Mini-Review: Snoop Dogg & Dr. Dre, Missionary

Or, Gussied-Up Nothing is Still Nothing

Sometimes you get exactly what you expected from an album, and it’s the problem. I’ll admit I didn’t expect much from the Snoop-Dre collab Missionary (because they already did Doggystyle, I suppose), which for all the big buildup was received with a resounding “yeah, whatever,” but that little bit of me wanted to believe. Could they turn the clock back to the early ‘90s? Or, perhaps even better, could they make a case for their continued relevance?

Well, they certainly remain relevant. As Snoop will remind you throughout the album, he’s in commercials now. And Dre’s largely shifted from music to business anyway, although he remains enormously successful in that regard. And like, call me a curmudgeon here, but it couldn’t be any clearer to me that their focus on extracurricular has hurt their music, to the point where the resultant album sounds more like an extension of their respective brands than it does, well, a passion project. And I don’t know about you, but I’m getting mighty bored with self-promotion, especially for its own sake.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad album. Snoop’s flow is still solid, and he manages the occasional clever line. The beats are crisp and clear, mostly rooted in g-funk but with the occasional triple-time hi hat just to remind you that these dudes have indeed listened to music lately. But mostly those beats just sound expensive, all vintage samples (Tom Petty on “Last Dance with Mary Jane,” whose guest vocal by Jelly Roll is about the album’s only heartfelt moment; “Message in a Bottle” on “Another Part of Me”) and other middle-aged rappers (Method Man on “Gunsmoke,” Eminem and 50 Cent on “Gunz n Smoke” - nobody sounds hungry) that serve more as reminders of how well-connected the principals are than reasons to listen again.

Happens to everyone, I suppose. Snoop’s been on the falloff for a long time now, but he remains one of the most prominent names in rap; hell, I could do a similar rant about Em, whose Death of Slim Shady was just… bad. His constant quotations of his earlier work only emphasize how stuck in the past he is. The dude seems more interested in bragging about his old accomplishments than forging new ones. And if this is all he has to say anymore it’s like, dude. Smoke a bowl with Martha Stewart and get out of the way so a new generation can come in.

Oh! Magdalena Bey won that poll. Get ready for a much more positive review come Thursday.