Legacy of the Rhyme
I share the same brother with Tupac Shakur. Tupac was one of the biggest Hip-Hop artists in the 1990s and is one of Hip-Hop's biggest legends. From his stardom, he formed the group Thug Life with his brother Mopreme Shakur, Big Syke, and Macadoshis. Tupac had a wide variety of music hits that touched on many subjects. He was an activist for social equality and a humanitarian for education who had one of the biggest impacts on modern culture. His untimely death in 1996 at age 25, left the world in confusion and sadness.
Turned to Thug Life
In 1997, I had an apartment with my cousin Winston in the San Fernando Valley off of DeSoto Avenue. Back in those days surviving Los Angeles was hard but we always had enough. My sister and my brother-in-law Jay lived down the street where I would play John Madden Football in my spare time. One day some friends who we played basketball with said that Mopreme lived down the street from us and wanted to give me some tips & advice on music. I just finished my first album called “From the Far East”, an album based off of inexperience and dreams alone.
I was living the fast life as a teen so everything literally happened lightning fast that I found myself a few days later in front of Mopreme Shakur, a rapper I looked up to from Thug Life. The first day we met we all drank Hennessy VSOP and passed around countless Swisher Sweets. I was just waiting for my moment to ask about his experiences and for some advice in the music business. I soaked up all of the advice from that first day and a bond was created. Over the next few years though we had both moved I would frequently visit Mopreme and he would continue to mentor me about the streets of Los Angeles and its music business.
Over the years in our brotherly bond, we would discuss street politics and motivational philosophies. One of those priceless philosophies he taught me was that Tupac used to quote, “If you can't do it, then you're just not on the record.” A young artist or musician could interpret this in many ways but I was lucky enough to have had years with Mopreme to study this in-depth. The core of its meaning is “whether you have 1 hour or 1 year with an urgent task, you must rise beyond your maximum limit and deliver a victory.” In our case, we are using it in terms of music production and the steps needed to take a song to final production (the victory).
I used to accompany Mopreme during his sessions in Los Angeles’ legendary Can-Am recording studios and watch this philosophy at work. In his recording sessions, there would be bottles of Hennessy being shared by numerous rappers who were either there with his label or rappers who were known around Los Angeles. In those days, though I was working on my own project, I was with Mopreme more as family support and the extra ears for the songs.
Whenever Mopreme would have a feature on a song, all the rappers in the session would indirectly compete for the feature spot. When he wanted them to write faster and work harder he would say, “If you can't do it then you're just not on the record.” Sometimes he would say to them he was going to put me on the records, which pushed all the rapper even harder. We used to joke and laugh about how none of those rappers wanted to be out rapped by an Asian rapper.
Carrying on a Legacy
No one can deny the massive impact Tupac and his Thug Life Legacy had on The United States and its culture in the 1990s. The world would later be introduced to Tupac’s brand commercially after his passing. Over a decade after those nights with Mopreme at Can-Am recording studio, Tupac Shakur and Thug Life t-shirts were abundant in Asian countries. This helped carry their music and ideas to young international audiences who may not have been alive when Tupac was. MP3 downloads and iTunes from Apple allowed access to Tupac's music internationally when some of these resources weren't easily available before 1996.
In 2008, Mopreme flew to Bangkok for a visit and I was able to show him how Thug Life was a part of pop culture in Thailand. I showed him that all the young Thai kids listen to Tupac and how they related Thug Life to surviving the struggle. Over a few days time I showed Mopreme Bangkok, Thai cuisine, and the Thai culture. Close to the end of his trip, we were in a taxi late evening fighting through the Bangkok traffic to get to the recording studio. I saw him stare out of the window with a bit of a sorrowed look on his face and asked him what was wrong? He replied, “I wish Pac was still alive to see all of this, he would have loved the warmth of the people.”
We arrived at Vintage Studios for a scheduled two-song session. The first song was for Malaysia’s DJ Fuzz and we finish that with no problems in under 2 hours. When it was time to begin the second song Mopreme noticed half of the page he needed had been ripped out (yes we’re old school writing in notebooks). I was ready to call an end to the session when Mopreme grabbed me by the shoulder and asked, “How important is this record to you?” I replied that it meant the world to me.
Mopreme told everyone to give him 30 minutes so he could take some lines from memory and write new lines to complete his verse. I asked back, “Are you cool with that? Can you do that?” His response was priceless and golden to my ears. He answered, “Well if I can’t, then I’m just not on the record.”
One of my Greatest Lessons
“If you can’t then you’re just not on the record.” A quote and ideal from Tupac Shakur taught to me by one my greatest mentors, Mopreme Shakur. I wanted to share one of my greatest lessons for every young artist out there with a dream. Remember that its core meaning is “whether you have 1 hour or 1 year with an urgent task, you must rise beyond your maximum limit and deliver a victory.” That night at Vintage Studios Mopreme delivered two victories and our song from that night, “A Thug’s Life” is one of them my favorite songs I've ever completed.
In this lesson additionally, two major details would be to continuously work on setting new higher self-standards in your craft and master your skills to perfection. This will only allow you to optimize every opportunity you receive on your journey to completing your life goals, whatever they may be. These two details are important because no one wakes up one day and are the best at anything. Your favorite superstars practiced years to lifetimes, in various skills to reach their dreams. You may not be doing a song with Drake tomorrow but one day, you may be in studio D and you run across him in Studio A. If your skills are perfected then you may have the greatest opportunity to be "on that record."
I hope one of the greatest lessons I've learned in music helps all of you complete everything you begin, on the path to reaching your dreams. In times you need the motivation to get out of stagnation, just close your eyes and visualize Tupac Shakur passionately yet almost angrily telling you, “If you can’t do it, then you’re just not on the record.” Then get up, get out, and go get something.
Reincarnate in Paradise: Tupac, Afeni Shakur, and Big Syke
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