Explain Nas' Illmatic To Me

But leaving that aside, what is a "relation between the stories he tells and the flow of his lyrics"?

if you think busta just shouts we'll never see eye-to-eye on this.

Re: Nas' narrative structure. I'd argue that it isn't essential for a hip hop lyricist to present their stories in a linear, narrative fashion. Although there are those that do (and you mentioned a few of them), i think that it's perfectly acceptable for Nas' to paint a mosaic of his life and environment. Nas presents conflict, action, and possible resolutions. To my ears, Illmatic is nearly flawless.

also, i don't think that you're taking into account that illmatic was recorded ages ago (in relative hip hop ) and Nas pioneered many of the lyrical templates that you see as boring or conventional.

BTW, Nas' capacity for a linear narrative is one of the few things that improved after Illmatic, in my opinion.

On Illmatic, I just love the sound of his voice rolling down those samples. I'm not sure what's so striking about it, especially with all the different producers, which is usually the kiss of dud. Something about his blank stare in the lyrics gets you. Something about the Rakim-gray you find so boring: not cool, more just... cold. Sounds like a fall day in New York.

Always I'm in some shit, my abdomen is the clip
The barrel is my dick, uncircumcised
Pull my skin back and cock me, I bust off when they unlock me
Results of what happens to niggaz shock me
I see niggaz bleedin, runnin from me in fear, stunningly tears
fall down the eyes of these so-called tough guys, for years
I've been used in robberies, givin niggaz heart to follow me
Placin peoples in graves, funerals made cause I was sprayed
I was laid in a shelf, with a grenade
Met a wrecked-up tech with numbers on his chest that say
Five-two-oh-nine-three-eight-five and zero
Had a serial defaced, hopin one day, police would place
where he came from, a name or some sort of person to claim him
Tired of murderin, made him wanna be a plain gun
But yo I had some other plans, like the next time the beef is on
I make myself jam right in my owner's hand

(Chorus)

Yo, weeks went by and I'm surprised
Still stuck in the shelf with all the things that an outlaw hides
Besides me it's bullets, two vests and then a nine
There's a grenade in a box, and that tech that kept cryin
Cause he ain't been cleaned in a year, he's rusty as clear
He's bout to fall to pieces, cause of his murder career
Yo, I can hear somebody comin in, open the shelf
His eyes bubblin, he said, "It was on"
I felt his palm troubled him shakin
Somebody stomped him out, his dome was achin
He placed me on his waist, the moment I've been waitin
My creation was for blacks to kill blacks
It's gats like me that accidentally go off, makin niggaz memories
But this time, it's done intentionally
He walked me outside, saw this cat
Cocked me back, said, "Remember me?"
He pulled the trigger but I held on, it felt wrong
Knowing niggaz is waiting in hell for 'im
He squeezed harder, I didn't budge, sick of the blood
Sick of the thugs, sick of wrath of the next man's grudge
What the other kid did was pull out, no doubt
A newer me in better shape, before he lit out, he led the chase
My owner fell to the floor, his wig split so fast
I didn't know he was hit, it's over with
Heard mad niggaz screamin, niggaz runnin, cops is comin
Now I'm happy, until I felt somebody else grab me
Damn!

I put Illmatic on last night and decided I don't love it but I do like it. I like it because it's great background music - unless I'm concentrating hard I hardly notice Nas or the beats, it all meshes together too perfectly to engage with me but perfectly enough for me to never find the experience un-enjoyable. I think what Sterling(?) was saying upthread about it being the basic hip-hop album, like a re-founding of hip-hop, holds true. It's like if you asked somebody to imagine what generic "hip-hop" sounds like they might well think of something like Illmatic in the same way as someone asked what "jazz" sounds like might well think of Kind Of Blue. It's an album so strong it can stand for all albums - which is its advantage and disadvantage.

(Exception - those sing-songy choruses annoyed me this time.)

It's funny, but teachers actually are assigning out a lot of hip hop homework...

I'm getting visions of Nas doing a modified "I'm a little teapot" dance. Too cute.

Hip-hop is a culture obsessed with heroes, and whether they are the result of manufacturing or earnest hard work, they are rarely as immovable as they think. A culture whose music and approach assume a short attention span necessarily treats its stars the same way, and the debate about hip-hop's truly untouchable names would be a relatively short one. The days of Nas' undisputed spot atop that dawg-pile may be long gone, but he will always have his place in the discussion, not simply as a gifted lyricist, but as a prodigy.

Nas came into our world fully formed, first as a snot-nosed upstart who nonchalantly bragged that he "went to hell for snuffing Jesus" back when he was twelve, then as a twenty-year-old counting stacks with his partner AZ on "The Genesis," the weightily-named introduction to his debut, Illmatic. There are no moments of vulnerability on the album, no rags to put the riches of today in proper perspective. He arrives as a manchild in a broken land: a man because there is no childishness or uncertainty in his pose but a child because it is so obviously and precisely a pose and, as with many who inherit a precocious brain but a plain heart, he relies more on instinct and response than emotional certainty, conviction or stability. It was as though the questions one wrestles in youth (idealism, material, morality, "the future")-the mortal world-didn't matter, for Nas arrived immortal.

