"Grab your guns when you see Tupac" "Call the cops when you see Tupac" "Whoever shot me didn't finish the job" "and now you will feel the wrath of a menace" "Let's hit them. " What you've just heard isn't just rap lyrics, it's a real threat. Words that were written and said with the pure hatred of someone who felt betrayed by his own friend.
This song was the culmination of the biggest beef in Rap history, and that literally ended up causing the deaths of two rap legends. Today we're going to reveal all the details behind Tupac's Hit 'Em Up and explain how the lyrics relate to the beef, life and death of Tupac and the Notorious Big. I'm Guilherme, and this is the channel DecifraHITS We're going to split this video into chapters so if you want to skip to a specific part, just click on the timeline or the description.
That said, let's first understand who Tupac and Biggie were, and how they met. On 06/16/1971, Tupac Shakur is born in New York. His parents were revolutionaries in the Black Panther Party.
And the ideals of social justice were absorbed by Tupac, who in '88 moved to California, and '89 began singing rap on topics such as racism, police violence and teenage pregnancy. In '91, he released his first studio album: 2Pacalypse Now, which made him famous all over the United States, and was even part of the soundtrack of the game GTA San Andreas. In '92, at the other end of the United States, in New York, another Hip Hop legend began to emerge: Christopher Wallace, better known as Notorious BIG, 20 years old, just 1 year younger than Tupac.
Even with a good education, raised by his mother who was a teacher, he got involved in crime at a very young and at the age of 12 he was already selling drugs. Despite this, at school he began to demonstrate an enormous talent for improvised rhymes, and gradually gained notoriety for his gift. We arrived at the year 1993, the most important year in this history.
This year, Biggie's talent was discovered by one of the greatest Hip Hop producers of all time, Sean Combs, better known as Puff Daddy. Then Biggie signed with Puff's record label, Bad Boy Records. In the same year, BIG, still on the rise as a Rapper, traveled to California, when he was introduced to Tupac Shakur, who was already one of the greatest American rappers.
BIG and Pac soon became great friends, to the point that Pac called BIG to open his shows, gave him several Rap tips, and even offered his house in California for BIG to spend his nights. And what started out as a great friendship, turned into a fatal rivalry. Still in '93, Tupac traveled to New York to shoot a movie, and while he was there, he ended up making friends with some rather dangerous people.
One of those people was Haitian Jack, a music executive. At that time, BIG even advised Pac to stop hanging out with these guys, as he could get into trouble . But 'Pac was living like a king with his new friend who presented him with jewelry, expensive parties, and was so influential that he even introduced Madonna to him Only that all this had an ulterior motive behind it, and a price that Tupac would have to pay Haitian Jack was associated with Jimmy Henchman, a drug dealer and mogul of music industry that had its eye on Tupac's talent, and was willing to pay whatever price it was to get 'Pac to his label Haitian Jack so proceeded to ask Tupac to sign with Henchman but 'Pac, knowing Jimmy's fame, refused all these requests From there on, things started to get complicated for Tupac In November '93, 'Pac hooked up with a woman named Ayanna Jackson at a nightclub and 4 days later, she was in a hotel room with Tupac and a few other men, including Haitian Jack What happened in that room, only those who were there know, but the fact is that Ayanna Jackson accused Tupac and his friends of having rap** her that night With the accusation, Pac had to shell out a hefty amount of money with lawyers and at that moment, he began to consider an offer from Jimmy Henchman who offered Tupac some money to record a song for him at Quad Studios in New York .
And on 11/30/1994, Tupac went to that studio with three friends. Arriving there, Notorious Big's cousin, who is the rapper Lil' Cease, saw Tupac and told him to go to the lobby and take the elevator, because BIG and Puffy would be there in the studio and wanted to talk to him When Pac got at the lobby, he was approached by 3 guys dressed in camouflage uniforms The guys asked for Tupac's jewelry, who tried to take his gun and then was shot 5 times, then robbed and beaten while he was down After playing dead and seeing that everyone left, Tupac managed to get up , entered the elevator, and went to the room where BIG and Puffy were Tupac later revealed that, before passing out, he managed to see in the eyes of BIG and Puffy, that they knew everything, and that he had fallen into an ambush From then on, the beef between Tupac and Notorious BIG began to emerge. A few hours after leaving the hospital, Tupac went straight to court in a wheelchair to receive his conviction for the rap*** of Ayanna Jackson.
In jail, 'Pac was already suspicious that Jimmy Henchman and Haitian Jack had set all this up against him and that Big and Puffy knew but didn't tell him Also, Haitian Jack, even though he was prosecuted for the same crime, had his trial set aside and was released And the only way he could have managed this, would be by collaborating with the cops against tupac hence, 'Pac felt betrayed and began to distrust many people, this explains his line At the beginning of Hit 'Em Up To make matters worse, a few months after being arrested, a new song by Biggie was released, called “Who Shot Ya” which means something like “Who shot you? ” (in an ironic tone) and despite the lyrics not naming names, Tupac immediately took this song as an affront and for him who was already paranoid about Biggie, that was the last straw In response, 'Pac started writing the song Hit ' In Up, while he was still in jail And at this point, when 'Pac was at his most paranoid, with friends drifting away, and filled with feelings of revenge, a man offered to post $1. 4 million in bail to get Tupac out of jail.
