Diamond life ... BIG in 1995. Photograph: Mark Lennihan/AP
It passed - save out in blogworld, where it was the basis of much downloading and debates about who the greatest rapper of all time is - with little fanfare, but Friday March 9 marked the 10th anniversary of the death of the Notorious BIG.
On that day in 1997, the MC popularly known as Biggie Smalls was shot by an unknown assailant en route to his hotel after a party following the 11th Soul Train Awards in Los Angeles. He was only a fortnight away from the release of his second album, titled Life After Death, which subsequently achieved the appropriately bling "diamond" status after 10,000,000 sales.
His back catalogue hasn't been as mercilessly plundered and remixed as that of his sometime friend - and mostly enemy - Tupac Shakur, but nevertheless the posthumous albums have arrived with predictable regularity, many of them putting Biggie on tracks with artists he never even met, much less recorded with. The investigation of his death - like that of Tupac's and Jam Master Jay of Run DMC - has moved at a glacial pace, with no arrests made.
Happily, the anniversary has still been marked joyously in some quarters, via the growing popularity of hip-hop karaoke. Rap might have come late to the karaoke party, but it's making up for lost time, and Hip-Hop Karaoke NYC hosted a tribute on the 9th which saw people rapping along to the likes of Hypnotize, Juicy and other Biggie hits.
Underground rapper OC even turned up to pretend he was an amateur. Further proof of the abiding affection for Smalls will be tonight's gathering at Hip-Hop Karaoke London in a West End bar. Amid the post-work crowd having a tilt at Salt'n'Pepa's Push It and Eminem's Lose Yourself will be those lining up for a crack at edgier Biggie fare like, er, 10 Crack Commandments and Kick in the Door . Guess we'll always love Big Poppa.
