Music video for "What's My Name", directed by Fab Five Freddy, depicts Snoop transforming into a dog that is chased by dog catchers[1]
Producer Jimmy Iovine: "This is proof why the real power in the record business should be left in the hands of the artist. Not the marketing department or the accountants or the lawyers. What record executive could possibly come up with a better video idea to represent their music than Snoop and Dre?"[1]
Music video for "What's My Name", which shows Snoop transforming into a Doberman pinscher and being chased by "dogg" catchers, is being played on MTV, and the song is receiving extensive airplay nationally on radio stations[2]
Gold: "On 'What's My Name?', Snoop raps over bits and echoes of half a dozen George Clinton songs filtered and pumped and rolled into a ball that sounds quite unlike anything P-Funk ever did but is inseparable from it, and he combines strains of every rap he did on Dr. Dre's album into something else altogether, postmodernism made flesh. Here is possibly the first post-mortem hip-hop song in history, spookily rapped from the wrong side of a drive-by shooting."[3]
Harrington considers the track the "most musically involving" of the ones on Doggystyle, "thanks to its silly sing-along chorus and sinewy funk texture"[6]
Saunders: "'Who Am I (What's My Name?)', his best and most popular cut, is a virtual beat-by-beat copy of the rhythm track from George Clinton's 'Atomic Dog'."[9]
Doggystyle had sold extremely well, despite both the song and music video already receiving extensive airplay on radio and MTV[10]
Pick: "Last January, when Snoop guested on Dr. Dre's The Chronic album, his laid-back rapping style was a refreshing change of pace. Now, he already sounds like a parody of himself; maybe he has nothing to say. Anyway, Dre's production sounds great, as it always does, but all the best parts are lifted virtually unchanged from the work of George Clinton."[10]
"Top-Rated Station Bans 3 Derogatory Words in Rap" - Claudia Puig, Steve Hochman - Los Angeles Times -
KPWR, the most popular English-language radio station in Orange County, made the decision to censor lyrics of songs like "What's My Name?" after listener complaints[11]
This decision is significant because it had the largest percentage of listeners in the market who were teenagers[11]
On the charts, "What's My Name?" is behind "All For Love" by Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart, and Sting[13]
"It Was a Good Year for Ice Cube's `Good Day'; Pop music: The year's most memorable single was part of rap's expanding prominence, but 1993's best is from all over the pop map" - Robert Hilburn - Los Angeles Times -
Los Angeles Times ranked it number 7 on their 10 most memorable singles for 1993[14]
Hilburn: "The chest-thumping bravado is annoying, but Snoop sings-raps with the fluidity of Sam Cooke and Dre's production is at its most seductive."[14]
Lepage: "So let's finally admit the obvious fact that, unless the wit of the raps catches up to the talent behind the mixing board, then no great art will come out of this scene. Doggystyle is seamlessly put together and, ultimately, monotonous to anyone but a believer."[15]
Rated number 456 in NME's "500 Greatest Songs of All Time": "Snoop's laconic, languid drawl is arguably at its finest here, on the rapper's debut solo single."[16]
"There's a big diff between asking 'Who Am I?' and being prepared for conflicting answers from your own audience, and asking 'What's My Name?' and having yet another fucking George Clinton sample reinforce your ego."[17]
According to Loren Kajikawa, Dr. Dre's production on "What's My Name" served the purpose of ingraining his protege's name in people's minds, while also making him sound as if he were a well-established star[18]
Justin Williams notes Dr. Dre's production for "What's My Name?" as an example of the kind of G-funk song that would be mixed specifically for listening in the car[19]
Williams: "The contrast between the high and low synthesizer frequencies in 'Who Am I?' and other examples in that style are particularly effective in aftermarket car sound systems, where the highly directional tweeters can exclusively support the high end frequencies, and the power of the subwoofer(s) produce the corporeal sensations from the bassline."[20]: 132
Williams: "Synthesized sounds, dynamic range compression, and prominent bass frequencies are but three elements that seem to be most compatible with the automotive soundscape."[20]: 133
Filmed on the roof of VIP Records, a record store and studio in Long Beach, California where Snoop recorded some of his earliest material[22]
The History of Gangster Rap: From Schoolly D to Kendrick Lamar, the Rise of a Great American Art Form - Soren Baker
Baker: "The single was as much a coronation of Snoop Dogg as the new face of rap in general and gangster rap specifically as it was a celebration of Snoop Dogg himself."[23]
Hook features a chorus of singers singing Snoop's name to the tune of George Clinton's "Atomic Dog"[23]
First verse features Snoop talking about selling cocaine and buying marijuana[23]
Dog motif, which Snoop uses as an animal personification of gangsters, is presented in the music video literally, as gangsters morph into dogs[24]: 337
Hook - chorus of women "adoringly" singing the rapper's name to the tune of "Atomic Dog"[25]: 76
Interpolates Dr. Dre's "Rat-Tat-Tat-Tat" from The Chronic, as Snoop warns listeners that those who threaten his supremacy will be shot[25]: 76
McCann: "What's My Name?" is "unabashedly joyful in its tonality"; its "heavy break beats and funky synthesizers create a sonorous envelope of g-funk abandon."[25]: 77
Song establishes Snoop's ascendancy to power as the best new talent in hip-hop[25]: 77
In the music video, as he preaches to listeners atop a Long Beach record store, Snoop compels his audience to "[..] just throw your hands in the motherfuckin' air / And wave the motherfuckers like ya just don't care"[25]: 77
In an article critical of how black music artists use animal imagery to portray themselves in their music videos, Aaron said that the music video: "[...] finishes the job of transforming Snoop—an intelligent, troubled artist—into a disposable cartoon who disrespects his own complexity."[26]
Aaron: "[Snoop] has been studied like a gangsta Mowgli who just dropped into the white man's global village, and in his video for 'What's My Name?', Snoop plays along obediently. Morphing from human to animal and back during the course of the clip, he feeds off the most cynical stereotypes imposed on young black men, and becomes a silly, bitch-pantin' pooch. OK, so he and his posse elude the dog catchers (i.e., cops) in a crude slapstick. Fine. Big whoop."[26]
Unfavorably compared it to Naughty by Nature's music video for "O.P.P.", where its visual metaphors of dogs and kittens result in a "heady bit of sensuality", instead of "Snoop's ill-conceived, sociopolitical worldview based on a one-note joke."[26]
