Jay-Z was dissed by Tupac in 1996 and now years later Outlawz member E.D.I. Mean explains perhaps why Shakur took aim at the Brooklyn rapper.
Fresh out on bail and on his new home of Death Row records, Tupac was clearly on a mission. Poised to come back 50 times stronger and take down his competition, Tupac wasn’t holding back. Clearly his intended target lyrically was the Notorious B.I.G. and the entire Bad Boy camp.
Tupac and the Outlawz addressed Biggie and accompany in arguably hip hop’s greatest diss record of all time, Hit ‘Em Up. Closing out the song, Tupac made it very clear that others who sided with Biggie were on the hit list.
“When I came out I told you it was just about Biggie, then everybody had to open their mouth with a motherf****** opinion. Well this is how we’re gonna do it, f*** Mobb Deep, f*** Biggie. F*** Bad Boy as a staff, record label and as a motherf****** crew and if you wanna be down with Bad Boy then f*** you too,” said Tupac closing out Hit ‘Em Up.
Chino XL was also mentioned on the diss record, while Nas and Jay-Z were dissed on other songs. On Tupac’s posthumous release, Hov was dissed on the record All Out. “You got a lot of nerve to play me, Another g** rapper, bustin’ caps to Jay-Z,” rapped Tupac.
Appearing on Cam Capone News, Outlawz member E.D.I. Mean who, was featured on All Out, revealed why Tupac decided to diss the Brooklyn rapper.
“It really had to do with their affiliation. The fact that it was a green light on BIG and so at that time it was a green light on anybody standing next to him. And when I say green light, I mean on some rap s**,” said E.D.I. Mean.
Indeed the two rappers were showing their allegiance. Biggie Smalls was featured on Brooklyn Finest off Hov’s debut album Reasonable Doubt. This is the record where Biggie dropped the infamous Tupac bar, “If Faith have twins, she’d probably have two Pacs (Uh), Get it? 2 Pac’s? (Uh, uh, uh).”
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E.D.I. also believed Tupac and Biggie would have squashed their beef, stating Tupac was “over” the beef. “I will say this, after Tupac came back from New York, especially with the One Nation project, he had started to wanna put a lot of that s*** to bed. Like, ‘Aight, I’m over it.’ And so I think there could have been a pathway to reconciliation,” E.D.I. explained in the 8-minute clip.
