Nate
Dogg
is ready to drop his long-awaited soloalbum, and — unsurprisingly — the King of Cameos
isn’t going it alone. Some
of Nate’s past collaborators — including Pharoahe
Monch, Kurupt, Jermaine Dupri, Ludacris, Dr. Dre and Snoop
Dogg — will rap along with the crooning O.G. on Music
& Me
, which drops December 4, according to hislabel, Elektra Records.
Supplying
the tracks to Nate’s gangstafied soul offerings will be
a roster of producers, including Bink, the Megahertz,
Mike City, Battlecat, Fredwreck and Dre’s sometime beatmaking
accomplice Mel Man, the Elektra spokesperson said.
Nate’s first
single, the bluesy "I Got Love," is already
getting airplay on a few radio stations and sounds almost
like a church testimonial. On the track, Nate reaffirms
that "ain’t nobody tighter" than him when it
comes to singing, and he asserts that he has no love for
hoes, but does have an undying affinity for his homies
and the ghetto.
Although Nate
has built his career not from his own songs but by singing
hooks for everyone from Warren G — on the 1994 smash
"Regulate" — to his most current appearances
with Fabolous, Mariah Carey and Brian McKnight, Music
& Me is actually not his first album.
He released
the double CD G-Funk Classics, Vol. 1 & 2 in
1998 on his independent label, Breakaway Records. That
LP spawned the underground hits "Never Leave Me Alone,"
which featured Snoop Dogg, and "Me and My Homies,"
which featured Tupac Shakur.