In this final track off of The Notorious B.I.G.’s classic debut album, Ready to Die, Biggie calls up Puff Daddy in the middle of the night to explain that he’s about to commit suicide. In one, long verse, he describes how he feels unloved and expresses guilt for all the crimes he’s committed, while Puff tries to talk him out of killing himself in the song’s ad-libs.

The telephone effect used on Puffy’s vocals, as well as other sound effects—e.g. gunshots and Big’s body falling to the floor—make the track both cinematic and haunting. Despite Puff’s pleas, Big pulls the trigger at the end of the track. Biggie’s fictional death directly ties into his follow-up album, March 1997’s Life After Death.

This conceptual track became even more significant after The Notorious B.I.G. was murdered in a drive-by shooting on March 9, 1997.^[[1] https://genius.com/The-notorious-big-suicidal-thoughts-lyrics]