Hip-Hop Blasphemy: It Was Written Is Better Than Illmatic (Episode 2)

[Axum Ezana]

i think nikkas just like the beats n subject matter more on iww.

I mean nikkas get into that easier

 

[KickoTheDon]

Im a mafioso head so IWW did more for me than Illmatic. Affirmative action is one of my favorite songs on the album and the way AZ and cormega killed their verses isn't like anything on Illmatic.

 

[Deoji]

BLOCKED

that album showed growth after Illmatic. Songwriting..concepts...hooks. And Take It In Blood is my fav Nas record. were you even listening to rap when IWW or Illmatic dropped?

 

[ISO]

I was talking thematically not sonically. But it wasn't just Nas a bunch of albums were heading in that direction, spearheaded of course by the unmatchable Cuban Linx.

Mobstyle and Kool G Rap are the innovators for this subject of rap. Azie Faison from Mobstyle is the guy who AZ got his name from and who he based his persona off of Sugar Hill was Azie's turf. They lived the life rappers talked about everybody should know the Azie, Alpo, Rich Porter story by now. They had the album cover with the triple beam and Moet bottle in '91.

Raekwon had the same sample for Rainy Dayz Remix from a classic underground Mobstyle cut...

 

[ignorethis]

IWW was better

Illmatic was raw talent fresh out the draft, IWW was that raw talent refined and focused.

Y'all won't let anything be better than Illmatic.

IMO IWW = RD > Illmatic

 

[Easy-E]

Watch Dem nikkas

Literally one of the best beats Nas ever rapped on, breh.

 

[Sound (∀√a) Maths]

Bro. he called himself Esco on The Infamous. He was on Fast Life. He was on Mo Money Mo Murda.. Gimme Yours. Verbal Intercourse. and the list goes on. and these was all what people was considering classic verse. He was killin shyt. He then releases IWW. Next thing u know people get dumb and act like the album went in the direction it did out of nowhere. I'm like. There's no way people followed his career thru out 95 and was shocked by IWW. Literally no way. On top of that. It wasn't just that rap was going in that direction. Nas was one of the main ones pushing it in that direction. lol. So he wasn't even following a trend. He was one of the people creating it.

Bingo

 

[Sukairain]

I like IWW more than Illmatic, but then I don't really fukk with boom bap beats like that. IWW had better beats to my taste

 

[Sound (∀√a) Maths]

Nas didn't do the mafioso shyt because of anybody. It was a general trend at the time on the East Coast that was popularized by Kool G Rap and Mobstyle.

He is a Kool G Rap stan, has songs on Illmatic talking about "lamp like Capone", "Uptown was Alpo heard he was kingpin", and "I'm like Scarface sniffing cocaine" has a whole song called The World Is Yours. He was featured on AZ, Kool G Rap, and Raekwon's albums all mafioso albums in '95 and going by Esco on The Infamous.

Nas catching shyt for doing R&B/rap collabs with Jodeci, Lauryn Hill, and R. Kelly but nobody say nothing when Wu-Tang working with SWV and Method Man putting out songs with Mary J. Blige.

Man, foh.

Word

 

[Art Barr]

It wasn't poppy. It was more polished. Album was still dark as fukk in tone.

I see you toys telling on yourself cop'n pleas in this thread.
You and other jiggy bullshyt sympathizers are the exact reason.
this shyt is fukked up real talk,...

Just disrespect for a whole culture, and now look at it.
We only have you toys and pop sympathizers who are gateway rap fans and don't and still don't care for hip hop to blame.
Yet you wanna base everything you do off of the same culture you do not respect.


Art Barr

 

[Sukairain]

It's not surprising. They prefer pop/gloss. And IWW is certainly the poppier side of Nas. It has nothing to do with the production. The production on Illmatic holds up way better than IWW.

Nah, IWW has Watch Dem nikkas, the beat of which is superior to anything on Illmatic. Because g-funk is simply the greatest style of hip-hop music.

Maybe with the other tracks you could make a case but my logic for IWW having better beats than Illmatic is simple:

1. G-funk is music fit for the gods
2. Illmatic has no g-funk
3. It Was Written has one g-funk track
4. Therefore It Was Written has the superior production

 

[bigbadbossup2012]

IWW written is much better.
Illmatic is so consistently meh,the songs are all very similar making it more a smoother ride

IWW's is more of a roller coaster ridein the song variation
IWW was written is better creatively,Lyrically and hit record wise.

 

[SirBiatch]

Nah, IWW has Watch Dem nikkas, the beat of which is superior to anything on Illmatic. Because g-funk is simply the greatest style of hip-hop music.

 

[spliz]

I see you toys telling on yourself cop'n pleas in this thread.
You and other jiggy bullshyt sympathizers are the exact reason.
this shyt is fukked up real talk,...

Just disrespect for a whole culture, and now look at it.
We only have you toys and pop sympathizers who are gateway rap fans and don't and still don't care for hip hop to blame.
Yet you wanna base everything you do off of the same culture you do not respect.


Art Barr

I'm just gonna respectfully disagree and keep it pushin fam. I'm not gonna argue cause we been down this road already. I respect ya opinion cause u don't fukk wit none of these nikkas and we can leave it at that.

 

[Menelik II]

This is blasphemy

IWW has some faults:
- it tried to follow a precedent from OB4CL and was never able to live up to it
- one or two tracks could disappear from the tracklist no harm done e.g. Watch Dem nikkas & Nas is Coming

Illmatic is a near flawless piece of work.

But lyrically IWW was a vast improvement you can't deny that.

Illmatic >>> IWW any day.

Agreed but IWW wasn't better lyrically. The GOD MC went from introspective universal to Mafiaso generic, plus a small drop in flows. When you put it in perspective he had crazy features at that time, we were expecting great things on the back of "one plus one", "eye for an eye" , "on the real", "true dialect" but IWW failed with lines like "drunk of champagne from Sicily" smh


You have to understand the climate at the time, and despite PAC Big et all, Nas was that nikka, the resurrection and torch carrier of Rakim legacy. IWW was commercial and artistically way below ILL, and a lot of cats were like "say it ain't so"