A new series of Slow Burn re-examines the deaths of two of music’s biggest stars. ‘We still haven’t had closure,’ says its host
On the night of 29 November 1994, Tupac Shakur arrived at a recording studio in New York. Having risen to stardom via his debut album 2Pacalypse Now and 1993 commercial breakthrough Strictly 4 My NIGGAZ, the Californian rapper was now on trial for possession of illegal weapons and sexual assault after a woman accused him and his entourage of raping her in a
New York hotel room 12 months earlier. The jury was almost ready to deliver its verdict, and the planned recording session – with Brooklyn MC Little Shawn – promised a brief respite from these legal woes, and to net the rapper a much-needed $7,000.
But as Tupac entered the lobby at Quad Studios, three waiting gunmen opened fire. He survived, and accused New York gangsta rap figurehead Christopher “Biggie Smalls” Wallace of setting up the hit. This ignited a conflict between hip-hop’s east and west coast factions that would outlive its key protagonists; Tupac was shot dead in September 1996 and Biggie was killed in a drive-by the following March. Both murders remain unsolved.