How ironic that the place where two legendary West Coast rappers would go to squash their long-standing beef was at quintessential NYC hip hop club The Tunnel.
For those of you who don’t know what The Tunnel was, I’ll let Cipha Sounds explain the club, and what the term “tunnel banger” means:
Cipher Sounds: To truly understand the definition of a “Tunnel banger,” you first need to know about The Tunnel itself. Peter Gatien’s NYC nightclub was a hotspot for house music and techno in the early ’90s, but it wasn’t until the creation of a Sunday-night party called “Mecca” that the Tunnel would cement its place in hip-hop lore. When Funkmaster Flex took over the party’s prime-time slot—roughly 1 a.m. to 2:30 a.m.—in the mid-’90s, the “Tunnel banger” was born.
Cipha Sounds Presents: The 75 Greatest Tunnel Bangers | Complex
Ok, so back to the story. As the two driving forces behind N.W.A.’s success, alongside Dr. Dre, both Cube and Eazy are integral in taking the group from a local Compton act to worldwide fame – Cube penning a majority of the lyrics and Eazy masterminding the business side of things.
As everyone knows how the story goes, Cube felt he was getting his fair share of the profits and left N.W.A. to become a solo act. Shots were subsequently fired from both sides, though none as vicious or sustaining as Cube’s “No Vaseline,” which still stands as one of the greatest diss records of all time.
Fast forward a few years, N.W.A. had split up with all members, past and present, moving on to their separate projects. Cube, who at this time was beginning to venture into Hollywood, ran into Eazy at The Tunnel in 1995.
Bone Thugs-n-Harmony member, Krayzie Bone, who was signed to Ruthless Records, was there with Eazy on that night.
Krayzie Bone: Walking to the back of the club, we spotted Cube. The thing that I didn’t really see and I don’t know if I turned my head or not but when they saw each other it wasn’t like how it was portrayed in the movie of how they stood up for a minute and it was like a standoff. As soon as they saw each other it was all smiles and love. They sat down and actually chopped it up the entire time. I remember Eazy saying that he hadn’t seen them since everything happened.
Krayzie Bone Has Powerful Memories About Ice Cube & Eazy-E’s 1995 Reunion After Years of Beef | Ambrosia For Heads
“N.W.A would have not existed without Eazy-E,” Ice Cube later said in an interview with Rolling Stone. “No doubt in my mind. He was bold and not scared of anything. He was 21, 22, I was 16 — to me he was fearless. That’s what he brought. “I don’t want to do no corny ass records that try to get on the radio. I want to do hardcore records about what the hell is going on around here.”
