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The Maroon.
May 01, 1997
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The Maroon., May 01, 1997, Image 12
Funding for the digitization of this title was provided by a Digitizing Hidden Collections grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR). The grant program is made possible by funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
About The Maroon. (Atlanta, GA) 1996-???? | View Entire Issue (May 1, 1997)
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Newspaper Page Text
by ricky d. mercer
contributing writer
BIGGIE ’S Death and the State of Hip Hop
F irst 2Pac, now Biggie. Killers aren't
satisfied with just killing the aver
age brother anymore. Now
they've moved up to the high profile
brothers. It's a damn shame, but think
about it: what can we all say about
Biggie's death that we didn't say when
2Pac got killed? "Uh—we need to stop
the violence." Or "uh—all this senseless
violence has got to stop." This whole
thing is stupid to me. We got rappers,
good rappers, dropping like flies, and
then the hardcore rappers, like
everybody's favorite gangster rapper
turned preacher rapper turned gangster
rapper again (Ice Cube), canceling con
certs in their own hometowns because
they're afraid. They're afraid that the
real gangsters that they glamorize are
going to come after them! What the hell
has Hip Hop come to? Good rappers
getting killed in their prime while the
wack ones run scared and keep making
records! And MTV has the gall to dis
Biggie on the DL when they were report-
mention his weight.
The most tragic thing
about Biggie's death was
that it came when he was
saying the most positi
things in his career. He's
taking it upon himself to
do his part in squashing
this whole East Coast-
West Coast thing,
preaching unity, and
he's gunned
dally if they're on Bad Boy Records,
and he's showing love. And his re
ward is a clip full of bullets and
a one-way ticket to the morgue.
Hip Hop's got nowhere to
go but up from all of this.
Maybe since
The most tragic thing about Biggie's death was that it came
when he was saying the most positive things in his career.
He's taking it upon himself to do his part in squashing this
whole East Coast-West Coast thing, preaching unity, and he's
gunned down.
ing the memorial service in Brooklyn.
The man is dead but the reporter goes
out of his way to say that his "300 lb
body was shipped to New York."
Shipped, like he's a side of beef or a spe
cial extra large package. When Curt
Cobain blew his own brains out he
wasn't "shipped" anywhere—he was
sent —and they for damn sure didn't
Not to disgrace the dead, but at least
2Pac had gravitated back into his old
hating, negative self when he was
killed. I miss his lyrical skills and his
delivery, but I'm not going to miss hear
ing how the west side is the best side.
(Sorry, I'm not from California.) And
Biggie's in L.A., which is enemy terri
tory for anybody from New York, espe-
Page iii
are actually dying now rappers will stop
talking about killing people and start
getting back to what rap originally was:
a mouthpiece for the young Black expe
rience. We don't all live in ghettos, and
those that do don't always sell drugs
and shoot people. We go to parties, we
have fun with our boys, we discuss life
and our futures, and some of us even
fall in love. I hate to see Biggie go, es
pecially when he was on such a posi
tive tip, but hopefully Hip Hop will
grow because of it and get better.
May 11997/
The Maroon