As such, Illmatic is fearless, shocking and literally unbelievable. There was a brazenness to Nas' "understandable smooth," Yeah-I-said-it delivery, a cool absence of thought or hope (maybe both), and whether he was indeed the journal or the journalist, there were few images as crisp and brags as cold as his. I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death. Cause I'm as ill as a convict who kills for phone time. I rap in front of more ni**az than on the slave ships. On "One Love," his description of an over-anxious, would-be young thug from around the way-"Shorty's laugh was cold-blooded as he spoke so foul/Only twelve trying to tell me that he liked my style/Then I rose, wiping the blunt's ash from my clothes/Then froze, only to blow the herb smoke through my nose"-wasn't just a dope rap lyric; it was an amazing piece of writing, regardless of age.

Through it all, Nas himself seems to seek very little in the exchange. If he is to be believed, he was already very rich, and though he would later try and refashion himself as a martyr-in-progress, on Illmatic he seemed too young and jaded to care much about any end, because in the end, nothing happens. Life's a bitch, as his song goes, but then what? Do you find redemption in ether? Philosophy? Do you pray for a merciful God? No. Life's a bitch and then you die, and the only thing Nas seems to believe in is the grace of falling. Religion clearly doesn't matter ("Cause yeah, we were beginners in the hood as five-percenters/But somethin' must of got in us cause all of us turned to sinners" from AZ's verse on "Life's a Bitch") and when Nas boasts that he "loves committin' sins" ("Represent"), you almost believe him.

Almost because there's still something behind Nas' eternally negative, harum-scarum worldview-not fear, but a dim consciousness of his own status as immortal. It is the belief that, though we may not live to see tomorrow, someone will. And, with history as our witness, we better seem pretty fucking fly to them. On Illmatic, Nas cared less about his place in God's eyes than his place in history, and history alone provided young Nas with a sense of salvation; a sense that the depravity surrounding him would one day be enshrined as the conditions for his genius. The album, like the man himself, excels because it is obsessed with the bright, fawning legacy that trails faithfully behind. He says as much on "Nas is Like," a song he wrote during the Illmatic sessions: "But what's it all worth? Can't take it with you under this Earth/Rich men died and tried, but none of it worked/They just rob your grave, I'd rather be alive and paid/Before my number's called, history's made."

There's something alluring and inevitably unsatisfying about seeing someone so nihilistic go about life, especially at such a young age. You can say you want to (or will) die before you get old, but those words feel cheap and flat when you live just cautious enough to survive well into your late-20s and early-30s. When you grow up against the anti-philosophy you lay out in the dim idealism of youth, you go from old school to old fool, and somewhere along the way, old Nas realized that he wanted redemption. He thought he would find it by earning the plaques and sales that he rightfully deserved, refashioning himself as a pretty thug and then again as the champion for the masses, finding solidarity with lesser cliques (Bravehearts, Murder Inc.) and beefing with Jay-Z, the man who took the best parts of Nas' blueprint and gave it both corporate and heartfelt dimensions. But nothing worked, and these muted expressions of fear only served to make Illmatic seem that much more unbelievable. As a kid, Nas didn't fear God; he just thought he was better, and he wanted people to know that tomorrow. Unfortunately that next day came, and the boy who was ahead of his time grew into a man forever captive to it.

Sterling - look, don't bully people into insisting why Illmatic is the shit. I'm not going to insult you if you don't believe it is but you seem to have this chip on your shoulder to dislike Illmatic to the point where you're ridiculing people's civil attempts at suggesting that maybe the album is actually pretty good.

Why not just chalk this up to "I'm not feeling it" and leave it at that? This complaint of yours that Nas' songs have no structural relationship between content and flow reminds me musicology students I've come across who seem more intent on dissecting the mechanics of a song rather than talk about their emotive affect. The two aren't mutually exclusive but one shouldn't need to justify either a like or dislike of a song or artist based on its structural qualities anymore than one should judge a painting solely based on its brush work.

YOU DON'T LIKE NAS. Ok, we heard you the first time, but goading people into proving you wrong is a waste of both people's time. You're clearly defiantly intractable in your position.

For the record - I'm not a huge Nas fan, mostly for many of the reasons Hua points out - dude has squandered his talents time and time again and I find Nas' acolytes to be a funny bunch of believers who continue to insist he can do no wrong despite having made a catalog's worth of shitty songs. That said, Illmatic is firmly planted on my top 10 list of all-time great hip-hop albums for all the reasons that people have already stated and if people disagree, that's cool with me.

