Philaflava.com ::

We are approaching 20 years since the death of Tupac. I don't hold Tupac the artist as high as many people do. When I was in 8th grade and 2Pacalypse now dropped, I was so immersed in other artists that it just didn't register with me and sort of came and went. I liked If My Homies Call and Brenda's Got A Baby was compelling, especially because of the video. [Funny side note, we all used to sing it to our friend Brenda Cruz and she used to get so upset, so naturally we did it more. JHS kids are the fuckin worst! haha was thinking about that the other day] Anyway, he obviously followed it up with S4MN which aside from the singles, just didn't register with my East Coast sensibilities. The MC Breed joint was much iller to me than anything he did on that album, although I Get Around and Keep Ya Head Up are 2 classics in Hip Hop History and are tracks that I loved then and now. But then his life started getting crazy and we all know what happened.

The result of that 2 year period and subsequent jail stint (along with the attempt on his life) was Me Against The World. To me, this was Pac at his best. It encompassed everything that made him who he was to that point and he really made an album that captured his true feelings for life, both dark and light. For me, that is my favorite Pac joint. Everyone loves All Eyez on Me, and I like some of the songs, but I wasn't and never will be a fan of the most of the production and I thought that he went off on this Thug/Gangsta thing that just wasn't what I was looking for from him. The high points are great, but it was too sprawling and full of bullshit for me. I wanted him to expound on what he did on MATW, but he went the other way with the Death Row shit. Makaveli was more of the same although as with AEOM the high points were really fuckin good.

I guess I am biased being from NY and Queens so at the time I was in HS and was really on some fuck Pac shit. But as I have gotten older and went back and really discovered some of the album cuts, I def appreciate Pac much more as an artist. Especially that first album. He was speaking like a grown man about real fuckin topics and he was like 20 years old. Very impressive in retrospect.

I still don't think he was all that great of an MC in the sense of true lyricists, but his lyrics were thought provoking and meaningful. He didn't have to be super lyrical with bars to make an impact and there is something to be said about that. One of the true artists who gave you himself, and it dominated the music and made it what it was. Not many artists show the vulnerable side of themselves. I think Nas does it well too and that's why these guys resonate with so many past just the bars and the hooks.

After years of reading and watching interviews and a couple of documentaries, I think Pac the man was one of a kind. An amazing dude gone way to soon. Would love to have seen what he would have become. As I would many of the fallen artists.

Me Against The World is my favorite Pac album.

really hit his stride with THUG LIFE imo (group album). that's the first undeniable one. also the first one he really starts to contemplate death, which would become an obsession and ultimately a self-fulfilling prophecy. "bury me a G".... "how long will they mourn me".. these guys miss their homie cato. there's sadness & melancholy.

continues this on me against the world with "so many tears", but the ones that stand out to me are darker: "fuck the world", "death around the corner". now he's really thinking about his own mortality. not that the darkness consumes the album, there's lightness to balance it out.

all eyez on me is obv too long -- if it's the best pac album then BP2 is the best hov. not much i need to say, it's the album that defines him to the world. my fav is actually makaveli, which i feel like you're selling a bit short. at 12 tracks it's concise and it hits hard. nearly every joint on there is a classic. "bomb first" "hail mary" "me & me girlfriend" "to live & die in LA" "blasphemy" "krazy" "against all odds" popping out at me rn. these are powerful songs each for very different reasons, without even getting into his old conscious shit like "white man's world". these songs all mean something.

what he did better than any other rapper is convey emotion. maybe credit it to his performing arts background, but compared to a rapper like nas who tells stories through words.... pac may not be a writer on that level but when you hear him on a track it's just different. jiggaman, ghostface, game all have successful emotional tracks, but none of them are touching pac. the only rapper i'd put close is eminem.

little bit about me: i actually got into rap after my homie eastvan demolition (used to post here way back) lent me his discman with me against the world in it. the rest is history

I don't mean to sell Makaveli short, I'd put it at #3 on my list of his albums, maybe #2. Again, as someone from NY AEOM and Makaveli didn't go over well with me at the time so while I can appreciate the high points I am biased for sure. And Pac was never a favorite artist of mine so my approach at the time when listening to his music was different than most. He has mad fans that look at him the way I do Nas or Tribe. It's almost as if I am discovering a lot of his material for the first time even though I have heard it many times.

