Despite leaving the world 27 years ago, Biggie Smalls remains one of the most unifying forces in American culture. The gravity of that time in Biggie’s life wasn’t lost on the Brooklyn native. The straight A student turned street hustler knew his proverbial back was against the wall and breaking big through bars was the only way to remove the weight of the world without turning back to a life of crime. It was go Big or go bust. Nothing in between. And the urgency of that moment reverberates through every syllable delivered in that incomparable, bottom-heavy, nasally baritone voice throughout his culture-shifting debut.

Ready To Die hit the earth like a comet through its grounded gangsta narratives and weighty — sometimes shocking — depictions of a kid from a shattered family living the life of an aspiring drug kingpin who then becomes so repulsed with himself that he commits suicide. It’s been described by cultural commentator Cheo Hodari Coker as simultaneously “gangster and political.”

You can hear that political yet gangster sentiment through bars like, “I know how it feels to wake up fucked up / pockets broke as hell, another rock to sell” (“Everyday Struggle”). Or on “Gimme The Loot” where he spews, “I wouldn’t care if you’re pregnant / Give me the baby rings and the No. 1 Mom pendant” with such vitriol that the word “pregnant” was played in reverse on the original album because the imagery was too powerful for a commercial release. (They say “no women and no children.” Apparently Biggie’s circumstances didn’t include room to be distracted by either.)

That political yet gangster sentiment permeates through the opening of “Juicy,” Hip Hop’s quintessential Horatio Alger tome about the pot-holed laden journey from rags to riches. On “Suicidal Thoughts,” that sentiment reaches its tragic conclusion. “I reach my peak. I can’t speak,” he says gravely. “Call my nigga Chic, tell him that my will is weak. I’m sick of niggas lyin’, I’m sick of bitches hawkin’. Matter of fact, I’m sick of talking [gunshot].”

Dynamic. Foreboding. Deeply personal yet supremely accessible. Effortlessly captivating. The gravity of Ready To Die ushered in an era of elegant mafioso rap while simultaneously snatching the microphone from the West Coast, bringing the energy back to its birthplace. It pushed culture forward and cemented “The Black Frank White” as the King Of New York, marveling millions worldwide since its release.

One of the most telling Biggie Smalls superlatives is that, despite passing away in 1997, he is still consistently considered one of, if not THE, greatest rapper of all time. Perhaps GOAT conversations are anecdotal in nature, but 25 years later, it’s difficult to find a top rapper list that doesn’t include Christopher Wallace somewhere in the top 10, if not in the top 5, if not No. 1. Ready To Die was in a sense a dark Cinderella story, but his sophomore release, Life After Death, is when those visions of grandeur littered all across “Juicy” came to chart-topping fruition.

One of the most looming questions about what The Notorious B.I.G. is: What might his life had been like had he not been murdered on March 9, 1997? It’s a hypothetical that’s impossible to answer, but one that easily comes to the forefront of the mind because of the way Biggie dominated the space at that time.

In a conversation with MTV News in 1998, JAY-Z talked about how Biggie’s passing affected him personally and how the tragedy changed the direction of his second album In My Lifetime Vol. 1. Biggie appeared on Hov’s debut album, Reasonable Doubt, on the track “Brooklyn’s Finest.” Hov returned the favor, appealing as a guest on Life After Death’s “I Love The Dough.” Here’s how Hov described the loss he felt:

“I don’t have anyone to bounce off of, you understand?” Hov said. “We bounced off each other like, ‘Oh that was crazy; I gotta make something crazier.’ When you don’t have that, you don’t have that gauge. It’s just hard to adjust; you have to find other ways to motivate yourself… A lot of different songs were influenced by what was happening. ‘City Is Mine,’ the first verse, you could just hear it. I think two hooks on there came from songs that he had previously recorded…”

Snoop Dogg was so omnipresent in that era that, not only was “Tha Shiznit” included in the intro to Ready To Die, Biggie also mentioned him at the beginning of Life After Death’s “Somebody’s Gotta To Die.” The song opens with “I’m sitting in the crib dreaming about Lear jets and coupes, the way Salt ‘Shoops’ and how to sell records like Snoop.”

“They in there smoking some bullshit ass weed and I come in there with that thang that killed John Wayne, you know what I mean? I pull my weed out and change the temperature of the room. So Biggie’s at the board and he’s like, ‘Hey Snoop, I want you to hear this shit. The motherfucker pressed play… It was like him letting me know in front of all his homeboys, ‘Nigga I fuck with you, I love you and I ain’t gon’ never have a problem with you. So going forward me and his situation, it never was a situation to begin with, but we had that understanding that, that’s all in the game of war. You win some, you lose some.”

JAY-Z. Nas. Snoop. Three brilliant creators who’ve become household names, certified superstars, and purveyors of the future of Black excellence.Biggie was at the epicenter of the hip hop universe and each planetary contemporary in his orbit shot off to billion dollar legacies. Toss in Wu-Tang Clan and Dr. Dre and it’s impossible to think that the gravitational force that each of them all agreed upon wouldn’t have reached similar astronomical levels had he not been tragically murdered in 1997.

But that’s neither here nor there. In art, hypothesizing is an indelible way to distract from the present. And presently, despite leaving the world 25 years ago, Biggie Smalls remains one of the most unifying forces in American culture. The young man who grew up “fat, Black, and ugly as ever” revealed so much of himself in such an impactful manner, inspiring millions worldwide that, from atop the Empire State Building to the bottom of all of our hearts, the gravity of the Christopher Wallace legacy is omnipotent, affecting each of us forever.