Tupac’s Legacy is Forever Linked to Who?!
A brief reexamination of Tupac’s posthumous Pac’s Life reveals a surprising list of collaborators.
I don’t know what spurred me to listen to this album again after so many years, but what made me keep listening was hearing Nipsey Hussle rapping. I had to stop and look at my phone to make sure I wasn’t hearing things. When I heard Ludacris a couple songs later, the peculiar nature of this collaborative project had officially piqued my interest. Next thing I knew I came to, at my computer, Googling the album.
Looking at the entire track list and featured artists was like watching a salmon swim up a waterfall. It was unbelievable but I knew it was real. I sat there for a while, perplexed. Then, eventually, after realizing the ridiculousness of what I was doing, I got up and went back to doing average everyday stuff. The rest of the day though, as I was doing my average everyday stuff, I couldn’t help but crack a smile for Lil’ Scrappy.
Lil’ fuckin’ Scrappy.
Congratulations dude.
Let’s go song by song and see how we feel afterward.
1. “Untouchable” — Swizz Beatz & Krayzie Bone
Krayzie Bone, a cornerstone of the group Bone Thugs N Harmony — musical peers of Pac while he was alive — is an understandable inclusion on a posthumous Pac album. I’d rather have had the entire Bone Thugs crew but, you know, at least Krayzie was actively rapping when Tupac was. Stylistically, Krayzie and Pac lace the Swizz beat with similarly emphatic raps.
Swizz Beatz — The One Man Band Man — is one of the few hip hop producers with a resume immediately worthy of being moved to the “yes” stack when looking for producers to work on a POSTHUMOUS TUPAC ALBUM. He’s an undeniable producer. Just take a look at his pre-Pac’s Life resume:
- Ruff Ryders Anthem — DMX (1998)
- Tear Da Roof Off — Busta Rhymes (1998)
- Gotta Man — Eve (1999)
- Jigga My Nigga — Jay Z (1999)
- Party Up (Up In Here) — DMX (2000)
- Good Times — Styles P (2002)
- Hotel — Cassidy ft. R Kelly (2004)
- Bring Em Out — TI (2004)
- I’m a Hustla — Cassidy (2005)
- Check On It — Beyonce ft. Slim Thug (WAY TO GO SLIM!!) (2005)
- Spit Your Game — The Notorious B.I.G. ft. Twista & Krayzie Bone (2006)
He’s since worked with Beyoncé some more, Jay Z some more, TI, Ludacris, Alicia keys, Whitney Houston, Chris Brown, Bono, The Edge, Rihanna, Drake, 2 Chainz, Kanye and Kendrick.
From a resume standpoint, Swizz is a reasonable inclusion on this album. He and Krayzie Bone put together one of the few songs on the album that has aged “well”. What’s weird though, is how similar this song sounds to Spit Your Game, a posthumous Biggie record, produced by Swizz and rapped on by Krayzie, that came out in the same year (2006). Regardless, these two seem at home on the back cover a Tupac album. You don’t read “Untouchable (prod. Swizz Beatz) (ft. Krayzie Bone)” and think “Damn Pac really sold out in his afterlife.”
2. “Pac’s Life” — T.I. & Ashanti
TI leads a curiously large group of southern artists on this album including Ludacris, Chamillionaire and Young Buck. Why take the album in such a southern direction? Southern rap’s emergence in 2006 as popular and commercially viable? Probably. 2006 saw the likes of Young Dro, Dem Franchize Boyz, Mike Jones, The Purple Ribbon All-Stars, D4L and Yung Joc all crack the top 50 on the Billboard Hot 100. In fact, Yung Joc, Young Dro and T.I. earned a combined 17 weeks atop the Billboard hip-hop charts. That’s a third of the year!
3. “Dumpin” — Hussein Fatal, Papoose & Carl Thomas
Michael Jordan played with Kwame Brown and Popeye Jones and Tupac rapped with Hussein Fatal and Carl Thomas. I guess that makes Papoose Etan Thomas? Jordan’s Wizard years and this posthumous Tupac project actually have a striking resemblance. Both were unexpected, sold more product (tickets and albums) than their quality merited, and for most of Pac’s and Jordan’s collaborators it was the highlight of their career.
