The East Coast–West Coast Hip Hop rivalry in the ’90s took a serious turn when Suge Knight dropped his infamous speech at the 1995 Source Awards. In his diatribe, Suge dissed The Notorious B.I.G., Diddy and Bad Boy Records as a whole in one of the most talked-about moments in Hip Hop history.
In the latest segment from his interview with VladTV, Junior M.A.F.I.A.’s Lil Cease spoke about that crazy night and how things were initially calm until Suge took the plunge and dissed the Bad Boy Records family.
“I didn’t know if [Suge] and Puff had no beef,” he said. “We didn’t know about them havin’ no issues and situations like that. We didn’t think nothin’ of it because while we was there during rehearsals and things like that, we was actually seeing them, seeing Daz [Dillinger], saying wassup to Snoop [Dogg]. Everything was all fine!”
Cease continued, “They had other issues going on in there … Bone Thugs was beefing with, I think, Death Row at that time with the Eazy-E shit, but it was cordial and mutual with us. We didn’t think nothing of the situation. We didn’t know that they was tryin’ to sign 2Pac. We didn’t know nothin’ that was goin’ on, so everything was all love until [Suge] got on that stage and said that shit.”
The Bad Boy Records family was taken aback by Suge Knight’s statements that night, with various members of the collective taking it a declaration of war. According to Cease, Biggie’s friends from Brooklyn were ready to start some trouble — but Diddy shut all of that down.
“Shit could’ve went different in there,” he remembered. “Puff being Puff, [he said] ‘Nah, we’re not going to go that route. We going to let it be.’ But nah, the Brooklyn n-ggas, the Biggie n-ggas, they was ready to get it on and poppin.’ But Big really trusted Puff and took Puff’s word.
“We just let it be. You see when Puff got on stage and did the total opposite; after the man dissed him, he got up there and was like, ‘Yo, I got love for the brother. He’s cool. Misunderstanding’ … Puff is the one that’s responsible for putting Big in the position where he at and Big saying, ‘Chill. Stand down.'”
Diddy tried his best to alleviate the tense situation by getting on stage at The Source Awards that year and expressing there was no issues between him and Suge Knight, but sadly that wasn’t enough. A year later, 2Pac was hit in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas and succumbed to his injuries days later. Biggie met the same fate when he was gunned down in Los Angeles six months later.
Lil Cease has previously said he believes Biggie and ‘Pac could’ve squashed their beef had they actually spoken to each other following the 1995 Source Awards. That was made clear last year when Cease explained how Biggie told Junior M.A.F.I.A. and other members of Bad Boy Records not to respond to Pac’s 1996 “Hit ‘Em Up” diss record.
Lil Cease Explains Why Biggie & Junior M.A.F.I.A. Never Responded To 2Pac's Brutal Diss Track
“That’s why Big didn’t make a record,” he said during an Instagram Live interview with Fatman Scoop. “At the very beginning, Big didn’t rush in and make a diss track. He was like, ‘Nah.’ He told everybody, ‘If you make a record, I’m not fuckin’ with you. Don’t call me, don’t fuck with me. If you respond to anything, you will be cut off.’
“So none of us could do it — Junior M.A.F.I.A. was ready to respond, Kim was ready to respond. But Big was like, ‘Nah, we not doing that.’ I just think Big was tryin’ to leave it open, so he could really just, ‘Yo, what’s up dawg? Like come on n-gga, you talkin’ to me. What’s up?'”
I don’t believe one word that comes out of Diddy’s mouth. If that was the case he would’ve reach out to Suge Knight and said squash the beef after Big Jake got killed. Nope by that time both these dudes egos we’re full blown and it started to spill out of control where it was involving other artists now. Diddy could’ve squash it along with Biggie by also stopping the Quad Studio Shooting in the first place since they had to have known that Jimmy Henchman had his goons waiting downstairs for Pac and then they say there all silent like they had no idea what happened on their own block. (BS) Even after the shooting,Diddy had the information on who shot Pac but didn’t bother to say anything or step in to put an end to the East Coast/West Coast Beef due to it causing his artist to being able to sell more records. The selfish fairy even offered up bounties for Death Row chains during that time period and paid for using third party intermediaries to make sure he couldn’t be tracked but c’mon now… your Diddy who ain’t gonna know who you are or affiliated with if you are coming from NYC. And then this brass idiot kept sneak dissing Pac before he died then all of a sudden had Biggie putting out subliminals throughout his whole album and freestyles especially when he had Biggie freestyle on The Wake Up Show (Long Kiss Goodnight verse) which was the last straw that pissed off many people who saw that as an ultimate sign of disrespect of a man (legend) who died 6 months prior. So even before Biggie got shot, his own head of security tried to warn him not to go out there it if we do at least increase security because there have been reports that they’re after BIG. Diddy ignored it and we all know what happened after that. But you know the messed up part, he put on this big front like he really cared about BIG like he really was his best friend and took care of him and his family but when the man died his family died get hardly anything as far as money from his estate and still don’t because Diddy still owns the majority of his master’s and the family gets chump change. So everytime a Biggie documentary comes out or a best of album collection just remember that this snake gets paid off of it. It’s what his Diddy’s estate has been kept afloat off of for decades. That man can go to hell seriously.
I’m from Harlem and I love Biggie to death but Puffy is definitely the primary reason that he’s no longer here. There’s no doubt that if Puffy was a responsible man he wouldn’t have put Biggie in those situations in the first place. You keep your ego, the streets, and the money separate always. That and Puff has rubbed to many artist here the wrong way by doing backdoor deal and knowingly not teaching them about the business in order to take advantage of them contractually. He gets no love from most of us, that’s one of the reasons why he doesn’t come around here anymore.
I’m not understanding how Lil’ Cease can say Lil’ Kim didn’t diss Tupac on a song, when in fact she DID!! And the lyric goes as follows “Who shot ya? Don’t know but they gotcha, wet up, fed up maybe next time you’ll keep your head up”. What song was this you ask Big Mama Thang feat Jay-Z and Lil’ Cease that’s why there is long instrumental before Cease comes back in.
Here’s what would’ve happened in a perfect world. Biggie would’ve reached out to Pac right when Pac begin accusing him of planning the hit that got him shot and robbed. And, Suge was a complete gangster, and very corrupt person. Noone should’ve allowed him into the industry, and especially with all the beefs. Those beefs made Suge feel impt because that’s what life he lived.
But, we aren’t in a perfect world, and it’s all behind us now. We can learn from this entire ordeal and make things better, but it doesn’t appear that we’ve done that either.
I have a feeling I’m very much in the minority in this opinion and that I’m probably gonna catch a lot of hate for what I’m going to say, but I have always felt that hip hop was never better and more entertaining than when these two factions were beefing . For that matter , whenever two prominent rappers in their peaks are going at it (Jay vs Nas , jada vs beanie , 50 vs Ja, etc) , hip hop has almost always benefitted from unforgettable music. The genre of hip hop has always been about competition and the big- pac beef took it to a level there was no going back from. Nonetheless , they were two grown adults who knew what they were getting themselves into and are now iconic figures as a result of the paths they chose . As far as I’m concerned , I’m all for more beef in hip hop and wish more rappers today weren’t so keen on being friends with each other .
Yeah, I miss the old “if you can’t take the heat, get your a$$ out the kitchen” mentality that was more prevalent in hip hop back then
I feel you, but only if they’d keep it in the realm of competition Like Jay and Nas. But these guys are killing each other.
I get where you coming from but if you didn’t know, kids are killing each other right now over raps, a patch of turf they don’t own and other lame hoods hit, that should keep your dick on hard for a long time