HOLLYWOOD (CNS) – A star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was unveiled Tuesday honoring Dr. Dre for his career as a performer, producer, founder and CEO of Aftermath Entertainment and Beats Electronics, and co-founder and president of Death Row Records.
Snoop Dogg and music impresario Jimmy Iovine joined Dr. Dre in speaking at the ceremony in front of the El Capitan Entertainment Centre and next to Snoop Dogg’s star.
Dre joked that Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent and Ice Cube had all received Walk of Fame stars before him “for some (expletive) reason.”
“No, but in all seriousness, I love the idea of being memorialized on the Hollywood Walk of Fame,” he said. “It’s an incredible tribute to my artistry. Growing up in Compton, I never imagined that I would one day be represented here amongst some of my childhood heroes. You know, we’ve heard the saying a million times before, `Focus on your passion and the rest will follow.’ And that’s exactly what it is for me. Pouring my whole soul and self into my passion for hip-hop led me on a pathway to an incredible career. And I’ve been fortunate enough to make a living doing exactly what I love to do.”
He added that he is most proud of his work “elevating the clarity and sound of how we experience hip-hop.”
“Getting that thing right is one of my greatest achievements,” he said. “The clarity of hip-hop.”
The star is the 2,775th since the completion of the Walk of Fame in 1961 with the initial 1,558 stars.
Born Andre Romell Young on Feb. 18, 1965, in Compton, Dr. Dre has said he was inspired by the 1981 single, “The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel,” a live DJ mix recording of Flash scratching and mixing records from various groups using three turntables.
Young frequently attended a club called Eve’s After Dark in the unincorporated Willowbrook area to watch many DJs and rappers performing live. He then became a DJ at the club, initially as Dr. J, the nickname of his favorite basketball player, Julius Erving, later becoming Dr. Dre, based on his first name and Erving’s nickname.
Dre was also a DJ on the Los Angeles radio station KDAY.
He became part of the electro group World Class Wreckin’ Cru and in 1985, co-founded the landmark Compton gangsta rap group N.W.A, which was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2016.
Dre became a major solo success in 1992 with his album “The Chronic,” which was certified triple platinum by the industry trade group the Recording Industry Association of America for selling more than 3 million copies and reached the top 10 on the Billboard 200.
A single from the album, “Let Me Ride,” won a Grammy for best rap solo performance in 1994, the first of his seven Grammy Awards.
Dr. Dre launched Aftermath Entertainment in 1996, where he discovered such hip-hop superstars such as Eminem, 50 Cent, Kendrick Lamar and Anderson .Paak
Dre and Iovine established the headphones and speakers company Beats Electronics in 2006 and the streaming service Beats Music in 2014. Apple acquired both companies in 2014 for $3 billion in cash and stock.
In 2013, Dre and Iovine founded the USC Iovine and Young Academy, which seeks to nurture critical thinking at the intersection of arts and design, business and entrepreneurship, engineering and computer science and communication.
In 2022, they partnered with the Los Angeles Unified School District to create the Iovine and Young Center Integrated Design, Technology and Entrepreneurship Magnet on the campus of Audubon Middle School in the Leimert Park, which bills itself as offering “a cutting-edge, interdisciplinary program that fuses a curriculum with real-world, project-based learning opportunities with top institutions and companies.”
In January 2021, Dre was treated at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center for a brain aneurysm. He recently revealed that he had three strokes while in the hospital. Appearing on the podcast “This Life of Mine with James Corden” last week, Dre said the experience “definitely makes you appreciate being alive, that’s for sure … It’s crazy, so now knowing that I had no control over that. It’s just something that could happen out of the blue.”
