Snoop Dogg
Who Am I (What's My Name)
«Who Am I? (What’s My Name?)» (commonly titled «What’s My Name?») is the debut solo single by American hip hop recording artist Snoop Doggy Dogg. It was released on October 10, 1993, as the first single from his debut album, Doggystyle, with the record labels Death Row Records, Interscope Records, and Atlantic Records. It was ranked number 456 on NME’s «500 Greatest Songs of All Time».
The song, produced by Dr. Dre, features samples and interpolations from George Clinton’s «Atomic Dog» in its chorus and throughout, the bass line from Funkadelic’s (Not Just) Knee Deep and an interpolation from Parliament’s «Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)» in its bridge. The song’s intro contains a sample from The Counts’ «Pack of Lies.» A vocal sample («the bomb») from Parliament’s «P. Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up)» can be heard throughout.
The song and music video were parodied in director Rusty Cundieff’s film, Fear of a Black Hat (1993). In the UK in 2014, the song was used on an advert for MoneySupermarket, which featured Snoop Dogg.
Track information
Released October 10, 1993
Recorded 1992
Genre G-funk
Label Death RowInterscopeAtlantic
Songwriter(s)
Calvin BroadusAndre YoungGeorge ClintonGarry ShiderDavid Spradley
Critical reception
Alan Jones from Music Week gave it four out of five. He wrote, «Clearly influenced by George Clinton, Cameo and the like, this laidback rap cut has been widely praised with the industry has a gimmick warcry, some soulful femmes and stands every chance of being a hit. Ralph Tee from the magazine’s RM Dance Update complimented «its infectious «Bow wow wow yippy yo yippy yeah» hook and a production steeped in the tradition of Seventies George Clinton and Cameo». He stated that «it’s Snoop’s rhymes and the aforementioned hook that’s making this a smash.
Music video
Fab Five Freddy directs a CGI-driven music video for the song. Snoop and others are able to transform into dogs (such as Doberman Pinschers, Rottweilers, Pit bulls, and the women Cocker Spaniels and several other breeds) to evade upsetting fathers and run wild, while also evading a pair of clumsy dog catchers while in these forms. One scene shows the dogs wearing sunglasses, smoking cigars and gambling on dice games (a parody of the late 19th century/early 20th century series of paintings by Cassius Marcellus Coolidge titled Dogs Playing Poker). Throughout the video Snoop can be seen standing on the roof of V.I.P. Records, a record store and studio where Snoop Dogg recorded some of his first material. Other associates of Snoop make cameo appearances such as Kurupt, Daz Dillinger, and Warren G. Another known person to appear in this video was a clinical nurse liaison Athena Germany, who later appeared in Family Feud with rest of the family in 2021.
Snoop Dogg - Who Am I (What's My Name)
DID YOU KNOW?
When this song was released in October 1993, Snoop was up on murder charges from the shooting of a rival gang member in a Los Angeles park just two months earlier. His bodyguard pulled the trigger, but Snoop was driving the Jeep he was standing in to fire the shot. The incident bumped Snoop up in the headlines and drove even more demand for the song and his debut album, Doggystyle, which went straight to #1 when it was released in November.
In the song, Snoop makes it clear he’s armed and dangerous, which certainly didn’t help his court case, but he had a not-so-secret weapon: lawyer Johnnie Cochran, who was working the O.J. Simpson case at the same time. As with his O.J. defense, Cochran showed that the LAPD mishandled evidence, and was able to convince the jury that Snoop and his bodyguard acted in self-defense. When the case finally came to an end in February 1996, both were found innocent.
The song borrows elements from George Clinton’s seminal funk track «Atomic Dog,» with Snoop turning the «A-tom-ic Dog» chorus into «Snoop Dog-gy Dog.
Snoop also lifts the «Bow, wow, wow, yippy-yo, yippy-yay» bit from «Atomic Dog,» something he did on Dr. Dre’s track «Dre Day» from The Chronic.
In a Pandora Stories feature, Snoop talked about how this song came together. «Me and Dr. Dre used to hang out together every day,» he said. «I would ride with him every day in his Benz. Wherever I was staying, he would pick me up and we would go on a rendezvous, and then from the rendezvous we would end up in the studio. That ride from the rendezvous to the studio was usually me in the passenger’s seat with a cassette tape controlling the music. One day George Clinton is on, ‘Atomic Dog,’ and when they get to the ‘A-tomic Dawwwwg,’ I started singing, ‘Snoop Doggy Dogg.’ I said, ‘We’re recording that as soon as we get to the studio.’
