The official 2Pac channel on YouTube uploaded the track on the 5th July 2011, and as of September 2019, it has over 226 million views and almost 1.7 million likes. 2Pac was unable to be in the music video as he was in prison serving a four and a half years in prison. The music video features Afeni Shakur herself, who re-enacts her reconciliation with a lookalike of Tupac Shakur. Pac just came through and just dropped it and blessed it with them vocals.” 2Pac’s record producer Tony Pizarro spoke about “Dear Mama” in Jake Brown’s 2005 book “Tupac Shakur: 2Pac in the Studio (The Studio Years 189-1996): “Pac used to make references to ‘Dear Mama’ in a lot of different songs and I’d always be like ‘You know that’s a songs in itself.’ And one day he was like ‘I got somethin’ for that.’ And he was like ‘Man, you have In My Wildest Dreams by the Crusaders’ and I was like ‘Yeah.’ He was like ‘Yeah, I got something for that.’ So I got the track ready. At age 17, 2Pac was kicked out of his home by his mother and they did not have contact until years later when her son was a well-known musician. Afeni was also absent during 2Pac’s adolescence when she became addicted to crack cocaine. Afeni Shakur (2Pac’s mother) was an active member of the Black Panther party in New York, and was often absent during his childhood, choosing activism over him. In “Dear Mama”, 2Pac discusses his childhood poverty and his mother’s addiction to crack cocaine, but also emphaises his love and respect for his mother, so they supersede the hard times and bad memories. It is a tribute to his mother and the lead single from his third studio album: “Me Against the World”.

“Dear Mama” is deemed to be the best of its genre, created by infamous hip-hop artist 2Pac in 1995.

2pac dear mama parody