Saw this and felt like sharing

There are some other important factors to note as well. Firstly- hip hop in 1994 had transitioned to a place where it was known in the “mainstream” but it was still not “mainstream.” It was a controversial genre, often not considered legitimate music, kids were often forbidden to listen or buy albums, some places like schools openly banned the art from, and even if not banned many tracks were too obscene or profanity laced to get away with. Add in that the digital age had come around yet and you had to catch songs on the radio/MTV, or go get a physical copy at a store- and basically it was just harder to find out about and listen to music then than now.

Looking at Tupac’s catalog, we can see that many of the “club songs” and the like he might be known by a wider audience for are only a fraction of his work. The “party anthem” California Love beat out Keep Ya Head Up, Mamma, Brenda’s Got a Baby, and many of his other songs which were less light hearted and had more depth. So it isn’t even that in the present people would prefer “superficial” music to deeper songs- even with his own songs the more “dancable” ones tended to be more popular. Also factor in that when censored for profanity etc such as a “radio edit” many tupac songs become quite distorted.

@famousone- always.

Another factor to consider, Tupac died before the internet became mainstream and as such wasn't making new music to get people to click on and be like "to what's dis dudes other music sound like"

Very true. Back then just about the only way to reach the masses with music asides word of mouth was Radio and MTV- and many Tupac songs were deemed inappropriate for public airwaves and either needed to be heavily censored- or some not played at all due to subject matter. Tupac was killed right as his career seemed to be really taking off, and shortly before the internet would become a relatively household thing. I can’t stress enough to those who weren’t alive how much being able to download music online changed things- especially in the early days of free music sharing. People could and would listen to things and be exposed to things they never would have heard and very likely wouldn’t have paid to take a chance on.

Radio stations tended to be much more conservative with their musical selections and stations tended to be much more focused on a single type of music that was targeted to a fan base. Songs didn’t cross genres as much as they do today where a pop station might play a popular mainstream country song or rock song etc. rap was on rap stations- uncommonly mixed with R&B. People who didn’t listen to those stations wouldn’t be likely to have a rap song come up on their usual station if they weren’t already a fan, and the average person was less likely to have this eclectic taste as they were to stick within a certain genre sphere.