Dog Sinks His Teeth Into N.W.A’s Hometown

Rap musicians, like brush-back pitchers, spark a lot of feuds.

LL Cool J had a major tiff with Kool Moe Dee. M.C. Hammer went after Vanilla Ice. Bytches With Problems (BWP) have been dissing a variety of female rappers, especially Harmony.

But when it comes to a first-class bean-ball war, watch out for the battle that’s brewing between Compton’s own N.W.A and Tim Dog. A bold--or perhaps foolhardy--Bronx rapper, Dog’s new single is designed to provoke an intense dissing match with N.W.A, one of the few rap groups to hit the top of the charts (the band’s “Efil4zaggin” album is still in the Top 10).

Dog’s new song “(Expletive) Compton” features obscenity-laced tirades directed against N.W.A, their girlfriends, other West Coast rappers, gangbangers and other targets. His lyrics (at least the ones that aren’t too obscene to print) go in part:

Talkin ‘bout niggas from Compton

they’re no comp and they truly ain’t stompin ,’

all you suckers that riff from the West Coast,

I’ll dance and spray your ass like a roach.

It would be easy to dismiss the song as a young rapper’s crass attempt to win his media spurs. But the Ruffhouse Records single isn’t being promoted by a tiny independent label--it’s distributed by powerful Sony Music Entertainment, which handles Ruffhouse’s product. Even more amazing, considering the song’s filthy language and threats of violence--Sony’s Columbia Records division is enthusiastically promoting the record.

In fact, a Columbia press release heralded “(Expletive) Compton” as a “deliberately provocative statement aimed at West Coast rappers, intended to shatter the current perceived hegemony of L.A.-based groups on the street-level rap scene.”

Having heard N.W.A’s new album, which features such repugnant material as “One Less Bitch” and “To Kill a Hooker,” we’re frankly pleased to see a hip-hop counterattack. As Dog succinctly explained to us: “I’m the janitor of rap and I’m cleaning up the filth. N.W.A is just three Jheri-Curled garbage men who don’t know how to rap. I don’t do songs about killing women or beating them up, so I’m calling those roaches on it.”

But why attack Compton, a community that has been struggling heroically to rid itself of gang-related crime and violence? And why use the same foul language--and threats--N.W.A uses?

“It’s not Compton I’m after,” he said. “By dissing Compton, I’m attacking N.W.A. I want every ghetto kid to know you don’t have to be from Compton to be a hard-core rapper. It’s got to the point where nobody respects your music unless you’re from Compton. Everyone goes around wearing Compton hats--or Raiders hats--even though it was the Giants who won the Super Bowl!

“I use the language I use because kids on the street know what’s fake and what’s real. If I’d done this record in a less powerful way, it wouldn’t have worked on the street.”

In the song, Dog also blasts N.W.A’s Dr. Dre for an incident in which he attacked Fox TV’s “Pump It Up” veejay Dee Barnes, who is now suing Dre for assault and battery. (N.W.A blamed Barnes for a “Pump It Up” segment that combined appearances by N.W.A and former member Ice Cube, now a hated rival. Dre refused to be interviewed for this story, but Dre’s bandmate, Eazy-E, is apparently unrepentant. He was quoted in the July issue of rap magazine The Source as saying: “The bitch deserved it.”)

Dog insists that the song isn’t simply inspired by East Coast jealousy over the ascendancy of West Coast rap, saying he’s a fan of such L.A. artists as Ice-T, Tone Loc and Above the Law. But he acknowledges that his upcoming album, “Penicillin Wax,” due out this fall, contains attacks on other L.A. rappers, including Ice Cube.

Hip-hop has been fueled by so much verbal creativity that it’s sad to see rappers show their pride by disrespecting their rivals. But Dog has no regrets. “I’m from the Bronx and I’m proud of it. But sometimes you have to attack your opponent first to get your message across.”