Gimme the Loot, however, is the most impressive track. Suicidal Thoughts – the album’s closer – delivered a call for help and a gunshot to end the album. Everyday Struggle’s theme is made clear in its title, while Ready to Die itself reflected Wallace’s desolate life choices. It is hardcore hip-hop, rooted in the New York streets, with a bleakness that is found throughout his 2004 album. Gimme the Loot is far more representative of Ready to Die than Juicy or Big Poppa.

He boasts about his lavish lifestyle and namedrops luxury brands – which would become one of hip-hop’s predominant themes.

Big Poppa – one of Wallace’s many nicknames – is also, against all odds, a ladies’ man, despite the fact that he was married. Big Poppa portrays a surprisingly lovable character, even if he does seem to be Hollywood’s idea of a Mafia kingpin. It’s backed by a sample of Mtume’s Juicy Fruit that gives an uplifting touch to the rapper’s rags-to-riches tale.īiggie’s second single was an immodest introduction that was unnecessary, given the success of his Juicy debut single and his album, Ready to Die. They were exaggerations, but they added drama to the tracks and revealed a gift for storytelling. His lyrics told of extreme struggle, near-starvation and missed Christmases. He began rapping as a teenager, and after leaving jail adopted the name Biggie Smalls and released a freestyle mixtape. He went on to have various run-ins with police and a stint in prison in 1991 for dealing drugs. He was born on in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighbourhood of Brooklyn, where he lived with his mother.

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