Straight Outta Compton

Thirty-eight years ago today, N.W.A released Straight Outta Compton on Ruthless Records. The album was recorded at Audio Achievements Studio in Torrance, California in approximately six weeks for around $8,000. Dr. Dre and DJ Yella produced it. The title track opens the album and introduces the group member by member: Ice Cube delivers the first verse, MC Ren the second, and Eazy-E the third. Dr. Dre handles the intro. The verses, including Eazy-E’s, were written by Ice Cube. It was a gang introduction in the form of a song, and it arrived like a door being kicked in.

The album peaked at number 37 on the Billboard 200 and number nine on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart, with almost no mainstream radio support. It spread through independent record stores and word of mouth. The most notorious track, “Fuck tha Police,” drew a warning letter from the FBI dated August 1, 1989, signed by Milt Ahlerich of the Bureau’s Office of Public Affairs. The letter told Priority Records that songs glorifying violence against law enforcement posed a real danger. N.W.A was the first musical act to receive an official FBI warning. The letter was the most powerful piece of free marketing the album ever received.

Before Straight Outta Compton, hip-hop had one center of gravity and it was New York. The album moved that center west. Ice Cube left the group in 1989 over a financial dispute with manager Jerry Heller. Eazy-E died in March 1995, six weeks after publicly disclosing his HIV-positive diagnosis. Dr. Dre went on to build Death Row Records and then Aftermath Entertainment, signing Eminem and later Kendrick Lamar. The album was added to the Library of Congress National Recording Registry in 2016. It was made in six weeks for eight thousand dollars and it changed the direction of American music.