That man was Suge Knight, a producer and mogul who launched big names in California rap, like Snoop Dogg Suge is one of the most controversial names in the Hip Hop industry, and the reason for this is long, but we already explained this story in the video from Like Toy Soldiers by Eminem For us, it's enough to know that he was a very truculent and dangerous guy but who knew how to present himself in a civilized and subtle way when necessary And so he approached Tupac, offering to pay his bail in exchange for a contract in which ' Pac should make 3 albums to Suge's record label, Death Row Records Knowing that Suge was rivals with Puff Daddy, and the entire east coast, including Biggie 'Pac, he took the opportunity and signed his handwritten contract and was then released from jail and straight to the Death Row studios where he got together with his group of friends called "The Outlawz" and started recording the song "Hit 'em Up", which was released on June 4, 1996 If you're enjoying the video so far, please like and subscribe, so you don't miss any musical analysis Now let's decipher the lyrics through the targets that Tupac attacks in the song. Starting with Notorious BIG. In several lines, BIG is accused of stealing Tupac's style: "Now you just want to know about Versace, you copied my style!
" Pac was one of the pioneering rappers in this trend of wearing clothes from haute couture brands in hip hop . He was a personal friend of the creator of the Italian brand Versace and was even invited by him to participate in fashion shows in Milan before that, these clothes were practically exclusive to white celebrities and Pac helped to popularize this trend among black rappers also Pac already had a certain resentment of Biggie for copying some of his styles but it increased after seeing that Biggie started to wear clothes and the classic Versace glasses in all his videos This line is a way to attack Biggie while also paying homage to MC Lyte a great friend of Tupac who released similar verses in her song 10% Dis 'Pac complained that BIG stole his beats, and then he used some elements of BIG songs in Hit 'Em Up (a sarcastic way of attacking BIG with his own works) Rapper EDI Mean, who sings the fifth verse of Hit 'Em Up, confirmed this information in an interview with VLADTV in 2015 Saying that 'Pac met with Biggie's wife, Faith Evans (who, by the way, in the song he says he had sex with) and showed her this Rap that he was doing to attack Biggie and that sampled the beat of an RnB song called “Don't Look Any Further” EDI believes that Faith ran to tell her husband And so, Biggie tried to anticipate and released this beat before in the track "get money" But Tupac already had predicted this move, and the version he showed to Faith was just a demo of Hit 'Em Up 'Pac had already prepared an alternative version, which is the one we know today, in which 'Pac mocked "Get Money" by BIG by putting an audio with the voice of Faith Evans saying “Take Money” during the chorus Also, 'Pac mocks imitating the chorus of the song that Biggie was recording on the day of the attack at Quad Studios And of course, a reference to the infamous song "Who Shot Ya" from BIG could not be missing in the line "Frank White needs to take a beating for making traps” Frank White is one of the nicknames of Notorious BIG, because that is the name of the drug lord in the movie “The King of New York” since, Notorious BIG was so influential in the city that nothing happened without him knowing for this reason, Tupac got so mad at Biggie, and never believed him when he said he didn't know who set him up at Quad Studios. In the song they also call Puffy Daddy a weakling and at the end Tupac says: This makes reference to an event that took place on March 29, 1996, at the Soul Train Awards An award in which Tupac and Biggie were present And according to rapper EDI Mean, when Tupac arrived at the scene staring at his enemies Biggie and Lil Cease just stared back But Puff Daddy soon left, jumped on his bus and quickly disappeared Tupac also took advantage of his wrath in Hit 'Em Up to attack some random rappers who had nothing to do with Notorious BIG and all that beef, but they had released songs attacking Tupac in some way One of them was Chino XL, who gained fame by dissing 2Pac in a song while he was in jail saying he was being rap** in jail The other was the duo Mobb Deep, who quoted the expression “Thug Life” in a song and for some reason, Tupac thought he was being disrespected because Thug Life is a philosophy that 'Pac was promoting at the time Even though Mobb Deep denied any intention of dissing Tupac 'Pac attacked the duo on a very sensitive point, saying: “Oh yeah?
Mobb Deep? Isn't there one of you who has sickle-cell or something? " "Stay around and you'll end up having a seizure or a heart attack" "better get away from us before you bust your ass" in fact, one of the members, the Prodigy, spent his life fighting a very painful genetic disease called "sickle cell anemia", which causes the deformation of blood cells On June 20, 2017, Prodigy was hospitalized due to the disease, when he died In addition to these rappers, Tupac offends Bad Boy Records; and all the Notorious BIG crew known as the Junior MAFIA especially rapper Lil' Kim, and Lil' Caesar, Biggie's cousin who lured Tupac into the lobby on the day of the Quad Studios shooting.
