Coolmixes

Snoop's second album for the No Limit label finds him in fine form--maybe the finest since Doggystyle. On Top Dogg, Snoop has taken control of his own album; in working with a number of producers (Dr. Dre, Ant Banks, Raphael Saadiq, DJ Quick, and the Beats by the Pound team), he takes the best each has to offer and forces them to play to his own strengths. Though there are a few gangsta tracks on Top Dogg ("My Heat Goes Boom," with its "boom boom boom" chorus, is one of the album's best), the strongest songs here are the ones on which Snoop gets creative. There are a pair of tributes to Slick Rick--"Snoopafella," a Cinderella story on which Snoop aces Rickey's flow, and "G Bedtime Stories," which opens with a little kid asking "Uncle Snoop Dogg" to read him a bedtime story--and a few tracks built around classic samples (of George Clinton's "Black Hole Theme," Earth, Wind & Fire's "Shining Star," and even Brick's "Dazz"). There may not be anything here as transcendent as "Gin and Juice," but that's a minor complaint; Top Dogg is Snoop's best album in years. --Randy Silver

17.98