Hip Hop muziek heeft een lange weg afgelegen en toen in de jaren negentig gangster rap op kwam sloeg het genre een nieuwe weg in en maakte ruimte voor een hele generatie nieuwe muziek en artiesten. Daar over gaat de documentaire The Defiant Ones die de afgelopen nacht op HBO USA was te zien, en uiteraard verscheen deze even later op de bekende download kanalen waar je niet schuldig over hoef te voelen, want als je gangstah rapper bent weet je ook dat geript worden er bij hoort. De website Collider had een interview met Allen Hughes over de documentaire en daar van kan je hier onder alvast een stukje lezen.

Collider: How did this documentary come about? You've talked about how Dr. Dre mentioned doing something like this, in passing, but when did you get serious about doing it?

ALLEN HUGHES: About four years ago. Five or six years ago, we did that "I Need A Doctor" video together with Eminem. That was the first time I'd worked with Dre, even though I'd known him for over 25 years. So, I called the president of HBO one day and said, "What if I told you I could get the most enigmatic hip-hop artist of all time to open up about his life in a documentary?" They said, "Who?" I said, "Dr. Dre." They said, "Green light!" I'd never heard a green light when I was in the room, in my life. And then, the president said, "We have one issue. We just agreed to make the Interscope documentary with Jimmy Iovine." I said, "I'll call you right back." A lightbulb went off. I thought, "Oh, my god, that's the story - the two of them." I called Dre and he was with it right away, but it took some convincing with Jimmy. Jimmy had passed, for a whole year. We had a green light and he wouldn't do it.

Did he give you a reason for why he wouldn't do it?

HUGHES: He was like, "There's just too much stuff. You want to go digging all that stuff up." I knew which stuff, with Death Row and Time Warner. He just didn't know if he wanted to get into it. He wasn't ready, clearly. We had three crisis meetings and I was like, "This guy's not ready. I'm outta here!"