The title is sincere. I have to get that out of the way, in case you were expecting a snarky diatribe against the D-R-E for his role in attacking peer-to-peer networks, or maybe his part in birthing upon the world 50 cent. But as real as those sins were, he has redeemed himself!
Was it a supreme act of charity (a la Bill Gates)? Perhaps he created a magnum opus which all his personal failings can be rationalized against (vis a vis Wagner)? Or did he take the fastrack to redemption: a quasi-tragic early death (cf. Amy Winehouse)?
Nope. He made it socially acceptable for me to walk around in public with these on my head:
I can already hear the hipsters groaning, “the douchebag headphones? Pssssh, those things are just overpriced cans for NBA fans! Totally not worth it, real audiophiles know that if you really want to hear all the subtleties of Tom Yorke’s voice you need the BLAH BLAH.” The groaning naysayers are missing the point. Dre is not vindicated for making the best headphones, he is absolved for making the best category of headphones a reasonable option for a man about town.
Just a few short years ago, you had one option for headphones:
If you walked around with studio quality cans, you may as well have been carrying around an old boom box. But now, through a partnership with Monster audio and a horde of top tier athletes and pop stars, Dre made it not only reasonable to wear goofy chunks of plastic and wire on your dome while waiting for the bus, he made it hip! I can’t tell you how many compliments I've gotten wearing Beats around town.
And they’re ridiculous looking! It’s like Dr. Dre’s re-written the “Emperor’s New Clothes” fairy tale as a 21st century performance piece, and he’s totally getting away with it. It is awesome. And for that, he is forgiven his many, many sins (who let him make this commericial? Or does he just really fucking love Dr. Pepper?).
Now, if only he could somehow make socks with sandals hip, thus alleviating my most egregious teenaged fashion foible ex post facto, I would actually start a religion for him.
This would probably be our Lord’s Prayer.
This our Apostle’s Creed.
Maybe we could do the stations of the cross somewhere in Compton?
God damn that old school raiders hat makes me nostalgic. Okay, full disclosure: that hat alone, and the positive memory mind trip it just took me on, is enough to make up for his Napster stance. It took the headphones to come back from that soda thing though.