The first one I bought was "Strictly..." which is really good and (imo) kind of underrated, maybe because it's not a particularly "west coast" sounding album. Other than that I'd go with Thug Life but if I want to listen to some Pac I usually go to Dirty Harry & Vlad's 'Rap Phenomenon' mixtape.

I still really enjoy his verse on DU's 'Same Song' too.

Me Against The World is the most complete, unfiltered, unDRbiasbullshit album he has ever done. Easy Mo Bee is a god.

step one wrote:The first one I bought was "Strictly..." which is really good and (imo) kind of underrated, maybe because it's not a particularly "west coast" sounding album.

Yeah, since the thread title is "favorite," I honestly think I've listened to 2Pacalypse and Strictly more than any other Pac albums. I can recognize the later works as being more influential, more complete, better sonically and just objectively better albums, but the production and Pac's particular style on those first two records are probably the ones I go back to the most.

I chilled with Easy Mo Bee one time. Mad cool dude.

You can put favorite and best if you want. Just trying to spark the convo.

Me Against the World

Me against the world is the correct answer (Internet/Wikipedia answer) but Killuminati is the street answer (most likely to be on repeat in a trap house).

Me Against The World is damn near a perfect album.

All Eyez on Me

i dont care about the 'filler' argument, it has the best high points and there's a bunch of them.

^yeah & there's actually not that much filler. it's not like disc 1 sucks, as is the case with BP2

this thread shows why m2C is dead. no one cares about new music, and when u talk about old shit like 2pac they already "got their minds made up". half these guys saying me against the world probably haven't listend to it in two years.

EMCEE DARTH MALEK wrote:this thread shows why m2C is dead. no one cares about new music, and when u talk about old shit like 2pac they already "got their minds made up". half these guys saying me against the world probably haven't listend to it in two years.

Not sure how people not frequently listening to an album he released 21 years ago means anything in relation to people offering their opinion about their favorite album of his. And you can apply that to any artist. The guys been dead for 20 years.

It's still summer regardless of the fact that Labor day has past. And it's 2016. No doubt heads don't post as much as years past, but Social Media has obviously taken over people's time online. We can all still have discussions here, though. And I am from the outside on this Pac topic because as I said I am just starting to really enjoy some of his music all these years later, but I don't think people saying MATW is their favorite is like a knee jerk reaction or copp out for dudes. I think it's likely genuine.

I been on that Makaveli album all day and I agree that it is nothing to overlook, btw. It's dark and I really like it listening in this manner. Prefer that as a follow up to MATW rather than AEOM. But again, I'm not like you guys and MATW is certainly not my intro to Hip Hop let alone Pac. So maybe we have different opinions. You and MATW correlates to Me and Beat Street or some shit. My Mother took me and my brother to see that in the theater and my 5th bday party was GI Joe Toys and Beat Street on VHS cooking up shrinky dinks.

EMCEE DARTH MALEK wrote:this thread shows why m2C is dead. no one cares about new music, and when u talk about old shit like 2pac they already "got their minds made up". half these guys saying me against the world probably haven't listend to it in two years.

Front page got everything from the new Ka and De La to Nicki Minaj, Ezale and Young Thug so not sure what your point is. We don't have Emp bumping 6 year old threads to post a Mickey Factz freestyle or whatever but that's a good thing.

Also, absolutely no one would mind if you stopped posting

Philaflava wrote:Me Against The World is the most complete, unfiltered, unbiasbullshit album he has ever done. Easy Mo Bee is a god.

Agreed! That's my favorite album...

EMCEE GARTH MALEK wrote:half these guys saying me against the world probably haven't listend to it in two years.

I haven't listened to a 2Pac album in full since 2012. *shrugs*

Why does it matter???

EMCEE DARTH MALEK wrote:this thread shows why m2C is dead. no one cares about new music.

Considering most of the board is made up of ppl who grew up in the 80s, it would make sense we gravitate towards older music. not to mention, it's just significantly better. there is no disputing 90s music to the music of today. I listened to 2Pac just the other day fwiw.

