Ludacris doesn’t think there’s been many artists who have had the emotional grip as the late 2pac.
The 46-year-old rapper sat down with Cam Newton for his Funky Friday podcast for an episode published on Friday. The two talked about professionalism in the music industry and who, in Luda’s experience, exemplifies true professionalism despite the subjective nature of the term.
“So this, again, is subjective. But for me, it would be the ones like the Jay Z's. Like the 2pac's, may he rest in peace, the [Notorious] B.I.G’s. It would be in the same conversation and category of what we arguably talk about as the greats,” Ludacris said at the 14:45 mark in the video above.
“Why I say that is because you could tell that they eat, breathe, sleep, shit rap music in the studio, like, just giving a heart. And I always say… Tupac, I don't think there's any artist that's ever been that has had that type of emotional impact on human beings,” he added. “The way that he was able to just transfer what was going on in his heart through them damn speakers when you listen to it and affect people the way that he did.”
He continued, “Now, there are some people that came close, but this is just my personal opinion, man that Tupac, sheesh. But that's what I would say. Those are some of the professionals.”
However, the Atlanta rapper didn’t limit his praise to the greats from yesteryear exclusively.
“I would say today, I will put Future in that category. You could tell like it's the people … that they stay in the studio because they got something to prove to themselves. The Kendrick Lamar's, definitely J. Cole, like, these are professionals in my eyes.”
Elsewhere in their conversation, Luda recalled the differences between coming up as an artist back then compared to now and how he hustled his way into mainstream success as an independent artist by investing in himself while also working part-time at a radio station.
“The times change however the foundational elements of getting things done— I don't think they ever change and what I mean by that is I did the independent route,” said Luda. “So even though I was at that radio station I saved up enough money to put my own album out, mix and master, and pay for it.”
“I want to say it might might have took me $20,000 over for the whole Incognegro album, which later became Back for the First Time. The [album] that everybody knows with ‘What's Your Fantasy’ on there and [‘Southern Hospitality’] and [‘Ho’] and all that.”
