After nearly three decades, two-thirds of the iconic rap group Salt-N-Pepa have finally put a name to the faceless man who cuddled with Salt in their 1994 music video for “Whatta Man.”
In a resurfaced interview, Sandra Denton, 56, aka Pepa, and Cheryl James, 57, aka Salt, spoke with rapper Mad Skillz for the “Hip-Hop Confessions” podcast, where they made a confession about the popular video that might have been unknown to fans.
Halfway through the almost two-minute video, Denton decided that it was time to identify late rapper Tupac Shakur as the long-time unidentifiable man in their R&B soulful hit song with En Vogue.
“I wanna confirm,” she began, “a lot of people don’t know really with ‘Whatta Man,’ that was Tupac.”
Verifying her partner’s reveal, James nodded her head while adding, “That’s right. In the bed with me.”
Denton then continued naming all of the high-profile cameos that were noticeably made, such as rapper Anthony “Treach” Shawn Criss.
Within the first minute of “Whatta Man,” James is seen giggling with a male figure as they fondled each other on a bed.
Despite the mom of two completely covering her mystery man’s face, a connection to Tupac was made after the rapper’s tattoos, prominent bald head, and bandana were made visible to viewers.
“They only showed his tattoos,” said James.
Denton shared, “Yeah, so that was never, no one knew that was Tupac in ‘Whatta Man.’”
The outlet recently shared a clip from their interview on Instagram, where supporters responded to the “Push It” vocalists’ declaration and acknowledged how many legendary ventures Tupac was involved in before his time was tragically cut short.
“Pac did so much in so little time.”
“Everyone in hiphop has a pac story. What a legacy.”
“2pac, what a great human being, what a great existence. One of the wonders of this world.”
Although this appears to be the first time that the Grammy-winning group verified the “All Eyez on Me” rapper as Salt’s male love interest, the lead rapper of Naughty by Nature confirmed same information while speaking on Hot 97’s “Ebro In The Morning.”
Back in 2022, the “O.P.P” lyricist shared, “It was crazy because if you look close at the video, of course, I was with Pepa and Tupac was with Salt.”
Treach proceeded, “His face, the original one they had, they kind of cut his face ‘cause at the same time he was going through that bogus sexual assault charge.”
Although Tupac’s side profile and his infamous “Thug Life” tattoo was briefly shown, Treach confirmed that everyone who rocked with Pac knew that it was him.
Spinderella was also featured in the “Whattaman” music video. However, due to her severed relationships with Salt and Pepa over the years, she left the group in 2019.
