They knew more about East Coast and West Coast “beef” than I did, and they taught me to really listen. Naturally, they avidly subscribed to African American culture and hip hop. I talked about this incident in a poem called On kindness (commissioned by Andy Craven Griffiths) but what happened next is what deepened my appreciation of Tupac. When I confirmed so, she played Do for Love to the class, making them listen in silence as she and I nodded to beat and lyrics. Some days later, in an astonishing show of solidarity, the teacher asked if I was a fan of Tupac’s work. In my first English class, I raised my had offering to read from the text we were studying, and the whole class laughed at me. There was a belief that Africans could not read, that Black People where backwards and animalistic. After the painful discovery (and experience) of racism in London, I moved to Dublin where things were far worse. Dublin was in its infancy regarding race relations. I began listening, and the more I listened, the more poetry, craft, artistry, flow, voice - the sheer blend of it all - began to grow in me. It seemed he had posthumously conjured my friend in his song. His name was Jack, and later on in Change, at 3.30 exactly, Tupac says: In the song, the line “They get jealous when they see you with your mobile phone” was what pulled me into listening to the lyrics, because a close friend of mine had had his first mobile phone stolen as I waled beside him. In 1998, two years after the had passed, two years after I had been in London, perhaps she most famous song, Changes, was released. On September 7, 1996, Shakur was shot four times by an unknown assailant in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas he died six days later and the gunman was never captured. Shakur became heavily involved in the growing East Coast–West Coast hip hop rivalry between 19. This was because I was ignorant to many things, racism, inequality, desperation and rage. I enjoyed music and melody, but I couldn’t understand why in hip hop, the dudes talking over the music seemed to be constantly angry. The following year, 1996, I moved to London, and I still didnt really get hip hop. Shakur achieved further critical and commercial success with his follow-up albums Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z (1993) and Me Against the World (1995).
By the time he released his debut album 2Pacalypse Now in 1991, he had become a central figure in West Coast hip hop, introducing social issues into the genre at a time when gangsta rap was everywhere. I to Lagos, Nigeria, I was 9 years old and I still didn’t know who he was. When he moved to Los Angeles in 1993 to further pursue his music career. At this time, I was a 4 year old rugrat in Jos, Nigeria, unaware of him. He was born in Manhattan, New York City, but moved to San Francisco in 1988.
In his music, he addressed social issues that continue to plagued inner cities, and he is considered a symbol of resistance and activism against inequality. He is considered to be one of the most influential rappers of all time. Better known by his stage name 2Pac, and by his alias, Makaveli, he was an American rapper and songwriter. Tupac Amaru Shakur was born on Jand he died on September 13, 1996.