Frankly, I'm not feeling the Streets and you know why? I can't hang with his accent and no amount of lyrical analysis can overcome that bias on my part. I guess now I'm being defiantly intractable. :)

--Oliver

The first thread on this board ever, back in 2000 (or late 99?) was Tom "provoking" ppl into defending emo.

This board has a long long history of exactly this sort of discussion, and its always been when it works out one of its strengths.

Sterling...where do you stand on Illmatic now? Has it changed for you?

i like illmatic a lot but it sounds old and soft to me. that lyrical style everyone says they like is all over the next seven albums. he's not perfect (five mics for stillmatic didn't make any sense because it kind of sucks), but lyrically, pretty much everything else he did kills illmatic badly. it's almost like people enjoy the philosophy or something of illmatic more than anything else or maybe the idea of it, the whole reactionary, tired dullness of it. like, "damn, why'd this guy hook up with hot producers and get hot rappers on his shit and step his lyrical game way up when he could have remade illmatic a million times???"

I'm not saying Nas is irredeemable but Jay-Z had it right - Nas' consistency is pretty far off, at least in my opinion, and the only people who really seem to go to bat for him (yourself excluded) are precisely kids who fell in love with Illmatic and keep desperately hoping that he comes back to that.

In other news, there are rumors that Columbia is planning on doing a remix version of "Illmatic." 10 producers for each of the 10 songs. Hot or not?

I like Hua's essay lots but it sorta misses the "uplift" side that ppl get from him which was there well before "I Can" and also I'm a bit skittish about the teleology reading Illmatic as a prophecy of future downfall or something. Something in nas' "there-i-said-it delivery" (great line) implies to some people at least, some sort of spiritual redemption in itself -- not quite the seamless valorization of a fall from grace. I've been listening to Illmatic less than ever, really and don't even think I've unpacked it after my move this summer. But I thought of Nas recently when I thought of the trying-too-hard-teen-poetry quality of the Pac verses on the Biggie duet.

Explain what is reactionary, tired and dull about Illmatic. Other than the fact that there is a consensus of opinion about it, which obviously bothers you.

it's still a great album and i love nas.

it's still a great album and i love nas.

It's great but it's dull? Say what?

And how are you drawing on the consensus dissenting opinion in your critcism of the "reactionary" consensus? I'm confused.

I like Illmatic very much. I also like early 90s hip-hop production style. I like old funk and soul music, and I like when producers sample it.

Dear fucking GOD. Kill me now. I don't want to live on the same earth as someone who can say this without feeling physically ill.

the hua hsu thing is the differentest thing i've ever seen written about it and most of the stuff he likes about it is all over the other albums, too.

I have read people saying that he never did anything as good as Illmatic, and that he went in a different direction musically because he wanted to sell more records. Is that what you mean?

I notice you're arguing that his lyrics got better. I haven't listened closely enough to tell. But what about the music? Did that get better? I don't think so, personally.

anyway what the fuck is "perspective" worth? this is mark s' point about how rockism fails on its OWN terms. If you value long-term critical perspective then you can't retreat to rad-subjective "i like it coz it makes me feel happy" simultaneously & what does it say that yr. leaping to assumptions about who heard what when anyway?

why does it make you feel euphoric? which lines do? what do they remind you of, how is the delivery especially effective? is it a euphoria like sniffing ether or like drinking red wine or like getting a backrub? what are you afraid of?

Besides what everyone else has said, the beats make me happy. I love the sound of the production, the way it all comes together. I love how Nas voice sounds, I love the lyrics because I can envision virtually everything he says, I love it because of its cinematic imagery, the darkness present in it, and I enjoy it because it is exquisite music. Frankly, I think the burden is on YOU to provide reasoning for why you hate it beyond this bizarre "I find it boring" argument.

It seems like you are just trying to be provacative here...I just plain enjoy listening to the album on its own terms. It is one of the few albums that I listen to with ANY regularity - the others being Organized Konfusion's "Stress" and Biggie's "Ready To Die" and Mingus' "Black Saint" and "Mingus x5" and Miles Davis' "Porgy and Bess" and "Astral Weeks" by V Morrison...I just plain LOVE listening to it; its as near to perfection as any music I have ever heard.

I didn't buy your argument either tho. Not because I don't think opinions formed over a period of time aren't likely to be more accurate and insightful--they are. But you have to back it up with some concrete detailed examples (which are notably absent from cloverlandthug's posts too).

So Skinner is over now? How quickly the hipsters move on.

Slow day at work today...

(ps there are no grounds on which to argue for a standpoint of "informed subjectivity" -- hell, maybe he listened to too much rap and it made him cynical and burnt out!)

ps there are no grounds on which to argue for a standpoint of "informed subjectivity"

I have no idea what this means.

re: grounds, the point is that there's no basis to argue that "informed" euphoria is any more valid than "uninformed" euphoria. if you want to argue about "quality" then you need other criteria than "my subjectivity is better than yours".

ez rock just died i'm gonna put up with this shit

lol the streets