NAS: hate me...now?

oh, and cappadonna, eh? go back and listen to the nas verse on raekwon's album again. and again and again until you have it memorized. 'props is a true thugs wife'? damn! 'trick my wisdom with the system that imprisoned my son'? this is nas with street knowledge, it's one of the best instances of internal rhyme i've ever heard, and dear god, listen to the flow on the first four lines.(check out the transition to rae's verse, where he's saying practically NOTHING compared to nas. it's a slap in the face to how empty wu rhymes often are.) for christ's sake, the whole thing is so much better than cappa babbling about his fade being like a porcupine it's not even funny.

And Q-Tip, Q-Tip, Q-Tip - it's disquieting to hear him schill for the shake-it-fast generation ("Vivrant Thing", "Breathe & Stop"), but it worked for Busta, I guess. (I'll have to start a new thread.)

re: my above post about pharcyde, 'he' refers to the guy from 90210, not fatlip, who i like quite a bit and had a superb self- deprecating single in 'what's up fatlip?' and is an all-around good guy.

And since when do late night talk show hosts decide what's cool? Least cool people ever.

does joe camel speak?

He just picked a goddamn goofy name. Say it a couple times. Funny, no? Meanwhile, he is/was a seriously ill rappper.

Ethan's right about "One Time 4 Your Mind" being a bit of a filler, BTW (though I still think virtually everything on Illmatic is awesome).

didn't read thread, just got it was written, god's son, stillmatic

"if snoop is cool, then joe camel and mr.t are cool too." --Ethan, 2001

ha i almost quoted that

snoop and tip do indeed have wonderful voices, but their image isn't really 'cool' in the way that nas certainly was. remember when 'snoop doggy dogg!' was the punchline to every fucking late night talk show joke for practically all of 1994? he's a fucking clown.

re: my above post about pharcyde, 'he' refers to the guy from 90210, not fatlip, who i like quite a bit and had a superb self- deprecating single in 'what's up fatlip?' and is an all-around good guy.

-- ethan, Tuesday, June 5, 2001 8:00 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Link

i sound like a fag here but i stand by my judgment that snoop isnt actually "cool" in the same way that illmatic-era nas is...

Nas is cool like Miles Davis, Snoop is cool like Muddy Waters. Respect based on effortless virtuosity vs. respect based on elder statesman status the result of labored virtuosity.

I think apparently effortless complexity vs. clearly labored-upon complexity is the key here.

early/mid-90s snoop is just as effortlessly "cool" as illmatic-era nas imo. i wouldn't conflate snoop's continued pop culture relevance/him capitalizing on it (doggy fizzle televizzle) with 'labored virtuosity'

yeah when i think of cool rappers i think of like t.i., kane, real slick type dudes, not the dude who did dizzle tellyfizzle or whatever the fuck that was called

lol xpost

i guess i was listening to nas in 94 and not snoop so i didnt get up on him til i was buying every no limit release and by then he was basically a punchline

dont get me wrong his albums are still dope but to me hes like luda or redman or something not a "cool" rapper

I'm talking specifically about his early 90s rhymes though, the polysyllabic acrobatics sound mad contrived to me, which isn't a "problem" per se but is distinct from Esco's naturalistic rhyme schemes & flows.

mad xps

BIG SNOOP aka the steendizzle

yeah i see that but i mean snoop, luda and redman have all been given the opportunities to make themselves parodies to middle aged white people, be it on the view, crash or some fox sitcom. nas and kane and whoever never really got that chance and who knows if they would've taken it. maybe not but idk

i mean ethan i wouldn't recommend seeing t.i. play some herb ass 19 year old wanna be dealer in american gangster

yeah i skipped that shit

I'm talking specifically about his early 90s rhymes though, the polysyllabic acrobatics sound mad contrived to me, which isn't a "problem" per se but is distinct from Esco's naturalistic rhyme schemes & flows.

mad xps

-- BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, April 13, 2008 2:33 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

yeah i mean i can see this, snoop's rhyme schemes early do seem to be much more studied or maybe calculated, whereas nas it's just like whatever is coming out of his mind that minute, in which case yeah nas is more 'effortless'

and wizzle

big hoos i never really thought about it that way but youre right - even on doggystyle snoop rhymes feel like a non-rapper figuring out the game instead of a natural born mc with lyrics flowing out the mouthpiece

like yknow how sometimes a producer or an r&b singer or some other type of non rapper will get on a track with a verse and its technically flawless from being either ghosted or meticulously written out but in the end it seems too professional & cold

i get that feel from luda too but not reggie noble

Yeah and I imagine Nas goes through a serious drafting process (or at least that he probably did once), but he doesn't sound like he does. Even with some of Ghost or Rae's stuff (Doom is an obv choice here), it's like yeah yall can shout and sound compelling and all that but I can still damn near hear the strikethroughs in your notebook.

im surprised you werent a huge snoop head back in 94 ethan! that dude was EVERYWHERE and i didnt get into nas til a couple years later. we were like 11 yrs old then!

i was a serious kid

big hoos don't steal my nas talking points

<i>or nas with immaculate construction and raps that you can imagine written down and read and re-read, pencil scratches and shit crossed out in the flow.</i>
Freeway -- "Free At Last"

what kind of shit is not using italics what the fuck is this cake mix [] shit but fuckin big hoos don't steal my nas talking points

or nas with immaculate construction and raps that you can imagine written down and read and re-read, pencil scratches and shit crossed out in the flow.

hows ethiopia dogg

lots of people borrow that shit and they borrowed shit from other people but nobody could be FIERCE like dylannn.

i'm not in ethiopia yet man

LOOK WHAT I BRING TO THE T aw fuck it

closing ranks around big hoos aka the steendriver

d post that nas retrospect

wait i thought yall were the same dude wtf

JUST OF THE SAME GENRE OF EVIL GUTTER WHORE 12 STEP

nice to see some real rap talk

recent opinions on nas live?

Oh man:

http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2010/10/07/nas-vs-def-jam

aside from the random ALL CAPS moments & the general inflated sense of worth that all rappers share, i thought that was a rather reasonable email

yeah ilxor stop throwing dog shit on a MAGICAL moment.

was just about to quote that part

vv

Nas writes better than Lefsetz, that's for sure. I hurt my brain trying to parse the sentence "But this doesn’t count against my commitment story is popping up ever more frequently."

the fact that $200 grand is a "bullshit" promotional budget in 2010 is kinda blowing my mind right now

a magical moment

model dater
big threat to a lotta u haters