Death Row Records is entering the legal marijuana industry under Snoop Dogg’s sativa-fueled stewardship.
The legendary gangsta rap label, which Snoop has been steadily working to revive after becoming its new owner earlier this year, announced on Thursday (December 29) the launch of its very own weed brand, Death Row Cannabis.
The news was unveiled via a brief animated video shared on Instagram, which gave fans their first glimpse at the company’s logo and upcoming product line.
The logo puts a metallic, marijuana-laced spin on the label’s iconic electric chair emblem, depicting the soon-to-be-electrocuted death row prisoner holding a joint.
The 22-second teaser also featured music by long-time Snoop Dogg collaborator and fellow West Coast Hip Hop veteran DJ Battlecat, while promising the company’s products are “coming soon.”
Fans won’t have to wait long as Death Row Cannabis is set to make its debut in stores next week. Its first product will be a cannabis flower, with diamond-infused pre-rolls set to follow.
Curating Death Row Cannabis’ product offering is AK, a “West Coast legacy cultivator and industry insider best known for RS11, Studio 54, and Shirazi strains from exotic cannabis breeder DEO,” according to Okayplayer.
Cookies, the weed company founded by Bay Area rapper/entrepreneur Berner, will be the first outlet to carry Death Row Cannabis in select stores across California.
Death Row Records has made its presence felt in cannabis culture long before launching its own weed brand. During its ’90s heyday, the label dispensed some of Hip Hop’s most iconic weed-friendly albums including Dr. Dre’s The Chronic and Snoop Dogg’s Doggystyle.
Snoop is no stranger to the weed industry either having launched Leafs By Snoop in 2015, making it one of the first celebrity-endorsed weed brands in the U.S. Leafs originally catered to smokers in Colorado — the first state to legalize the recreational use of cannabis alongside Washington, D.C. — before expanding into Canada in 2018.
Tha Doggfather has also invested in a number of other marijuana brands as the global market has grown into an estimated $20 billion industry thanks to relaxed laws. His early support of Dutchie helped the Oregon-based weed tech company double its valuation to $3.75 billion last year.
Snoop’s own smoking habit is the stuff of legend, with the 51-year-old rapper telling his Potluck Dinner Party co-host Martha Stewart earlier this year that he blazes through as many as 25 joints a day.
But the seasoned smoker has been out-smoked by at least one other celebrity, as he admitted on Tom Brady, Larry Fitzgerald and Jim Gray’s Let’s Go! podcast earlier this month.
“With Willie fucking Nelson,” he said when asked about the most stoned he’s ever been. “We was in Amsterdam on 4/20 and he was doing a concert out there. He performed on the 19th and I performed on the 20th. So we went back to his hotel room and we was playing dominoes. Willie had a vape, a joint, I had a blunt and he had a pipe.
“So me and him were playing dominoes one-on-one. He whooping my ass, and I’m just getting higher and higher and higher. And he just keep passing it to me and I’m like, ‘This old muthafucka’s out-smoking me.’ And I’m trying to stop but I can’t ’cause I don’t wanna show no signs of weakness.”
H/T: hiphopdx.com