The one where he rhymes "Hennesey" with "enemy."

pradadon wrote:

EMCEE DARTH MALEK wrote:this thread shows why m2C is dead. no one cares about new music, and when u talk about old shit like 2pac they already "got their minds made up". half these guys saying me against the world probably haven't listend to it in two years.

Not sure how people not frequently listening to an album he released 21 years ago means anything in relation to people offering their opinion about their favorite album of his. And you can apply that to any artist. The guys been dead for 20 years.

It's still summer regardless of the fact that Labor day has past. And it's 2016. No doubt heads don't post as much as years past, but Social Media has obviously taken over people's time online. We can all still have discussions here, though. And I am from the outside on this Pac topic because as I said I am just starting to really enjoy some of his music all these years later, but I don't think people saying MATW is their favorite is like a knee jerk reaction or copp out for dudes. I think it's likely genuine.

I been on that Makaveli album all day and I agree that it is nothing to overlook, btw. It's dark and I really like it listening in this manner. Prefer that as a follow up to MATW rather than AEOM. But again, I'm not like you guys and MATW is certainly not my intro to Hip Hop let alone Pac. So maybe we have different opinions. You and MATW correlates to Me and Beat Street or some shit. My Mother took me and my brother to see that in the theater and my 5th bday party was GI Joe Toys and Beat Street on VHS cooking up shrinky dinks.

man pac was just hitting his prime

yeah i've def listened to these 3 + thug life at least once this year. but tbh 90% of my rotation is albums from the past 2 years.

@phila i get that you have definitive opinions, i'm saying they're so cemented that you're not really talking about the music anymore. you're just talking about your opinion that you formed a decade ago.

@wicked i know you don't fuck with new shit. if you don't fuck with old shit, do you actually even listen to music anymore?

Thun wrote:The one where he rhymes "Hennesey" with "enemy."

HOT TAKE BRO

Livin' lavish like a playa all day

Me Against The World beats bland as fuck. They don't really suit him.

edit: of course I fuck heavily with If I Die Tonight and Old School, but that's it.

Strictly 4 my N.I.G.G.A.Z. is my favourite 2PAC album, very good energetic production by Stretch, nice mix between/hybrid pre-chronic Westcoast up tempo and East Coast sound. Almost no radio friendly songs & some dope features.

Fritz wrote:Strictly 4 my N.I.G.G.A.Z. is my favourite 2PAC album, very good energetic production by Stretch, nice mix between/hybrid pre-chronic Westcoast up tempo and East Coast sound. Almost no radio friendly songs & some dope features.

You could say with the exception of All Eyez, this album had more radio friendly songs than any of his official albums.

Holler If Ya Hear Me
Keep Ya Head Up
I Get Around

Sucks this got cut from the Thug Life album because of sample clearance:

2Pac - Fuck All Y'all (O.G version)

Philaflava wrote:

Fritz wrote:Strictly 4 my N.I.G.G.A.Z. is my favourite 2PAC album, very good energetic production by Stretch, nice mix between/hybrid pre-chronic Westcoast up tempo and East Coast sound. Almost no radio friendly songs & some dope features.

You could say with the exception of All Eyez, this album had more radio friendly songs than any of his official albums.

Holler If Ya Hear Me
Keep Ya Head Up
I Get Around

I agree with Keep Ya Head Up & I Get Around, Holler If Ya hear Me was a single but not a radio friendly one.

Yeah its a stretch, no pun intended. But Keep Ya Head and I Get Around might be his biggest singles pre-Death Row era.

While we're on the subject, I read on Wikipedia today that the Makeveli Don Killuminati album wasn't released in the UK until 2001.

Is that just a weird Wiki hiccup, or was there really a five year delay for it to officially drop overseas? Any idea why?

Nah, it's bullshit.

Philaflava wrote:Yeah its a stretch, no pun intended. But Keep Ya Head and I Get Around might be his biggest singles pre-Death Row era.

You are right about the album being the most radio friendly after A.E.O.M., my perception is a bit blurred from his numerous posthumous albums (after Makaveli).

For those interested in unreleased 2Pac originals (especially the Vault leaks): mega:///#F!3x8mBTyQ!KMLFwtbdGUvmQovUUujkhw!CodQVZpa