DJ Akademiks Calls Out Hip-Hop Media’s Hypocrisy Over Angie Martinez’s Tupac Tapes
DJ Akademiks has a problem with how hip-hop media is treating “The Tupac Tapes with Angie Martinez” — and for once, he’s not just talking about a rapper. He’s talking about the media itself.
The four-part video podcast premieres on Netflix November 27, built around the interview Martinez recorded with Tupac in 1996, three months before his death. As we reported when the series was announced, Martinez sat on that interview for 30 years because at the time, Pac was speaking on his feuds and there was a real feeling that airing it could put people in danger.
Akademiks’ argument, as reported by HotNewHipHop from his stream reacting to the trailer: people like him — he named himself, Vlad and Adam22 — get maligned constantly for supposedly inciting violence with their coverage. But Martinez is being celebrated for releasing an interview that was shelved for the exact same reason. Same content, same concerns — different messenger, different reception.
He backed it up with a reveal of his own: Akademiks says he has an NBA YoungBoy interview that he refuses to air, for the same reasons Martinez sat on the Tupac sit-down. According to Ak, YoungBoy told him to post it when he passes away — and Ak told him he doesn’t even want to think about that.
The obvious counterpoint is time. The Tupac interview arrives 30 years later; the feuds it touches are history, not live wires, and that’s precisely why Martinez and Netflix say now is the time. Nobody involved is claiming the 1996 danger still exists in 2026.
So who’s right? Is Akademiks exposing a genuine double standard in how hip-hop media picks its villains — or is 30 years of distance exactly the difference between sitting on something dangerous and releasing a piece of history?
