- Snoop Doggy Dogg's second album recording sessions : second half of 1995 / March-November 1996
- Material for a triple album ? probably mixed with a new LBC/Pre-Eastsiders project (after original album being shelved because of Snoop/Lil C-Style dispute about royalties)
- The album was ready to be released in September but the death of 2Pac seems to have deeply modify the project.
- Tha Doggfather Original Demo LP (pre-Vegas tracklist)
- Corleone's Revenge : The OG Mafioso album (leftover tracks)
- The Eastside Party (various released tracks outside Snoop's album)
- Unused Instrumentals
- SPECIAL THANKS to Bomb1st Forum & Jay2Chill
### Tracklist by Jay2Chill. We chose to not follow the "Demo LP" leaked by Bomb1st Forum in 2016, just a random compilation of demo versions of retail songs. It is much more interesting to use the tracklist purposed by Jay2Chill of Bomb1st Forum (in a thread of June 2023), trying to rebuild the album sequence of September '96, right before 2Pac's death, following newspapers, interviews and other collected info. Except that we included demo versions instead of any retail songs. ###
The Sessions Part 1 : The Original Demo LP (Pre-Vegas) - LISTEN
- Producer - Daz (2,6,7,8,14,16), DJ Pooh (
7, 8, 11, 17), Soopafly (1,6, 10,12,15, 15), LT Hutton (10,13) Arkim & Reg Flair (3,14), Kurt Kobane (4) - This unreleased demo material is taken from leaked DATs (raw studio material) from 11/06/96 (PO781966 : tracks 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15), 10/07/96 DAT (PO781867 : track 16) and from Bomb1st's bootleg album (1, 16).
- * Tracks
2,6,8,12haven't been leaked yet in an alternate form so we chose to not include them in this bootleg (because available in the official released album). - ** Track
15is unleaked. We can hear a snippet of it in Smokefest Video, at 5:28. A re-recorded version of the song has been released in No Limit, Top Dogg. - Tracks 1,3,5,11,14,17 are close to the released version but with many different elements.
- Tracks 4,7,9,10,
12,13,15,16 were not included in Tha Doggfather LP (Death Row, 1996). - Tracks 3,7,10,13 have been released in a close form in SmokeFest World Tour (1998, Dogghouse) / Fuck Death Row (1999, No Limit).
- Tracks 8 and 9 have been released in Gridlock'd Soundtrack (1997, Death Row)
- Track 8 was included in a previous sequence of the album and would have been replaced by "Snoop's Upside Ya Head".
The original Doggfather LP : if 2Pac wouldn't have been killed in Vegas...
In 2016, Bomb1st Forum leaked a Bootleg with a compilation of alternate mixes and unmixed songs from Tha Doggfather, and a compilation of leftover tracks. All these unreleased materials are taken from early sequences of recording of the album, mainly from circa summer of 96.
Jay2Chill, in a Bomb1st forum's thread of June 2023, shared his work of reconstruction of what could be the state of the Doggfather album, right before 2Pac's death in early September. This has been deduced from the known tracklists of the DATs and the various info collected here and there in interviews, articles... After Pac's death, Snoop notably took off songs with 2Pac, remixed some other and shelved some which will end up in the SmokeFest World Tour album. More than half of the album was totally changed. We miss only four demo songs (if there are any existing alternate mixes) and a totally unleaked one (we can only hear a bit of it in Smokefest Video - maybe somebody could put the retail vocals of the song over the original beat remade) to get that sequence. It has no interludes, what is often said as a weakest point in the released album.
With this rebuild tracklist, we can listen to a different Doggfather album. Would it have changed the destiny of Snoop Dogg and Death Row Records ?
First steps of the album : Don Corleone & Don Makaveli
When 2Pac joined Death Row label in the fall of '95, Snoop Dogg was still struggling with his justice case (what ended in February of 96). It is said that at that time he had troubles to write new lyrics... 2Pac would even have told him that his original verses in "2 of Amerikaz Most Wanted" were weak, what led him to re-write and re-record his parts (some people even said that this lost original could have become "Wanted Dead or Alive"...). That could explain why 2Pac and Daz wrote reference songs like "This Ain't Livin" and "Street Life" in February-March of 96 when he started recording sessions for Doggfather.
So the Doggfather sessions really started in the end of February of '96, right after the end of the case, in the night of the 20th to the 21st. 2Pac was then recording his second solo album for Death Row (cf. Me Against The World pt. 2). After or before Pac recorded "Changed Man" with Nate Dogg (lyrics that refer to Carlito's Way could be also applied by Snoop's situation), Snoop recorded with 2Pac the freestyle song "If There Was A Cure", and maybe "Word on The Street" with his L.B.C. friends Bad Azz and Techniec. But it could be also this day he recorded the first "Eastside Party" with Nate Dogg, Daz and the remaining member of L.B.C. Tray Deee (Lil' C-Style was already left in Dec. - Jan., cf. Haven't You Heard ?). Five days later, he recorded "Just Watching" with 2Pac, the Dogg Pound and Hurt-M-Badd, and 2Pac recorded the reference song "This Ain't Livin'" for him...
But this is mostly the following month (March of '96) he recorded a first amount of songs for his album : "Gangsta Walk", "May I", "Doggfather", "I Will Survive", "Change Is Gonna Come", "Wake Up", "Come On Home", "Tommy Boy", "Never Leave Me Alone", "2001"... And Daz recorded the reference song "Street Life" for him. In April '96, Snoop recorded new songs : "Gangsta Life", "Smoke Enough Bud", "Dogg Collar", "Doggyland", "Too Black", "Poly High"... what leads him to reconsider the direction of the album.
