Dr. Dre recently sat down with Kevin Hart from an episode of Hart To Heart and explained why he decided not to work with Prince and Michael Jackson.
According to the producer, he was approached about working the two dynamic artist and then goes on to explain why he turned it down. “Nah, they just asked me to work with them and I just [was like], ‘What the fuck am I gonna do with them?’ Those are my fuckin’ heroes man. Yeah, that happened.”
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This isn’t Dre’s first time speaking on producing a track for Michael Jackson. Back in 2001 he did an interview with MTV Radio and revealed he declined the opportunity to produce MJ’s album, Invincible. “Somebody approached me about working with Michael Jackson, and I did say no because I like working with new artists or people that I’ve worked with in the past,” he told MTV. “I can develop them from the ground up. There’s no set standard that I have to live up to or anything like that.
He added: “All I have to do is go in the studio, and basically they’re going to bust their ass to come in there and do their thing the way it’s supposed to be done.”
In that same interview with Kevin Hart, Dre also revealed that he turned down working with Stevie Wonder for the same reasons he turned down Mike and Prince.
“So I’m workin’ on an album with Marsha Ambrosius, right?,” he begins. “She’s amazing. We did a song using Stevie Wonder’s music, and he had to clear it. And he called me up, ‘Yo, Dre’ — for some reason, Stevie Wonder calls you like super early in the morning, like six, seven in the mornin’ or somethin.’ Like, just ’cause you can’t see the time.
He continued: “True story, [he was like], ‘I don’t like the lyrics. I don’t like the lyrics, Dre.’ Okay, we went in and changed the lyrics. What the f*ck is the difference? Like 5 a.m. or 5 p.m. for Stevie? So this sh*t happened.”
“He called me back like, ‘Okay, Dre. Now I like the lyrics. Why don’t we work together and just write a song together?’ [I was like], ‘Yeah. Alright. Alright, Stevie,’ and yeah, I didn’t show up.”
“What the f*ck am I gonna do in the studio with Stevie Wonder? Huh? Touch the drums? No. Touch the keyboard? No. What the f*ck? Nah. I went that way.”