Tupac Amaru Shakur

    Tupac Amaru Shakur was born June 16th 1971 in Brooklyn, New York and was the son of two Black Panther members, and his mother was actually pregnant with her son while being held in a New York prison. As a teenager Tupac studied at the Baltimore School Of Arts, before he moved to Marin City, California with his family and began hustling on the streets. His first appearance on the hip-hop scene came with a brief spell as part of Digital Underground, but it was with his 1991 debut 2Pacalypse Now that he announced himself as one of rap's newest talents, while gaining censure from various quarters for the album's explicit lyrical content. He gained his first crossover success in July 1993 with "I Get Around". The platinum-selling album which housed it, Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z. offered a rare degree of insight, with glints of wisdom like in Last Wordz which said "United we stand, divided we fall, they can shoot one nigga, but they can't shoot us all". To further his views he ran the Underground Railroad network for troubled teenagers in his native Oakland, California.

    In 1992 he was arrested  when a fight he was involved in resulted in the accidental death of a six-year-old boy, although the charges were later dismissed. He was accused in October 1993 of involvement in the shooting of two plain clothes policemen (later dismissed), and one count of forceful sodomy of a female fan. He was already on bail for an outstanding battery charge for allegedly striking a woman who asked for his autograph, and had also been arrested in Los Angeles for carrying a concealed weapon and assaulting a driver. Further controversy followed when a tape of 2Pacalypse Now was found in the possession of a man arrested for murder. Tupac was found guilty of the sexual assault in November 1994, but the following day  was shot and robbed in the lobby of Quad Studios in New York's Times Square. Tupac later accused Biggie Smalls (the Notorious B.I.G.), Andre Harrell and Sean "Puffy" Combs of involvement in  the shooting, directly leading to the east coast/west coast feud that would eventually result in the deaths of both the Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac himself.

    Following the shooting incident, Tupac was sentenced to four and a half years in jail on February 7th, 1995. The epic Me Against The World was released while he was serving his sentence, but still debuted at number 1 in the US charts. Meanwhile, Marion "Suge' Knight, president of hip-hop's most successful label Death Row Records, had arranged parole for Tupac, who eventually served only eight months of his sentence. Newly signed to Death Row, Tupac released the 1996 record All Eyez On Me, which entered the main Billboard US chart at #1. The reviews were both supportive and outstanding, and the album sold over six million in its first year, and generated a hit single with the Dr. Dre duet "California Love'. During the same year, Tupac began concentrating on his acting career again, appearing in Bullet and Gridlock'd with Tim Roth. Further drama came when he was gunned down in Las Vegas on September 8th after watching the Mike Tyson vs.Bruce Seldon fight at the MGM Grand, and died five days later. Various explanations were given, including the theory that the Notorious B.I.G. arranged the shooting after Tupac had bragged about sleeping with his wife, Faith Evans. The east coast/west coast rivalry continued after his death, leading to the Notorious B.I.G."s murder in similar circumstances six months later. In a further twist, Orlando Anderson, the chief suspect in Tupac's murder, was shot dead on  May 29th, 1998.