The Sessions Part 2 : The OG Mafioso Album (Corleone's Revenge) - LISTEN
17.
- Producer - Daz (3,8,13,15,16, 17), LT Hutton (10), Soopafly (4,11), Sean Barney Rubble (14), DJ Battlecat (1,
15) - Tracks 1,7,9,13,15 are taken from 7/10/96 DAT
- Tracks
14,16,17are taken from 6/11/96 DAT and were planned to be in Doggfather OG (Pre-Vegas Version) - Track
15was planned to be released in Doggumentary EP
Corleone's Revenge ?
This collection of songs was gathered by Bomb1st forum for the 20th Anniversary of the release of Doggfather album. All the tracks included are leftover songs from Doggfather sessions and were then unreleased in their original forms ("Vapors Battlecat Remix" has been released one year later in Neva Left, and was initially planned to be included in Doggumentary EP).
If we put apart the four last songs (used in the Original LP), the album so organized starts by
the whole story of the birth of a mafioso, and it ended in "Street Life"
by these words : "Corleone, rest in peace". So the subtitle of the known bootleg of Doggfather II,
"Corleone's Revenge" could be more than a random title. The Doggfather
sessions has enough material to constitute that legendary Doggfather II.
Was the "real" Doggfather 2 a Pre-Doggfather ?
The commonly known Doggfather II bootlegs, single disc (here) or double disc (available here and there), were constituted of songs taken from SmokeFest album and from various featurings (2Pac, Nate Dogg...), compilations and soundtracks (like "Freaky Tales", "Let Me Hit Something") and some well known unreleased leaked songs (like "Lil Crip A Lot", "Last Man Standing") which are not from Doggfather sessions, but more from Snoop's late times at Death Row or just after he left...
On the contrary, the songs here have been all recorded during the Doggfather recordings (1996), before the final mix which took place after Tupac's death in September '96. They can constitute a full forgotten album, a Doggfather pt. 2 or more exactly a pre-Doggfather. But nothing indicates that Snoop once thought to release a double album or a follow-up to Doggfather album, especially because these leftover songs were about mafioso subjects, that he seems to want to give up... These songs were put aside with the progressive constitution of the album we know and would probably have been given or re-used for various projects even if Snoop would not have left Death Row.
The Sessions Part 3 : Tha Eastside Party
- Producer - LT Hutton (1,3,6,9,10,11,12,13,14), Soopafly (2,14), Daz (4), DJ Pooh (7), Snoop Dogg (15), Sean Barney Rubble (16)
- Tracks 2, 9, 11, 13 have been released in Lost Sessions, vol. 1 (2009, WIDEawake)
- Tracks 3, 4, 10, 12, 14 have been released in Death Row's Snoop Doggy Dogg Greatest Hits (2001, Death Row)
- Track 5, 6 have been released in Chronic Re-Lit : From The Vault (2009, WIDEawake)
- Track 8 has been released in Gangsta Shhh 12'' (2009, DPG recordz)
- Track 16 has been released in Christmas on Death Row (1996, Death Row).
- Track 1 has been released as a b-side of Snoop's Upside Ya Head Promo Single.
- Tracks 7, 15 have not been released yet and are taken right from the leaked demo tapes and DAT.
- Hit Rocks (Ruff Mix) ==> LBC Crew album
- I Will Survive (Ruff Mix) feat. Techniec & Kurupt ==> Fuck Death Row
- Tommy Boy (Ruff Mix) - identical ==> Fuck Death Row / Dead Man Walking
- Eastside Party (Ruff Mix & Alternate) feat. Nate Dogg ==> Snoop's Greatest Hits
L.B.C. Crew about to become the Eastsiders ?
In the beginning of '96, Snoop & Doggystyle's project L.B.C. Crew went shelved because of Lil' C-Style and Snoop arguing about royalties. So in parallel of his album, it seems Snoop was probably thinking to record a new LBC Crew project without Lil' C-Style who does not appear in any Doggfather sessions (except if we consider that "Doggystyle 96" and "Out The Moon OG" that appear in a July DAT could have been recorded later than 95 - what is not believable).
The group name "LBC Crew" itself was not used anymore (except by 2Pac in "Untouchablez". In late Feb. - March of 96, Snoop recorded "Eastside Party Original" with Daz, Tray Deee and Nate Dogg, "Eastsiders Original" with Daz & Tray Deee (produced by Soopafly), maybe a new version of "21 Jumpstreet" called "21st Street" with Tray Deee & Daz, "Gangsta Walk" with Dogg Pound, "I Will Survive" with Techniec & Kurupt, "Tommy Boy" with Daz, "Smoke Enough Bud" with Jewell, "Dogg Collar" with Bad Azz & Big Pimpin, and very probably "Word On The Street" with Bad Azz & Techniec...
The group name eventually changed to "Eastsiders", a first version of the group that Snoop will later form with Tray Deee and Goldie Loc. Was that name restricted to Snoop, Daz and Tray Deee or was it supposed to include other close partners for a party album like we chose to consider it. Some songs from one project moved to Doggfather and other came in.
It is funny to notice that "Eastside Party", probably recorded circa end of February of 96, starts in its final mix version (probably mid of 96) by 2Pac's voice (something like "nigga ya yop..."), the exact same mix than in the end of "Initiated Remix" (with the blow sound during the whole song) that has also been produced by Daz.
The Sessions, pt. 4 : Unused Instrumentals -