Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z. [PA]

Performer: 2Pac
Artist: Ice Cube; Ice-T; Live Squad; Deadly Threat; Treach; Apache; Digital Underground; D.J. Fuze; Shock G; Money B; Stretch
Distributor: BMG (distributor)

Notes: Personnel includes: 2Pac (rap vocals); Poppi, Treach, Apache, Ice Cube, Ice-T, Deadly Threat, The Black Angels, Live Squad, Wycked (vocals); Stan Franks (guitar); The Piano Man (keyboards); D.J. Fuze (programming); Pacific Heights, Shockalock, Money-B (background vocals). Producers include: Tupac Shakur, Stretch, The Underground Railroad, Big D The Impossible, Bobby "Bobcat" Ervin. Engineers: Darrin Harris, Mike Calderon, Bob Morse. Recorded at Starlight Sound, Richmond, California, Echo Sound Studio, Los Angeles, California and Unique Recording Studio, New York. Personnel: 2Pac (vocals); Black Angel, Live Squad, Shockalock, Money-B (vocals); Stan Franks (guitar); The Piano-Man (keyboards); DJ Fuze (drums); Pacific Heights (background vocals). Audio Remixer: Lea Reis. Recording information: Echo Sound Studio, Los Angeles, CA; Starlight Sound Studio, Richmond, CA; Starlight Sound, Richmond, CA; Unique Recording Studio, New York, NY; Unique Recording Studiom, New York, NY. Photographer: Jeffery Newbury. On 2Pac's debut album, 2Pacalypse Now, the rapper showed himself to be a supremely passionate man, brimming over with ideas and anger and ready to voice his political and social opinions, call things like he saw them. This same kind of energy and lyrical acumen is found on his sophomore release, Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z., a record that, while it begins exploring the MC's more gangsta side ("Last Wordz," for example, which features verses from Ice Cube and Ice-T), still includes the provocative, reflective lines on which he first made his name as a solo artist, and which he continued even as he became more and more popular (and, for some, more and more frightening). "Keep Ya Head Up," one of his biggest hits, and his tribute to black women, especially single mothers, is deeply thoughtful and poignant ("And since we all came from a woman, got our name from a woman, and our game from a woman/I wonder why we take from our women, why we rape our women, do we hate our women?"), expressing opinions that aren't often equated with hardcore rappers, while tracks like "I Get Around" brags about his sexual conquests. But this was what 2Pac was, anyway, a juxtaposition between tough and sensitive, social consciousness and misogynistic boasting, and Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z. shows this. The angry protest songs calling out police and politicians, reminiscent of Public Enemy -- and with Bomb Squad-esque beats to boot (albeit a lesser version of) -- the screw-the-world mentality, the soft introspection, the preaching-but-not-proselytizing, and the party anthems are all here, and though the production sometimes suffers, especially in the middle of the album, where it's utterly forgettable, the record shows a continually developing MC, with increasingly complex lyrical themes, well on his way to becoming nearly unstoppable. ~ Marisa Brown Although Tupac Shakur had already released one solo album after leaving Digital Underground, it was 1993's STRICTLY 4 MY N.I.G.G.A.Z. that cemented his place in the hip-hop universe. A more musically diverse and lyrically heavy album than 2PACALYPSE NOW, this set included some of Tupac's sharpest writing yet. In particular, the singles "Papa'z Song" and "Keep Ya Head Up" were early proof of the rapper's more sensitive and thoughtful side, while "Souljah's Revenge" and "Point The Finga" addressed the state of the hip-hop nation in the wake of the anti-gangsta controversies of the previous three years. Musically, the album is of a piece with the stripped-down retro-funk style that Dr. Dre was turning into the dominant sound of West Coast hip-hop, although there's one throwback to Digital Underground's loopy playfulness on the party track "I Get Around."

The Source (4/93, pp.69-70) - 3.5 Stars - Good Plus - "...a combination of '60s black political thought and '90s urban reality, 2Pac is not afraid to speak his mind....balances the gangsta tendencies of street life with insightful revelations..." Melody Maker (5/1/93, p.34) - "...[on STRICTLY] 2Pac drops rhymes that drip with the sweat of hardcore funk....this is an adventure into life on the streets of America..."

Beginning his career in the early 1990s as a member of the Oakland rap-funksters Digital Underground, 2Pac rose to become perhaps the single most controversial figure in rap music, easily equal in popularity and notoriety to Snoop Dogg on the West Coast and sometime rival Notorious B.I.G. out East. Taking his moniker from a South American revolutionary, 2Pac managed to embrace themes of black self-determination and social conscience without dulling the edge of his thug image. Achieving almost unrivalled popularity while alive, 2Pac had a penchant for religious and iconic motifs, ensuring his status as a rap martyr after his murder in 1996.

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