Mac Dre is an American rapper who gained his fame through many hit songs he released from 1984 to 2004. His life needed sadly, but his legacy manages to live on though his amazing songs.
In today’s text we are going to talk about his life, his career and his net worth, in order to find out what makes him so special. If he is one of your favorite rappers, this is a perfect opportunity to learn more.
Mac Dre Early Years
Andre Hicks was born in Oakland, California July 5, 1970 – died in Kansas on November 1, 2004. People mostly know him as Mac Dre or by many other stage names he gave himself during his career like Pill Clinton Ronald Dregan and many others. He was an American rapper from the San Francisco Bay Area in California who debuted before the public in mid-1990.
Andre grew up in Oakland in rough times when there was a lot of segregation and racism. He moved with his family to Vallejo when he was really young and grew up in a Country Club Crest which is also known as The Crest.
Andre went to the Hogan High School where he was an okay student. He often talked about his childhood and based on his stories, he didn’t really have great childhood. We can assume that he grew up in difficult times and was faced with many obstacles on his road to success.
Since there aren’t many information about his childhood, we are going to talk more about his amazing career and the years following his death.
Mac Dre Career Path
One of the most beloved rappers of the Bay Area of San Francisco, California, where they come from, Tupac, Too $ hort, E-40 among others. His amazing music career started in 1984.
He started by releasing mixtapes until he was noticed by the bigger players in the game. He created his stage name in the same year and started performing under this name until the end of his career.
His first EP’s came out in 1988 and that is when his career kicked off. He was the creator of a type of dance known as “Thizzle Dance”. After having recorded three albums between 1989 and 1991, Mac Dre was accused of being part of the (planned) robbery of a bank (in fact he was innocent but never cooperated with the police).
In 1992, he was sentenced to 5 years in prison for not informing his friends about the said crime. He kept writing his songs in jail and recorded an album (Back in da ‘hood) by phone from jail.
While he was still in jail he was still an owner of the Romp Production Company, and he started recording his album via his phone. This only shows how serious he was about his music and how much he wanted to succeed.
In 1997 he was finally released from prison and was able to continue his career path. The five years he was in prison only made him more focused on his career and desire to succeed. The album Mac Dre Presents: The Rompalation came out in 1996 and the second album came right after that one in 1997.
The name of his second album was Stupid Doo Doo Dumb. Many producers started noticing Andre and he became a household name in the hip hop scene.
Producer who came up to him was Bernard Gourley who helped him produce the album called Rapper Gone Bad. People who also joined in on this project were Warren G, Tone Capone and Lev Berlak.
After leaving prison, he began to work hard on his music and was the founder of the production company Thizz ent (thizz is another name for MDMA). He was one of the leaders of the HYPHY movement who knew how to excite the people of his region and it seemed that he was destined for fame and wealth. Just when people from outside his region began to recognize his great talent nationally and globally they killed him.
In 1998, Andre decided it was time to get further away from Vallejo and choose Sacramento as his new home. There he founded the Thizz Entertainment. His mother helped him manage the company and the company was renamed into Thizz Entnertainment LLC.
His last two albums came out in 2004, just few months before his death. The last two albums he released were The Genie of the Lamp and The Game is Thick, Vol. 2. The last two albums that came out, were a total success. His songs are still being listened to and the younger generations see him as an inspiration even though he is no longer there.
In 2005, albums Judge Dre Mathis, Dre Day: July 5th 1970 and Pill Clinton came out posthumously. The albums were an homage to him and also a reminder to younger generations to avoid the life of crime and to focus their lives to better things. He was mentioned as a collaborator on albums A Tale of Two Andres and Da U.S. Open, both albums came after his death.
Andre’s net worth is estimated at around 1.5$ million. Surely this number would have been much higher if he only had time to achieve everything he imagined. Most of this net worth came from his music, his performances and his record label.
Sadly, we won’t be hearing new music from this talented rapper, but we can still enjoy his songs and smash hits from the nineties.
Should you wish for more updates and insights on celebrities, browse through our earlier posts where we’ve carefully analyzed all facets.
Mac Dre’s Net Worth in 2024
According to Celebrity net worth, American rap singer Mac Dre has a net worth of $1.5 million. Orre Louis Hicks, who goes by the name Mac Dre, was born in Oakland, California, and grew up in Vallejo. He started making rap music when he was in high school, and his first three records came out between 1989 and 1991.
His own record company, Romp Productions, was also born. He was caught and charged with planning to rob someone in 1992. He was sent to jail for five years because he refused to help find the people who had stolen the money. While he was in jail, he kept recording.
He made two CDs mostly over the phone. He recorded three more albums after getting out of jail. In 2001, he moved to Sacramento, California, and started Thizz Entertainment. As he drove down the highway in Kansas City, Missouri, in 2004, someone unknown opened fire on his car.
The police said he was dead at the scene. After that, someone stole his tombstone from the Oakland graveyard where he was buried.
How did he become rich?
Andy Louis Hicks was Mac Dre’s birth name. He was born in Oakland, California, on July 5, 1970. He used to go by the name MC Dre, but after a while, he changed it to Mac Dre. In 1989, he put out his first record by himself. It was called Young Black Brotha.
While we don’t know for sure, Wikipedia says that Hicks was asked on a road trip in Fresno on March 26, 1992, when he was 21 years old. Hicks had played in that city two weeks before, and he chose to go on the trip so that he could see a woman he knew there again.
The car was hacked by the FBI, Fresno police, and Vallejo police on the way back to Vallejo. Police told Hicks that while he was at a hotel, his friends were supposedly checking out a bank but changed their minds when they saw a Fresno TV News van in the bank’s parking lot.
When the cops asked Hicks about it, he said he didn’t leave the hotel and didn’t know anything. Following this, the police charged him with planning to rob a bank, even though there was no bank robbery and Hicks wasn’t with his friends or near the supposed bank.
He got five years in federal jail because he turned down a deal to plead guilty to the conspiracy charge. Later, Complex Magazine named the trial one of the 30 biggest criminal trials in the history of rap music. When he was found guilty, Hicks owned the record label Romp Productions.
Hicks got out of prison a year early on August 2, 1996, after spending four years, because he had been good. Hicks got “a better appreciation for freedom, life, and fun” while he was in jail. When Mac Dre got out of jail in 1996, he started the record label Romp Records.
Three years later, when he moved to Sacramento, the name of the label changed to Thizz Entertainment. For Mac Dre, getting back into the party scene after time in jail was like a drug. He was supposed to have a show with other Thizz members in Kansas City, but he had a money disagreement with the club promoter.
He died because of this. In the early hours of November 1, 2004, he was shot in the car. Mac Dre put out 15 solo records throughout his career. After he died, the next three came out.
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