Snoop Dogg

R&G; is Snoop's first album for Star Trak, the label run by fallen-off hip-hop hitmakers the Neptunes, a duo who all but ruled international radio with dazzling sci-fi stomp-clap new wave beats, but who've been starving for hits ever since they switched up their style to overcooked Vegas schmaltz-- all bloopy bass and shuffling drums and swooshing keyboards and unbelievably obnoxious falsetto crooning. The production duo laced five of this album's songs, but their fingerprints are everywhere else here. R&G; has a unified sound, rare in hip-hop albums, but it's a sound based on tinkly pianos and noodly guitars and windchimes. It sounds something like The Black Eyed Peas if they tried to make a Barry White album, but with more falsetto warbling.