The Revolutionary Roots That Inspired Tupac Shakur
Reveal
The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX
4.7 • 218 Ratings
🗓️ 3 June 2026
⏱️ 41 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
More To The Story: It’s impossible to overstate rapper Tupac Shakur’s influence on music and culture in the 1990s. One of the era’s bestselling musical artists, Tupac helped define West Coast hip-hop through vulnerable, introspective lyrics and Black power politics. By his own admission, sports writer Jeff Pearlman is not the rapper’s likeliest biographer. But as he waited for what he called “the big, fat biography” of Tupac, his impatience and long-standing fascination with the rapper got the best of him. So he set out to write it himself. On this week’s episode, Pearlman talks about his book Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur; discusses how Tupac’s Black Panther mother, Afeni Shakur, shaped her son; and examines the nuance and mystery surrounding Tupac’s life and death almost 30 years later.
Producer: Josh Sanburn | Editor: Kara McGuirk-Allison | Theme music: Fernando Arruda and Jim Briggs | Copy editor: Nikki Frick | Digital producer: Artis Curiskis | Intern: Joni Binder | Deputy executive producer: Taki Telonidis | Executive producer: Brett Myers | Executive editor: James West | Host: Al Letson
Read: The 24 Best Books We Read in 2025 (Mother Jones)
Listen: Baltimore Mayor to Trump: Don’t Send Your Troops (More To The Story)
Read: Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur (Mariner Books)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Tupac viewed himself as a revolutionary. |
| 0:05.0 | And Tupac always carried with him the Black Panther ethos, standing up for your people, |
| 0:10.0 | self-reliance, black empowerment. |
| 0:14.0 | He got that from his mom. |
| 0:16.0 | Coming up on more to the story, a conversation with author Jeff Perlman about Tupac Shakur, |
| 0:21.3 | his role in hip hop, his movies, and the legacy he left behind way too soon. Stay with us. |
| 0:31.9 | Want to make a lasting difference to reveal and protect independent journalism right now? |
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| 0:42.8 | Hi, it's Jane Butcher from Boulder, Colorado. |
| 0:46.0 | I've spent my life fighting for justice, which is why I'm a longtime supporter of Reveal |
| 0:51.8 | and the Center for Investigative Reporting. |
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| 1:21.4 | Your legacy gift of any size makes an impact, not just in the future, but right now. If you'd |
| 1:27.4 | like to join me or want to learn more, please reach out to GIFS at RevealNews.org. |
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| 1:38.6 | The Legacy Challenge is only available for a limited time. |
| 1:42.4 | Stand up for the truth today. |
| 1:50.0 | September 13, 1996 is a day that I will always remember. The world lost a tremendous talent. |
| 1:59.0 | rapper, actor, and activist Tupac Shakur died six days after |
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