's closet, well I went and did that all over the place. Wherever I was, if I heard beats that I liked, I snatched them and brought them back home and made songs and finished them.

ThaFormula.com - So what is the production gonna look like on this “Deuce” album?

D.O.C. - Me, Jazze Pha, Erotic D, Organized Noise, and that's about it.

ThaFormula.com - I was impressed with the tracks Erotic D did on your “Heltakh Skeltah” album…

D.O.C. - Well I think nobody gave the guy the credit he deserved because of what he had to work with, and we both took it upon ourselves, uh most of that album was all live drums, all live everything so I wouldn't have to compete with the computerized drum machines and the 808's so it ain't gonna kick like other hip-hop albums but it will play well to a Limp Bizkit lover.

ThaFormula.com - Now back to what you were tellin’ me about the “2001” album because it got me a little curious when you said it wasn't that fun recording that album...

D.O.C. - Nah, because I kept getting into it with Dre's people. His entourage, his group of people that worked at Aftermath and the people that he had around him in the studio are all a bunch of ball lickers, and if your gonna suck nuts and you’re around me then be aware that I'm gonna tell you that your a dick sucka!(Laughs) Dre has surrounded himself with a lot of non-Dre's. See nobody is pushing Dre to make great records right now. No matter what anybody says hip-hop is always who's better then who, and if nobody is pushing Dre to be better, then what the fuck has he got to do? Everything he does is cool cause nobody is doing anything better. But you wait till this record comes out. He's fittin’ to have to pull something out of that god damn bag. He's talkin’ about workin’ on a record called “Detox” he told me. Well he's gonna have to bring something other then that same ‘ol shit he's been doing if he think he's fittin’ to move the crowd now.

ThaFormula.com - What did it feel like being back in the studio with Snoop, Dre, Kurupt, and them?

D.O.C. – A lot of the shit was fun, though I never really felt comfortable. I never really felt at home. You know Dre had his people, Snoop had his people and it was me and 6’-2”. None of those guys knew 6’-2” so it was just me and him against the world really.

ThaFormula.com - So 6’-2” always stayed loyal to you?

D.O.C. - Oh, for sure man. 6’-2” is from Fortworth Texas. Now, he loves Dr. Dre and we all loved all the NWA spirit, but he don’t know those dudes and 6 ’-2” is not the type of dude to get star struck and sit around and watch all of this shit. It wasn't hard to see on the outside lookin’ in, that them niggaz is trying to plot and scheme on ways to make me make mistakes, or trip me up, or maybe they was even trying to push me out the way so that I would stumble and they would get 6’-2”, you never know.

ThaFormula.com - How was the “Up In Smoke” tour for you?

D.O.C. - It was cool. I didn't have as much fun as all these other guys but it was cool. I still felt kind of out of place you know. Like it wasn't my stage, it was their stage so I had to be careful not to get in the way, you know that kind of stuff. I always felt like it was cool for me to come and party with y'all but I had to go home eventually. But it was all about a 6 ’-2” record. Now after a while everybody started showing their shit a little bit more, so it became more a compilation. So instead of putting it all on 6’-2” to go out and have to deal with all this press and deal with these muthafuckas comin’ at him for the shit he's talkin’, I decided to just do sort of do a compilation record and call it “Deuce.” Put my name on the top of it and call it “Deuce” cause I really felt like it was my second record, and showcase all of my young dudes, but get all of my old school homeboys that I could use to make this album a classic and put it all together. Everybody is on this record, all the usual suspects. Kurupt, Nate, Snoop, Dre, Cube, Ren, Xzibit and more. But wait ‘till you hear the 6 ’-2” album. Dude got a rap on his album called "Mentally Disturbed.” The rap goes, "see me walk in with a semi limp, I don't even know it's in my pimp/Can't no other Niggaz be like him/let them hoes drown if they can't swim/I'm in this muthafucka tore up drunk, they could be hatin ’ but you know what punk?” (Laughs) I love that niggaz shit man!!

ThaFormula.com - Let's get to into this NWA thing. What were your thoughts on this NWA reunion album?

D.O.C. - I didn't think it was ever gonna happen. Matter of fact I still don't think it's gonna happen. What you all got on stage at the “Up In Smoke Tour” was a treat and it will probably be the closest thing you will get to an NWA reunion record. It was fun to see, but all of those guys on stage weren't equals, and if they are not equals then they’re not gonna be able to really make great music because one dude is always gonna think he's better then the next one. But no, I don't think it's ever gonna happen. Reason number one, there is nobody hurtin’ for money, so that means if nobody really has to do it. Everybody has to really want to do it and none of those guys want to spend time around each other for some reason. Maybe because one person has got his nuts up in the air and the other person don't. Reason number two, I wouldn't give a fuck what nobody says, you could never have an NWA record if I'm not there. It's not gonna work out right.

ThaFormula.com - So you weren't gonna have any involvement in the project?

D.O.C. - They never said shit to me. See, everybody except for the ingenious Mr. Dr. Dre realizes that I'm a huge piece of that shit. Dre doesn't think so for whatever reasons. He feels like the piece that I brought to the table can be manufactured from somewhere else or something, so you don't need to call me to be there, but that's a huge mistake.

ThaFormula.com - Do you think adding Snoop was a good idea?

D.O.C. - I don't think that adding Snoop was a good idea. I think that Snoop being involved in some of the music is a great idea. I think putting Snoop's face on it and callin’ it an “NWA” record is not a good idea. If anybody's face besides the 4 original muthafckaz that are still left, if any body's face should have been there, it should have been mine and I wouldn't even wanted mine to have been there. I mean it would have been cool to put some pictures of me in the sleeve or jacket in the middle. See the whole point is you can't replace Eazy. That's impossible. So adding somebody in Eazy's place is the exact wrong thing to do especially if your gonna add another nigga and have him take the place of the other nigga. If you gonna add somebody, do something that nobody would expect and add Eminem or some muthafuckin’ body that way nobody is prepared for that shit and they are going, "What in the fuck" and all you gotta do is tell nigga shit from a white boy point of view or somethin’ I don't know.

ThaFormula.com - What about Yella?

D.O.C. - I don't think he was gonna be a part of it and there again lies the big deal. Your not gonna be able to make those kind of records cause all these guys hearts are in different places. You got to be equals, you got to be brothers or you got somebody that's runnin’ the show and thinkin’ that his word goes and soon as he gets mad and walks out everything shuts down. That's a load of bullshit.

ThaFormula.com - Well, let's finish this off by tellin’ everyone about your label and what to expect with this album?

D.O.C. - Well, the name of my label is Silverback Records. That's Silverback as in gorillas because that's all I got on my team is young gorillas. I mean niggaz who love niggaz gorillas. We make great records in the old NWA tradition of hip-hop music. Which mean half of our music will really probably piss you off, but we don't give a fuck and we gonna do it cause it's alright to do it. All the young superstars from Dallas, Fortworth, El Dorado, 6’-2”, Cadillac Seville, and Uptite, those are my young soldiers. The record is supposed to drop November 12th 2002 and hopefully I'll be in California on that day when my shit comes out, blastin’ it just like I did 13 years ago with the top down.

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