“Still D.R.E.” was the first single released from Dr. Dre’s sophomore album, 2001. While “Still D.R.E.” is seen as a classic West Coast anthem, the song’s lyrics were completely written by an East Coast MC from Brooklyn, New York named Jay-Z.

Dr. Dre took a nearly seven-year hiatus as an artist to focus on production following the multi-platinum success of his 1992 debut solo album, The Chronic, so he wanted a strong comeback single for his follow-up album. Dre specifically recruited Jay-Z to write the song as he was still riding the success of his 1998 multi-platinum third album Vol. 2…Hard Knock Life. Dre detailed the songwriting process in a 1999 interview with Blaze magazine:

At first, he wrote about diamonds and Bentleys. So I told Jay to write some other shit. Jigga sat for 20 minutes and came back with some hard-ass, around-the-way L.A. shit.

The song’s production is highlighted by a hard-hitting piano melody courtesy of Scott Storch, who detailed the initial creation of the track during an interview with Red Bull Music Academy in 2018:

“Still D.R.E.” was released on November 2, 1999—two weeks prior to the release of the 2001 album. In the US, the single peaked at #32 on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, #11 on the Hot Rap Songs chart, and while the single initially peaked at #93 on the Billboard Hot 100, a new peak at #23 was achieved approximately two weeks after Dr. Dre included the song in his historical Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show on February 13, 2022. The song had better success internationally, reaching #1 on the UK’s OCC R&B chart while achieving platinum status in Denmark and Italy, as well as double platinum status in the United Kingdom. The UK’s NME magazine ranked “Still D.R.E.” as one of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.