In 1996, New York radio personality Angie Martinez flew to Los Angeles for an interview with Tupac Shakur. The conversation originated with the rapper, who suggested it be hosted in his home. There were some things he wanted to get off of his chest. Some parts of the conversation made Martinez feel uneasy at the thought of airing them, so she shared select segments but kept most of the conversation buried at the time. A few months later, Shakur was murdered. Now, Martinez is brushing the dust off of one of the rapper’s final interviews with The Tupac Tapes.
The four-part podcast series hosted by Martinez will premiere Nov. 27 on Netflix. It will mark the first time her complete interview with Shakur is heard by the public, 30 years after it took place. “There were things said in that conversation that could have hurt people, damaged relationships, and added fuel to an already dangerous situation,” Martinez told Tudum. “I chose not to release the more inflammatory parts. After Pac died, it became even more complicated. I felt a responsibility to protect something that was never meant to become his final statement.”
Martinez began her career at Hot 97, a staple in New York media. The parts of the interview she did air at the time spotlighted Shakur’s insistence that, despite what the hip-hop landscape might have suggested at the time, he wasn’t at war with the entire East Coast. The official trailer for The Tupac Tapes offers a glimpse into the parts that were omitted.
“I’ve done more for credibility in hip-hop than any fucking artist,” Shakur says in one clip. In another, he pushes back on Martinez, who’d started to say there were people who showed him love, before the rapper cut her off. “Where’s the fucking love?” he asked. “Just because they didn’t kill me? What love?”
When Shakur was killed shortly after, at the age of 25, Martinez was on shift at the station and shared the news on air. “It was one of the most emotional moments of my career,” she said. “I think about that whenever I think about the real human cost of everything that was happening. More than anything, I hope people leave with a greater sense of empathy. Because behind all the headlines, the records, the rivalries, and the mythology, there were real people. And the consequences were real.”
Last month, former Compton gang leader Duane “Keffe D” Davis, was sentenced to 40 years to life in prison after being convicted of orchestrating the September 1996 murder of Shakur amid escalating East Coast-West Coast rap rivalries.
The Tupac Tapes will include appearances from hip-hop experts and figures including Dream Hampton, RZA, Big Boy, Joe Budden, Charlamagne tha God, Monie Love, Bootleg Kev, Erica Ford, and more who will help contextualize the decades-old interview. In deciding who would take on that role, Martinez wanted to prioritize “people who were there, people who understood the culture, people who had different relationships with Pac, and people who could challenge the way we remember that time.”
Speaking about the decision to release the tapes, Martinez said, “They’re a piece of hip-hop history, and I don’t think they should just sit in my possession forever. The difference now is that I have the opportunity to share them with context. Not just play the most explosive moments and let people react, but really examine what was happening, why it was happening, and what we can understand differently today.”
