RaveThe Los Angeles TimesKennedy is a deft storyteller, ducking and diving through the origin stories of Dr. Dre, Ice Cube and their early meetings with label co-founder Jerry Heller ... Kennedy writes of N.W.A’s preeminence as if still in awe of its reach even today. Dre’s evolution from the 'dancey techno' of the Wreckin’ Cru to the soul-inflected funk samples he’d base a billion-dollar business upon is told with a genuine excitement. There are no shortage of moments when Kennedy breaks down Dre's infamous samples of James Brown or Parliament. Even more, he contextualizes the N.W.A's popularity within the racist history of popular music mediums like MTV that were hesitant to give black people any airtime ... With a heady combination of interview and fine-toothed combing through available research, Kennedy pieces together N.W.A’s downfall with an informed precision.
