Mayer + Snoop = Gangsta

Oftentimes, a label has an artist whose career needs a bit of a boost. Sometimes, it's a matter of updating tired and outdated production. You have a great artist, but for some reason the audience is not there. Hmmm. What do you do? Well, most of these record label mountain climbers wouldn't know their ass from their elbow. They have a formula: Take equal parts marginalized rapper/singer + equal parts Top/Pop 100 producer = Hit Single. Surefire...right? Nope. I mean...that sh*t works sometimes. Sometimes. Often, the results are disastrous. Just because you're hot over HERE, doesn't mean thats going to translate [well] over THERE. I dig Nine Inch Nails. I dig Norah Jones. I don't think I'm interested in a collaboration between the two.

The flip side? You have artists/musicians who actually understand the value and nuances of their craft. They know that they have a quality that if mixed with a true and accepting component, it will yield amazing results. You take a soulful rapper/crooner like Cee-Lo and mix him with a Beatles/Jay-Z mashing Danger Mouse. That pairing results in the genius that is Gnarls Barkley.

You take a moderately successful rapper like Freeway, pair him with underground production staple Jake One and you get The Stimulus Package (one of the better Hip-Hop albums of 2010). Al Green? An R&B legend. You wanna make a classic Reverend Al album without the late great Willie Mitchell? Simple. You employ the services of James Poysner and Questlove. Al Green is soul music. You have to have to pair him with guys who understand the music, the textures and the legacy, of not only Al Green, but soul music itself.

You're not re-inventing the wheel. It's equal parts peanut butter + equal parts strawberry jam. Rocket science it is not.

That brings us to my next case: Snoop Dogg and Mayer Hawthorne. You love Snoop. I love Snoop. In 2010, your mom probably loves Snoop. He's moved past the gang banging tunes of his youth and has settled comfortably in the realms of reality show dad and T-Mobile pitchman. BUT, he still makes albums. Actually, they're not quite bad. The trick is balancing mainstream Snoop against a Snoop Dogg album that exhibits some sort of Hip-Hop creditability (you're probably laughing as "hip-hop creditability" really doesn't exist, on a large scale).

Some of the better Snoop tunes have been the laid-back, easy breezy tracks wherein nobody gets shot (or "187'ed")---not even cops. I mean, even Snoop admitted he doesn't listen to much rap in his off time. Nope. He's more interested in listening to The Stylistics, The Dramatics, The Miracles, Al Green, Teddy P. etc. (i.e. the good music that plays in the beginning of inner city, shoot-em-up gangster movies).

Throwback soul music? Who, in 2010, understands that zone better than my new favorite, Mayer Hawthorne? Exactly. Yeah we've had some white girl brits who sing it, but truthfully, SOME of those chicks are the products of good production [with the notable exception of Adele and Alice Russell].

You pair the Smokey Robinson-infused (and influenced) groove of Mayer with the O.G. groove of Snoop and what do you get? Gangsta Luv.

It's retro, but modern. It's innovative--largely in part--that it takes pieces of classic American music and successfully melds it with Hip-Hop.

Son, I was sold with the doo-wop intro.