How did The DOC lose his voice?
The DOC was one of hip hop’s most gifted lyricists, but his talent was cut short following an accident that left him without a voice.
Real name Tracy Lynn Curry, DOC grew to fame during the 1980s hip hop era, working closely with Dr Dre to write NWA’s Straight Outta Compton. He then went on to create his own critically acclaimed debut album, No One Can Do It Better. His raw flow and West Coast grit earned him attention, and he was set to be one of the biggest artists in rap, selling approximately 750,000 copies in the first few months.
At one point, DOC opened for NWA and watched audiences sing along to every word of his hit ‘It’s Funky Enough’. For someone who came from humble beginnings, the sudden fame proved overwhelming. In an interview with The David Banner Podcast, he talked about his growing ego. “For a guy that came from nothing, where nobody expected anything of him, when [fame] happened, I wasn’t prepared for it,” he confessed, “And it got the best of me, and I started really being sort of an egotistical guy, and tellin’ mothafuckas how cold I was, and tellin’ ’em I was ‘better than you’.”
Yet only six months after his album came out, DOC was in a car crash. It happened on Ventura Highway in Southern California, and it nearly killed him.
“I was high as a kite, drunk-driving down the 101 freeway”, he admitted. Just earlier that evening, he had been stopped by police in Beverly Hills, but the officers had seen NWA’s gold records in his car and had ended up taking photos with him and only issuing him a ticket. He carried on driving despite being intoxicated. Then, 30 minutes after he was pulled over, he fell asleep at the wheel. “When I woke up, I couldn’t talk”, he said.
The emotional toll of the accident was profound. “It was just crushing,” he recalled, “I really don’t have the words to make you eloquently understand how deep that hole was […] It was a bad place. I stayed in that hole for about 10, maybe 15 years.”
DOC had permanently damaged his vocal cords and was unable to rap anymore. However, once he was well enough, he would show up at Dr Dre’s The Chronic recording sessions, helping support Snoop Dogg in his early career. Away from the studio, however, he was spiralling. “I’d be with whores, being a whore, and being doped up, being drunk, ‘cause that’s the only way that I could get back to a happy place”, he admitted.
Watching his fellow musicians progress deepened his pain: “I thought that the success of those things, The Chronic [and other projects] would be a way for me to get my high back. But it seemed the higher that everybody else went, the lower I got”, he confessed candidly.
With time and patience, DOC was able to recover some of his melodic voice, something he learned by yawning. He even made appearances on Ruthless with Ice Cube and Cold 187um, also hinting that more music may be coming in the future.
Voice or no voice, The DOC will always have something to say in hip hop, and his words have left a lasting impression on both seasoned and upcoming rappers.