| "I Wonder If Heaven Got a Ghetto" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by 2Pac | ||||
| from the album R U Still Down? (Remember Me) | ||||
| B-side | When I Get Free | |||
| Released | September 21, 1997 | |||
| Format | 12" single | |||
| Recorded |
1993 (Original Version) 1996 (Remix) |
|||
| Genre | Rap | |||
| Length | 4:40 | |||
| Label | Interscope Jive Records Amaru Entertainment |
|||
| Writer(s) | T. Shakur, D.K. McDowell, Larry Troutman, Lawrence Goodman, Roger Troutman | |||
| 2Pac singles chronology | ||||
|
||||
"I Wonder If Heaven Got a Ghetto" is the first posthumous single by 2Pac. It appears on his album R U Still Down? (Remember Me). The original was also released as the B-side on the "Keep Ya Head Up" single.
There are two versions of the song on the R U Still Down? (Remember Me) album. One is an OG Vibe (remake of the original, using the same sample); the other is a "hip-hop remix" version which was recorded while he was on Death Row and intended for the album. They are both different from the original version that was featured on the "Keep Ya Head Up" single.
The song title originally came from the lyrics of fellow West Coast Rapper Spice 1, of the 1992 song "Welcome to the Ghetto."
Portions of the lyrics were later re-used and remixed for the single "Changes" which appeared on 2Pac's Greatest Hits compilation released in 1998.
Rapper Nas sampled "I Wonder if Heaven's Got A Ghetto" in his song "Black President" on his untitled 2008 album. The line "And though it seems heaven sent/We ain't ready to have a black president" is used repeatedly as the chorus.
Contents |
In the Lionel C Martin directed music video, the perspective is a first-person viewpoint of Shakur. After being shot, he stumbles to a nunnery in fictional Rukahs, New Mexico. ('Rukahs' spelled backward is 'Shakur'.) The license plate of the car that Shakur gets in with the older man reads "61671", which references Shakur's birthday on June 16, 1971. The room he goes into with the girl is room number 7. The clock in the background at the end is set to 4:03, the same time Shakur officially died. At the end, he goes into Amaru Diner, Amaru being his middle name.
In the first 5 seconds "...rapper Tupac Shakur shot multiple times" is heard from the helicopter.
The video also features several notable figures. Mother Teresa is seen getting on a bus, and already on the bus are Jimi Hendrix, Martin Luther King Jr., a Black Panther Party member, and Elvis Presley. In the bar, Ray Charles is playing the piano.
| Charts (1998) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| New Zealand (RIANZ)[1] | 11 |
| US Billboard Hot 100[2] | 67 |
| US Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs (Billboard)[3] | 14 |