Ok, this is gonna be loooooooong but I feel like saying it all at the same time for once so I can use this for future reference when people are talking 'bout 2pac wasn't a technically gifted rapper:
The 'secret' was that, despite having the reputation of not being as lyrical as some other rappers and relying more on his passion and charisma, in reality he was one of if not the most technically gifted emcees of all time. People just overlook all the different techniques 2pac incorporated in his style because they take the quality of his tracks for granted and they assume it has to do solely with him being such an extraordinarily lively person. While his 'passion' added a lot to his music obiously, it's only half the story.
2pac steadily created a unique style over the years and managed to noticeably develop his artistic abilities further with each year. There are many aspects to his style which he often gets mocked for now simply because they are so characteristic of his own and immediately associated with him. The most famous example being his own particular vocabulary of general words such as thug, enemies, foes, pain, struggle, black male, nine, lord etc. Then there is the famous elongating of his syllables. It's often mocked by his detractors but it made his verses sound great. This immediately creates a certain tone to his songs which is instantly recognizable. He talked a lot about the hood on an observational level, speaking on his own experiences in general terms. This makes it easy for people to relate to him. Shakespeare had a very particular vocabulary in all of his work as well (though obviously a much bigger vocabulary than Pac) which he used to talk about the world in general terms as well. It makes your words applicable to many situations and therefore easy to relate to.
Then, a very underrated aspect of Pac's influence, is his use of multiple vocal layers. He may not be the very first in hip hop to do it (though I couldn't really give you the name of the first person to do it) but he certainly took it to a whole new level and singlehandedly made it an acceptable and popular technique. I think the way he used the extra vocal layers to emphasize his words and add extra emotion to the track was just a brilliant invention (meaning, being the first to use it to such an extent) of his and one of the technical aspects of his songs which may be overlooked as to why his songs seem to have more expression in them than other rappers' songs. It's not just his character, it's the emphasis he put on his words using this technique among others which made his stories and lines come alive.
Then there is the overall combination of literary techniques which he used which I think is underrated. He was one of the first to make heavy use of alliteration on a consistent basis, which can make an ordinary line sound much better to the ear, and he also used a lot of assonance in the middle of his lines which is something that, even though it's not rhyming as many syllables at the end of your bars for several bars as other rappers may do, makes the whole of your line interesting because the rhyme scheme is switched up more frequently which keeps it from getting repetitive. Pac seldom would rhyme the same end word for more than 4 or 5 bars which is what more reknowned 'lyrical' rappers often do. Instead, he switched up the rhyme scheme very quickly which made it less predictable as to which words he was gonna rhyme. Hard to explain the effect of this in words really.
Then there is his delivery, which is of course famous for its passion. But at the same time, and this usually goes uncredited, delivery is as much about technique as it is about being 'passionate' or 'charismatic'. It's not just about being able to put emotion into your words (as 2pac was trained to do in his acting classes at the school of arts), it's also about choosing which words to emphasize and which emotions to put into them. The way you vary these combinations can change the meaning of the story you're telling. 2pac was a master at knowing which words to emphasize in what particular way. The proof of this is to listen to alternate takes of the same verse where you can clearly hear huge differences in delivery. He didn't try to deliver the words the same way every time but instead tried different ways of delivering them, some of them doper than others. You don't usually hear these different takes though (since Pac often only did one take and nailed it on the first one) so it's hard to appreciate that it were the decisions he made on the spot in the booth to spit it a certain way which made the verse so dope. We usually only hear the end result (a dope verse) and we just take for granted that that is how the verse goes. When, in reality, writing dope lyrics and delivering a dope verse are two different things and Pac was perhaps the best ever at doing the second thing. It's still a matter of technique though.
This is easily shown by the difference in Pac's early songs (before his debut album) and his later work. He always had passion, but he polished up his technique to be able to translate that passion into a great delivery.
Plus, he's always used his voice as an instrument, not just to deliver his lyrics with the elongating of his vowels to express emotion, but to add to the beat as well. A famous example of this being the 'la la la la la la' part in Troublesome '96. Another good example, pre DR, is the 'ghetto ghetto ghetto GHET-TO' in the OG Ghetto Gospel. Then, near the end of his life, during the second part of his stay on DR, he started more and more to use his voice as a way to create melodies. He was starting to 'sing' hooks and outros more and more ( Military Minds is a good example) making it possible for him to turn an average beat into a great overall sound just because of the way he added to it with his own melodies. Then of course there's the rhyming of his outros where he's just talking really but he's also freestyling at the same time. It just comes out real dope.
I could add many more little things he did that were unique to his style which, again, most people just take for granted and they don't attribute it to his technique when they should. There are just a lot more techniques to the whole rapping business than just rhyming syllables, punchlines, metaphors, similes and double entendres. Most of them are less obvious and not as easy to name but they are perceived when you're listening to a song and they determine whether it's dope to your ears or not. In my opinion, Pac just had the best overall combination of all these techniques, using them in a creative way to add to what he was trying to accomplish with any given song. He didn't focus on just one technique but instead focused on the quality of the songs and that's why his catalog is so unfukkwithable in my humble opinion.
Bring on the 'Didn't read, lol' gifs..
.....according to your criteria,Fab my nikka but
), Pac genuinely inspires you.