it makes sense to go through the explanation line by line as most of it are pure cussing Now let's understand how Tupac and Biggie died, and what is known today about their deaths The day Tupac signed the contract with Suge is seen by many as the beginning of his end Some say that was the day he signed a contract with the devil , because Suge was a member of the bloods gang and was known by many as the “devil in the red suit” And after Tupac signed with Suge's label, Death Row Records 'Pac started recording raps with less social criticism and with more aggressiveness than he used to do . There is much debate about how much of this change was motivated by his anger at Biggie and the east coast or how much of it was influenced by Suge Knight, who it was the main supporter of the beef between West Coast and East Coast and harbored a hatred for Puff Daddy that would only increase in the following years On 09/23/1995, Jake Robles, a great friend of Suge Knight and also a member of the Bloods was murdered during a argument at a club in Atlanta And the guy who killed Jake was Puff Daddy's bodyguard. From there, the beef between Death Row and Bad Boy Records began to escalate out of control.
In December of '95, Death Row threw a Christmas party in Hollywood. A promoter friend of Puff Daddy was at this party and when Suge found out about this, he took the guy to a secluded room and started asking for Puff Daddy and his mother's address. When the guy refused, he was brutally beaten, and forced to drink urine in a glass of champagne Puff Daddy found out about it, and soon went ahead hiring a security guard from the Crips gang to protect Bad Boy Records This security guard's name was Keefe D, and he is a fundamental piece for us to understand the death of Tupac Keefe D he was the uncle of Orlando Anderson, a member of the Crips gang, who in July '96 stole the chain of one of Death Row's security guards, Trevon Lane, in a mall in California And that brings us to the day of Tupac's murder.
September 7, 1996, Tupac, Suge Knight and the entire Death Row crew went to Las Vegas to see a Mike Tyson fight at the MGM arena. And guess who was there that same night? Orlando Anderson, the guy who stole the Death Row medallion After the Mike Tyson fight, more precisely at 20:49 Trevon Lane, the security guard who was robbed, saw Orlando passing through the MGM hall, and went to tell Tupac At the same time, Tupac, Suge and the entire Death Row team went after Orlando and beat him up in front of everyone After that, Tupac left with his friends towards Suge Knight's 662 nightclub, but they never got there Because when they left at the MGM, Orlando Anderson called his uncle Keefe D, and two more friends from the Crips gang to go all out on top of the black BMW 750i in which Suge Knight was driving and Tupac Shakur in the passenger seat At 22:55 the BMW stopped at a red light and a paparazzi snapped a photo that would soon become known as the last photo of Tupac alive At 23:15, the car stops at another traffic light on the avenue in front of the Maxim hotel, when a white Cadillac stops right next to it.
In the passenger seat was Keefe D, who had a Glock. 40 He passed the gun to Deandre Smith, who was afraid to shoot. Then Orlando Anderson took the Glock and fired 13 times at Tupac , of which 2 bullets hit his chest, 1 in the arm and one in the thigh .
Suge Knight, was only hit by shrapnel and was fine Tupac, on the other hand, was taken to the University Medical Center in Las Vegas where he fought for his life in critical condition for 7 days until unfortunately he passed away on September 13, 1996 And just 6 months after Tupac's death, the day of the death of Notorious BIG arrived. He was in California for the recording of a clip of what it would be his last single in life, the song Hypnotize In the early morning of March 9, 1997, after Biggie gave a mega party that was closed by the fire department due to overcrowding , he got into his car and left in a convoy along with Junior MAFIA associates At 00:45, the car in front, where Puff Daddy and his security were, crossed an intersection while the car behind, where Biggie was, had to stop at a red light At that moment, a dark Impala SS approached and stopped beside Biggie's car. There was only the driver in this car, and he put a 9mm pistol out the window and shot the Notorious BIG 4 times, then disappeared.
Just 30 minutes later, the Notorious BIG was pronounced dead. The investigations into the deaths of Tupac and Biggie were never completed and the crimes remain unpunished . Anyway, we will now tell you the most accepted theory so far and the one that makes the most sense for most of the people involved, and for the fans.
Tupac was probably killed by Orlando Anderson, as revenge for the incident after the Mike Tyson fight, which does not exclude other motivations. Since a lot of people would benefit from Tupac's death but due to the media buzz at the time, the public's distrust fell only on the Notorious BIG who probably just wanted to rap and not to mess with dangerous people Orlando Anderson was murdered in 1998, but his uncle Keefe D is still alive and in 2018 he confessed to their participation in the murder of Tupac, according to him at the behest of Puff Daddy, who to this day denies the accusations in the case of Notorious BIG, who killed him was the assassin for hire Amir Muhammad who hired him was Suge Knight, and the target was actually Puff Daddy Who confirmed this was the former FBI agent, Phil Carson, who worked on the case for 2 years but had his investigations interrupted by his superiors In 2021, Phil Carson revealed that the investigation into Biggie's death just didn't go forward as the case was covered up by corrupt Los Angeles police officers like officers Kevin Gaines and David Mack, who are also members of the Bloods gang, and were acting in cahoots with Suge Knight And although Biggie's mother, Voletta Wallace, sued the city and LAPD over her son's death, the case was dismissed in 2010 no solution And you, do you think this theory makes sense?
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