“Listen to the words people say in their lyrics, and tell me, if that's some real shit, if that's real to you, you know what I mean. Listen to what they sayin', don't just bob your head to the beat, peep the game, and listen to what Im saying. Hold us accountable for it.”

—  Tupac Shakur

1990s, Prison interviews and interrogations (1995)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 28, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Listen to the words people say in their lyrics, and tell me, if that's some real shit, if that's real to you, you know …" by Tupac Shakur?
Tupac Shakur photo
Tupac Shakur 154
rapper and actor 1971–1996

Related quotes

Errol Morris photo
Patrick Dixon photo
William Wharton photo
Carl Sagan photo

“I say "Listen closely, you sonofabitch of the morning! This stuff is real!"”

Carl Sagan (1934–1996) American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author and science educator

Essay as "Mr. X" (1969)
Context: I can remember the night that I suddenly realized what it was like to be crazy, or nights when my feelings and perceptions were of a religious nature. I had a very accurate sense that these feelings and perceptions, written down casually, would not stand the usual critical scrutiny that is my stock in trade as a scientist. If I find in the morning a message from myself the night before informing me that there is a world around us which we barely sense, or that we can become one with the universe, or even that certain politicians are desperately frightened men, I may tend to disbelieve; but when I'm high I know about this disbelief. And so I have a tape in which I exhort myself to take such remarks seriously. I say "Listen closely, you sonofabitch of the morning! This stuff is real!" I try to show that my mind is working clearly; I recall the name of a high school acquaintance I have not thought of in thirty years; I describe the color, typography, and format of a book in another room and these memories do pass critical scrutiny in the morning. I am convinced that there are genuine and valid levels of perception available with cannabis (and probably with other drugs) which are, through the defects of our society and our educational system, unavailable to us without such drugs. Such a remark applies not only to self-awareness and to intellectual pursuits, but also to perceptions of real people, a vastly enhanced sensitivity to facial expression, intonations, and choice of words which sometimes yields a rapport so close it's as if two people are reading each other's minds.

Allen Ginsberg photo
Don McLean photo
Adyashanti photo
Michael Jackson photo
Nguyễn Văn Thiệu photo

“Don't listen to what the Communists say, but look at what they do.”

Nguyễn Văn Thiệu (1923–2001) president of South Vietnam from 1965–75

Bushy, D. The World Looked Away: Vietnam After the War, Archway Publishing, 2018 page 2.

Related topics