Craig Venegas Alvarado (born January 15, 1971), known by his stage name DJ King Assassin, is an American disc jockey, producer, and engineer from Los Angeles, California.
Venegas became influential in the west coast hip-hop music scene after having helped pioneer records for 1990s era rap moguls such as 2Pac, Ice-T and Eazy-E.
Venegas started producing at an early age, growing up in the California Bay Area. Starting in the 1980s, Venegas influenced the west coast hip-hop music culture by creating sounds for rappers in the Bay Area & L.A California. He connected with former Ruthless Records rapper Kokane and charted on billboard with Dr Kokastien and The Legend Continues.
Throughout his career, Venegas engineered over 300 titles for recording artists signed to Universal Records, EMI, Def Jam, including several of which reached the Billboard charts, respectively. In 2014, he peaked at #7 on the Billboard charts in the US following the release of a mixtape with fellow industry partner Kokane. For several consecutive years, Venegas has been awarded DJ of the Year for his lengthy music contribution in the West Coast Hip Hop Awards.
Early life Venegas spent most of his early life in California traveling from San Jose, Vallejo, East Palo Alto and Sacramento, where he then relocated back to his native California lifestyle in the city of Los Angeles. As a kid, he won his school's spelling bee at Hillsdale Elementary and later went on to the district of Franklin Mckinley's spelling bee. He also learned to play drums in elementary school, and in eighth grade, how to make music. From that time, he became interested in music as well as breakdancing, in which he won trophies at local fairs and contests throughout the state of California.
Venegas' influences include long-time friend and collaborator 2Pac and Eazy-E, as he has grown up in California.
Musical career
1990s-2000s: career beginnings Venegas moved where originally his parents are from, in Southern California, and began his career as a record disc jockey, in which he later produced for recording artists signed to Russell Simmons record label Def Jam. In the early part of his career, Venegas produced for several projects from Eazy-E at Kitchen Sync and Echo Sound studios. It was there where, Venegas, a rising producer, teamed up with Tupac Shakur in which he later established a close relationship with the West Coast rapper.
While Tupac Shakur worked on "Me Against The World", Venegas has claimed he began producing music with Shakur, later witnessing the creation and contributing scratching to the original version of "Dear Mama", one of Shakur's most successful hip-hop records, these claims have however been questioned as he misidentified the producer who worked on the original as being Tony Pizarro, Pizarro was brought in a year after the initial recording to revamp the song for release and had no involvement in the actual recording session or the version with scratching Venegas claimed to have contributed to. Encore Studios Inc. Venegas, thereafter, produced, mixed and mastered an inordinate number of records for hip-hop recording artists in the west coast of the US, influencing the unique funk sound established by rappers like Eazy-E and 2Pac.
2010-2015: The King Assassin Show & Mixtapes Venegas started his own internet syndicated radio show, The King Assassin Show, which featured appearances from recording artists and other notable figures like Freeway Rick Ross, for example. Throughout the first half of the 2010s, Venegas released numerous mixtapes, some of which featured unreleased music from Tupac Shakur, and others in collaboration with west coast rappers.
2016—present: original Dear Mama Recording & Makaveli Film In May 2016, following the passing of Afeni Shakur, Tupac Shakur's birth mother, Venegas was featured on TMZ and Billboard magazine where he spoke on his affiliation and relationship with the Shakur estate and the release of the original version of Tupac Shakur's classic record "Dear Mama". In 2016, Venegas announced he will be producing and directing a film loosely based on Tupac Shakur's personal life and music career. The film is expected to be shot in California, and acting cast has not been released yet.
In 2016, following the passing of Tupac Shakur's mother, Alvarado released a rare recording of 'Dear Mama' in honor of her death, which was later picked up by numerous music news outlets including TMZ, XXL and Complex. The version Alvarado "released" was however sourced from a bootlegg which had been posted to hiphop forums as far back as 2007 and uploaded to Youtube shortly after.
Guinness book of world records Assassin holds the Guinness Book Of World Records for recording the longest hip-hop song in the history followed by Rappers Delight entitled State Of Emergency which features mostly platinum and legendary artists and to be released in 2020.
