The influence of Dr. Dre’s 1992 solo debut, The Chronic, on West Coast Hip-Hop can’t be understated.

During the Paid in Full Foundation’s 2025 Hip-Hop Grandmaster Awards on the Bellagio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas on October 18, the topic was justifiably prime of thoughts.

Parliament-Funkadelic’s Chief Architect of Funk, George Clinton, was on deck to obtain the muse’s inaugural Quincy Jones Award. The group’s music was the constructing blocks for The Chronic, with Dre incorporating samples of “Mothership Connection (Star Child),” “Atomic Dog” and “P. Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up),” amongst others, into his G-Funk system.

Speaking to AllHipHop on the black carpet, The Fat Boys’ Kool Rock Ski praised The Chronic for its function in popularizing Hip-Hop with a mainstream viewers.

“I gotta be 100 percent honest with you,” he mentioned. “I saw the lack in the sales and the music around ’91 and thought it would just go strictly back to the streets. Nobody was really putting out nothing big. We had a lot of artists putting out big radio hits and stuff like that, but it wasn’t until The Chronic came out and opened up the doors again for Hip-Hop sales, and the popularity came again.”

“When I heard it, a lot of people didn’t know about the Funkadelic music. Of course, we came from a musical background, so everything we heard was like, ‘Oh, that’s from Funkadelic.” But on the similar time, it was blended so pretty with Hip-Hop, Snoop Dogg’s voice…I imply, it had an entourage of artists. It was clean.

He continued, “The Lady of Rage and The D .O .C. was on it. I was stoked when they did that, but it brought back the sales, too. Because remember, by that time, it was Vanilla Ice and Hammer, who was the only ones who were selling that many records, but they weren’t considered street Hip-Hop.”

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On the black carpet, former Yo! MTV Raps host Fab 5 Freddy, additionally caught up with Kool Rock Ski, Geto Boys’ Scarface, Ludacris, Roxanne Shanté and a number of other different Hip-Hop legends, who had been in Sin City to honor this 12 months’s hip hop Grandmaster Award recipients, Kool G Rap and Brand Nubian’s Grand Puba in addition to Kool Rock Ski, one among two recipients of the brand new Contributor Award. (The different, Whodini’s Jalil, was unable to attend in individual.)

Dr. Dre stunned the gang by becoming a member of a panel moderated by Quincy Jones III, who was interviewing Clinton about his indelible contributions to music. Dre went on to reward Clinton for his affect on him and numerous others.

“George Clinton is one of my main motivations and what I grew up to,” Dre mentioned. “Forty years this year, I started in 1985. This summer marks 40 years that I’ve been doing this thing. In the beginning of my career and my childhood and everything was based on this man right here. Everything that I’ve done, studied… all the drums and all the instruments that this man did inspired me to do what I’m doing right now, and I’m just so appreciative. It’s all love.”

The night was marked by a number of performances, together with from Nas, Kool Moe Dee, Clinton, Mobb Deep’s Havoc and extra.

And if you happen to haven’t seen George Clinton roll up on a motorized earlier than…you’re welcome.

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