The first time Snoop Dogg smoked weed
Calvin Broadus’ relationship with cannabis has become one of the most recognisable partnerships in music. The Long Beach rapper is as synonymous with blunts as he is with his smooth G-funk flow, but the story begins long before the world knew him as Snoop Dogg.
Speaking to Esquire, Snoop recalled being only eight or nine years old when his uncle offered him a roach clipped from an ashtray. Surrounded by smoke and malt liquor, the young Calvin Broadus took his first hit. “I hit that motherf***er”, he laughed years later. What might have been nothing more than childish curiosity turned out to be the start of a lifelong connection.
By the early 1990s, that early initiation had become central to his identity. His debut alongside Dr Dre on The Chronic introduced a new kind of West Coast cool. Where other rappers traded in urgency, Snoop delivered a voice that felt mellow and unhurried, perfectly in tune with the haze he celebrated in his lyrics. On ‘Gin and Juice’ he painted scenes of parties where smoking indo was part of the atmosphere.
The blunt soon became his trademark, thanks in part to Tupac Shakur, who introduced him to cigars filled with weed rather than simple joints. It was an image that stuck: half-lidded eyes, braids, and a constant cloud of smoke. Snoop turned cannabis into a symbol of style and serenity, shaping his public persona as much as his music.
Beyond image, his devotion carried cultural weight. Where hip hop in the 1980s was bound up in the destruction of crack, Snoop helped reframe cannabis as a softer, communal drug. He later argued that weed had saved hip hop, claiming that if rappers had embraced cocaine instead, “the game would be torn up”. Smoking together, in his eyes, spread peace rather than conflict. That shift in perception echoed across the scene, with West Coast rap making marijuana part of the soundtrack rather than the background.
The legacy of that first puff has only grown. Snoop has launched his own cannabis brand, invested in weed delivery services, and used his platform to advocate for legalisation long before it was fashionable. His stoner persona even crossed into mainstream entertainment, whether duetting with Willie Nelson or baking with Martha Stewart, a joint never far from reach.
What started with a clipped roach in a Long Beach living room became one of the defining cultural threads of modern rap. Snoop Dogg didn’t just build an image around cannabis, he helped shape its place in music, politics and popular culture. That first toke lit a fire that has never gone out.