List of albums, with selected chart positions and sales figures + Title Billboard Charting History Peak chart positionsSpotify + WebHeatseekers Dr. Kokastien Hosted By DJ King Assassin Chart History #1Dr. Kokastien Hosted By Dj King Assassin]Billboard Charts Number 1 Released: August 11, 2012 Label: Bud E Boy Entertainment Formats: digital download11DJ King AssassinBillboard & Spotify
Released: April 12, 2014 Label: Liferdef Records Formats: digital download 7 --
List of entire singles and albums Discography
Year Title Note12inch singles1990 Lyrical Prophecy - You can't swing this Featured and Production as DJ Raleem1990 Charizma And Peanut Butter WolfCirca 1990 -1993 Featured Adlibs1992 Cisco The Frisco Mc - Audi 5000 Featured and Production1992 Various What A RemixAssassin Bring The Drums Featured and Production1998 17 Reasons Various Cisco - Take Me Higher Featured and Production1993 Ghetto Politics - Ghetto Life E.P Featured and Production1995 Juvenile Style - The Cavi Production1996 Assassin Featuring Tupac - Real Bad Boyz Featured and Production2002 Assassin - Out Of Custody E.P Solo Album and ProductionCassette1994 Various Strictly For The Streets A Compilation about the game Official LP Features and Production1994 Assassin - Hitworks Original Cassette release 1996 Assassin - Hitworks 1997 Assassin - Born And Raised In The Bay 1998 Assassin - Armed N Dangerouz 1999 Assassin - Worldwide Game 1999 Assassin - Soldierz At War Compact disk1994 Assassin & Tupac's Thuglife - Strictly For The Streets A Compilation about the game 1996 Assassin - Hitworks 1997 Assassin - Born And Raised In The Bay 1998 Assassin - Armed N Dangerouz 1999 Assassin - Worldwide Game 1999 Assassin - Soldierz At War 1999 Assassin - City Of Dope 2000 Assassin - Revelation 2000 2001 Assassin - Anthology 2002 Assassin - Out Of Custody 2003 Assassin - Hitman For Hire 2004 Assassin - JT The Bigga Figga Fillmoe 2 San Jo 2006 Assassin - San Quinn - Fillmoe 2 San Jo 2 2007 Assassin - Mopreme Shakur Black And Brown Pride2008 Assassin - United Playaz Of The Bay 2008 Assassin - High-Fee Movement 2011 Assassin - West Turf Compilation Kings Mixtapes 2005: Tupac: The Way He Wanted It Vol. 1 2006: Tupac: The Way He Wanted It Vol. 2 2007: Tupac: The Way He Wanted It Vol. 3 2007: Lil' Prophet & W.G.G. Presents: 2pac: World Wide Mob Figga 2008: Tupac: The Way He Wanted It Vol. 4 2009: Tupac: The Way He Wanted It Vol. 5 2009: Dj King Assassin Presents: Mr. Loco & D.L.E.M.M.A.: 4 Tha Thugz & Guttar Folk 2009: Dj King Assassin Presents: Lokixximo : Enigma Mixtape (Dominican Republic) 2012: Dj King Assassin Presents Pro Reck (D.O.P.E) (Mixtape Album) 2012: Dj King Assassin Presents - Kelo - Gramzzterdam (Mixtape Album) 2012: Dj King Assassin Presents: Slick F.B : New Era (Mixtape Album) 2015: Dj King Assassin Presents: What Would Pac Do ft Kokane, Joe Young, Cold 187 um & 2pac (Single) 2015: Dj King Assassin presents: Kay Nine Tha Boss : "Cruise Control Road 2 Success". (Album) 2016: Lil' Prophet & W.G.G. Presents: 2pac: 20 Years Gone Mixtape (Hosted by DJ 4Five of DPG & DJ King Assassin 2016: Dj King Assassin Presents: O.G Rome Dogg (Rowdoggs) Grindmode Volume 2 2016: Dame Grease & King Assassin : "My Style" Feat. Sheek, Pusha T & Freeway Hip Hop DX Exclusive (Single) 2017: Dj King Assassin Presents: Bugzy Bluntz : Momma Tried (Single) 2018: Dj King Assassin Presents: T$P (Tha Survivalist) : Tales From A Cell (Album)
Filmography
Television & Major Motion Pictures Title Year Role Other notes The King Assassin Show 2014 Host Starring RoleSavoy Films Scenes For The Soul
Directors: George Tillman Jr.
Robert Teitel1995Soundtrack Featuring Tupac Shakur Real Bad BoysJoshua Dreams Films Producer Soundtrack Oprah Winfrey Show 2015 Special Guest Live television TMZ Live 2016 Special Guest Live television
Radio Title Year Role Other notes The King Assassin Show 2014 Host Web syndicated 98.2 The Beat 2016 DJ Web syndicated
References
External links Official Website Official Twitter