Tupac vs Jay-Z - What Really Happened

Tupac didn’t have as big a feud with Jay Z as he did with The Notorious B.I.G., but the two were definitely at odds at one point.

2Pac's beef with JAY-Z started after 2Pac heard the rumor that JAY-Z was dissing the West Coast. After 2Pac recorded his verses for "Hit 'Em Up" he added a message at the end of the song.
He was dissing JAY-Z before he took it off the record.

2Pac wanted to hear JAY-Z' album "Reasonable Doubt" before he decided to diss him.


"Reasonable Doubt" had 2 songs that Pac took offense to: "Brooklyn's Finest" (with Biggie) and "22 Two's".

Pac decided to diss JAY-Z on the Makaveli album, he passed away before the album was released. JAY-Z disses 2Pac after he heard "The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory" and after his opponent passed away. He recorded a song called "D*ad Or Alive" in which he responds to Pac's "Bomb First".

2Pac had already recorded about 10 songs to respond to a possible response from JAY. Even a decade after their beef ended you still hear a new song coming out every year that could be a diss against JAY-Z.

You might recall, Pac -- who d*ed in 1996 -- dissed Hova on the posthumous “B*mb First (My Second Reply)” and "F**k Friendz." Apparently, Jigga was prepared for a war of words with Shakur, as well. At least that’s what DJ Clark Kent, a longtime JAY-Z producer, told A Waste Of Time With ItsTheReal during an interview published Wednesday (Aug. 12).

"It never came out out of respect for the fact that he d*ed," Kent said. "Jay did a record going at Pac, but just as it was about to come out, son d*ed...We performed it, though. We performed it once. You have to understand. The chip on Jay’s shoulder is so crazy, it’s just like he had to perform it.”

According to Kent, Jigga played the cut during a show at The Apollo in Harlem. “It was scathing,” he said. "Crowds was like, ‘Oh, sh*t.’ It was super hard. If he was alive, there would have been no coming back...This was so tough. To me, it probably was one of the hardest dis records I’ve ever heard.”

Although they didn't see eye-to-eye at the time, Hova's perspective changed after the "California Love" MC's d*ath. Jay -- who later sampled Tupac's "Me And My Girlfriend" for his Beyoncé-assisted "'03 Bonnie & Clyde" single -- would go on to say he held no ill will towards Shakur.

"It was nothing personal," the Roc boss told MTV News in 2007. "We never met. You know, he and Big went through their thing.