4. “Playa Cardz Right (Female)” — Keyshia Cole
5. “What’z Next” — A3 & Jay Rock
6. “Sleep” — Young Buck & Chamillionaire
While history hasn’t been overly kind to Young Buck and Chamillionaire, they both put together solid runs in rap and might still be getting after it for all I know. What I know for sure is that there was a time in the early aughts when the radio played Chamillionaire like he was going out of style. Which, I guess, he was. Still, if I were going to pick a G Unit member to feature on a Tupac album it would (obviously) be 50 Cent. And the south is full of more historically consequential and era-appropriate rappers than Chamillionaire. Bun B and Outkast come to mind. However, considering the fact that the minds behind this album were clearly very concerned with putting trendy artists on this album and that Ludacris and TI were both already in, they could have done worse than these two. It still feels weird to say “that Tupac song with Young Buck and Chamillionaire” though. Doesn’t it?
7. “International” — Nipsey Hussle & Young Dre the Truth
Not sure who Young Dre the Truth is, but he does deserve credit for being ahead of his time in terms of stage names. Looking back from the era of Chance the Rapper, Tyler the Creator and BJ the Chicago Kid, Young Dre the Truth’s visionary self-naming skills are impressive.
Nipsey’s inclusion on this album is the only home-run that the producers hit. I didn’t know about Nipsey until 2010 or ‘11. The foresight to put on young Nipsey — a future face of west coast rap — is even more impressive considering how focused on 2006 the creators of this album were.
8. “Don’t Sleep” — Lil’ Scrappy, Nutso, Yaki Kadafi & Stormy
This might be the pinnacle of the ‘WTF-ness’ of this album. Of the four guys that rap with Tupac on this record I only recognize one name. Now, in fairness, me recognizing someone’s name is not a prerequisite for them being a good artist. But Nusto & Yaki Kadafi? That sounds like something I’d get for lunch in Chinatown. And Stormy? That’s just a type of weather. I mean… c’mon man.
It’s also a little odd that one album features a song called “Sleep” and a song called “Don’t Sleep” that aren’t intentionally linked for artistic purposes. Even weirder is that the song “Sleep” starts with the words, “Don’t fall asleep.” (spoken by Pac himself). Is this some musical version of Inception? Hold on I need to check if I’m dreaming right now.
Of all the artists on Pac’s Life, Lil Scrappy might be the luckiest. In 2006, the year Pac’ s Life came out, Lil Scrappy put out his debut album following the success of Money In the Bank — a catchy and repetitive song that could serve as an anthem for the simpler times of 2000’s rap. Capitalizing on his newfound fame, Scrappy found himself rapping on a Tupac project and frankly, that’s how I will forever remember him.
9. “Soon As I Get Home” — Yaki Kadafi
Kadafi was a long time friend of Pac and a founder and member of the Outlawz. While I don’t love the song, I understand why he’s on here. His inclusion is a way to nudge the arc of history toward justice. Lil’ Scrappy’s inclusion nudges it toward strangeness, but I guess that’s why Yaki is on the album four times to Scrappy’s one.
10. “Playa Cardz Right (Male)” — Ludacris & Keon Bryce
Ludacris isn’t the first rapper name I’d say if we played “Tupac word association”, but at least his resume and established place in the cultural conscious was an excuse to include him. Plus, they put Luda on a record about having sex, which is one of his fortes.
11. “Don’t Stop” — Big Syke, Yaki Kadafi, Hussein Fatal, EDI, Young Noble & Stormy
Yaki, Hussein and Stormy are back! And this time they brought a couple friends… Young Noble and oh, Big Syke?! I know that name. This song epitomizes the efforts made to include old associates of Tupac. Honestly, an entire Outlawz album probably would have worked better. Instead they went for 1/3 Outlawz, 1/3 trending artists, and 1/3 crusty toothpaste that somehow makes it on to your brush with the fresh toothpaste and stays intact while you brush.
12. “Pac’s Life Remix” — Snoop Dogg, Chris Starr, T.I. & Ashanti
Snoop is easily the albums most appropriate featured artist. The fact that he only appears on the remix of the title track makes the rest of the album even stranger. But seeing Snoop — a contemporary of Pac and someone who played a legit role in Tupac’s rise to stardom — on here, makes me happy .
