50 Cent Talks Snoop Dogg’s Reggae Persona Snoop Lion: “I Think It Will Work”

Snoop Dogg helped 50 Cent deliver one of his biggest commercial hits with “P.I.M.P.” off ’Fif classic album, Get Rich or Die Tryin’ back in 2003. Earlier this year, Snoop assisted 50 on his “Remain Calm” track off the G-Unit general’s, The Big 10 mixtape. On both occasions, Snoop was in his laid-back, gangster element.

That being said, Snoop definitely threw 50—and many others—for a loop, when he announced his transformation into reggae artist Snoop Lion in support of his upcoming reggae album, Reincarnated.

’Fif weighed in on Snoop’s Rastafarian persona during a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

“It’s interesting,” 50 said. “Of course, there will be some people who connect to it and there will be some people that run from it—I don’t know how his little league team’s parents will feel about his new persona. But again, it’s a persona—these are the choices he’s created for himself creatively. And, you know, I think it will work.”

Although Snoop has changed his persona, 50 doesn’t think he’ll stray too far away from being the marijuana-loving rhyme slinger that rap fans have loved for years. If anything, ’Fif has reason to believe that Snoop Lion will only magnify that quality.

“Snoop’s always been that,” he says. “In the very beginning, that was his consistent theme—he had the weed, and everything else was there. [But] for hip-hop culture, it will work, because there’s enough of that going on; Wiz Khalifa, his entire theme is that. I’ve consistently seen artists sell 500,000 copies with that as a theme: Redman, Method Man, Styles P.”

50 Cent appears in the film Freelancers, which puts him alongside Robert De Niro and Forest Whitaker. The movie opens in theaters in Los Angeles and New York City today (August 10), while it’s scheduled for Blu-ray and DVD release on August 21. 'Fif recently spoke to XXL about everything from Freelancers to his upcoming album Street King Immortal to his current relationship with Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo, entering the world of boxing promotion and Kanye West's "Perfect Bitch."

Meanwhile, Snoop Lion’s Reincarnated project is supposed to drop later this year.—Mark Lelinwalla