The funny thing about your statement is finding out Craig Mack wanted to “Keep It Real” didn’t want to be a “Player rapper” like puffy wanted him to because his name was Mack and laughed at Puffy for being over flashy and basically got kick out of Bad Boy for wanting to be a true school MC wile Biggie followed all of Puffys rules for commercial success.
If anything you should be giving props to Craig Mack for “Keeping It Real” and standing his ground for fighting to be a true lyricist and not a gimmick that Puffy tried to mold him to be.
he did that after he knew the demo.
he knew puff was on that commercial mca way shyt from jump.
big was always just the guy who may or may not get to come out originally.
he was a darkhorse white label artist.
as his content was seen as taboo.
so, at the exact time, big was seen as the cultural skilled emcee guy.
craig mack was the sellout still clinging to we want efx cypha skills like that shyt did not go out of style and was phased out sonically.
i remember what the reasoning for why i liked big and why i did not like mack.
you jumped to assumptions that i have to ask how old were you then, and were you in the culture then?
art barr