13. “Untouchable” — Yaki Kadafi, Hussein Fatal & Gravy
This song has literally the same name as the album’s opening song. Why?There are also two Playa Cardz Rights, but those were made on purpose to compliment one another. There are also two Pac’s Lifes, but one is a remix. Oddly, after you take out the two Pac’s Life songs, the two Untouchables, the two Playa Cardz Rights you only have seven songs on a thirteen song album with their own names AND THAT’S IF YOU INCLUDE SLEEP AND DON’T SLEEP. Holy Jesus this album is weird!
What exactly the executives behind this album were trying to do will likely remain a mystery. They seemed to be aiming at using Pac’s name and some known artists to sell an album that might — if it worked perfectly — catapult a couple new names into hip hop relevance.
Needless to say, they failed. But so what? Why does it matter? Why does any of this matter? It matters because legacy matters. Tupac’s legacy definitely matters.
Tupac is unique. He has as many posthumous albums as he has studio albums (five each) and was so prolific as a recording artist that the material he left behind was enough to release a new album every two years for a decade after he passed, all of which went platinum except — you guessed it — Pac’s Life.
To use the polarizing and arbitrary analogy of Mount Rushmore to illustrate the enormity of his legacy; Rap’s Rushmore has Tupac on it. I don’t care who you are. The hoops Rushmore has Jordan on it and the rap Rushmore has Pac on it. These are facts. Like other cultural icons who died in their prime, Tupac’s legend has eclipsed the fame he realized in life and has become sacred in the eyes of many. It’s a canonized mythology at this point.
Tupac may mean something different to different people, but he is almost universally beloved, and his legacy is something that is dear to music fans the world over.
Legacies are funny things though. They’re mystical and hard to talk rationally about. Especially when it comes to things like ranking and debating and awarding and all the other things that we love to do. Legacy is why people can’t put LeBron ahead of Jordan as the “Best player of all time”, and if you ever watched “His Airness” on VHS then you understand that to a certain degree. Legacies mean a lot to us. That’s why it hurts when people take shits on them. Even if they’re small-deer-turd shits that don’t completely destroy or defile them . Which is what Amaru and Interscope records did when they put out Pac’s Life. It’s a strange and mildly disturbing tinkering with a legacy that so many of us care about.
Maybe they were working with a tight budget and couldn’t get the kind of artists who would seem appropriate inclusions on a Tupac album. Did they forget about Dre? Eminem? Too Short? Ice Cube? Hell, bring Elton John back for another go with Pac. If they had the foresight to put Nipsey — an up and coming west coast artist — on the album, why couldn’t they have got Kendrick? Of course, hindsight is 20/20 and Lil’ Scrappy was bigger in ’06.
Maybe they were trying to do right by some of Tupac’s old outlaw buddies and give them the shine that was stripped from them when Pac’s actual life tragically ended. That’s my favorite theory. Call it the “WWTD (What Would Tupac Do) theory”. It seems like the right thing to do — a healing exercise of sorts.
Whatever the intention of the people behind this album, looking back from 2017, the list of featured artists — artists now, and forever, linked to Pac’s legacy — is a mind-bender. So strange is the cast of collaborators on this album that it’s hard to tell whether their head-scratching inclusion makes the album more or less listenable. Musical quality aside, I’d say the names themselves do. In the same way Baron Davis, Master P and Mark Lasry make the NBA’s Celebrity All Star Game curiously intriguing, so too do Young Buck, Yaki Kadafi and A3 make this album. It’s like watching a horse give birth. It’s pretty gross. It assaults the senses. But it’s hard to look away from and contains an element of spiritual beauty, the way unadulterated reality does when it slaps you in the face.
Amidst the twisted experience this album offers, it is easy to forget what really matters: more songs exist with Tupac raps on them now, than did before this album was a thing. Also important to remember is to be happy for Lil’ Scrappy. Framing it as “Lil’ Scrappy got to rap on a Tupac album” rather than “Tupac rapped with Lil’ Scrappy” is vitally important to living the type of positive and fulfilling life that we should all be striving for.
