C-Styles
Superstar
in hignsight Nas did everyone a favor by not making an ILLMATIC part 2! Some things are just meant to be left alone and growth is the name of the game
it was written is nas best album technically speaking in terms of writing lyrics imo
- Thread starter ronnie46
- Start date
in hignsight Nas did everyone a favor by not making an ILLMATIC part 2! Some things are just meant to be left alone and growth is the name of the game
chunky_mcdaniels
All Star
The Message is wack?
Yep.
It’s too manufactured for mine. I never dug the whole sting sample too. Was just too overt.
Classic song, but still commercial. "Juicy" and "Big Poppa" are commercial songs vs "Gimme The Loot" and "Machine Gun Funk" from the same album. From It Was Written, these songs are commercial:
Watch Dem nikkas
Black Girl Lost
Street Dreams
If I Ruled The World
A song like "The Message" is borderline mainly because of the sample, but the bassline and the drums give it a grimey feel to balance it out. "Affirmative Action" is another one that's borderline as is "Nas Is Coming".
Then you had straight up grimey songs like "Live nikka Rap", "Shootouts", "Suspect", "Take It In Blood", "I Gave You Power" and "The Set Up".
It Was Written is Nas's most balanced album. As a song writer, it's his best album.
What makes Street Dreams commerical?
Goat poster
KANG LIFE
Outdated points and critiques
I WISH more “commercial” or “formulaic” albums sounded like “it was written”
chunky_mcdaniels
All Star
Outdated? So I’m supposed to change my opinion because music has moved somerhwere else in the 20 or so years since? Not for that.
Outdated points and critiques
I WISH more “commercial” or “formulaic” albums sounded like “it was written”
I don’t mind listening to songs off that album, always have, even when it came out. I just wasn’t interested in the image and a&r direction that occurred on it. It was such a jump and departure from Nas debut. It felt so reactive and forced comparatively.
I understand artists adapt and commercial artists make big songs to sell. But songs like the message etc were the antithesis of his debut, it certainly felt like that at the time.
Goat poster
KANG LIFE
The message is a GREAT song with Dope lyrics and freaking DJ Premier scratches as the “hook”
That’s hiphop as fukk.
You seem to not be able to get past the Sting sample, but hip hop has ALWAYS sampled big records from rock and other genres.
I swear Illmatic is a curse for Nas, Nikkas wanted him to be some broke underground nikka and he made a album with more EXPANSIVE production and people got mad
To me IWW and RTD are 2 albums that blend commercial and street/grimy hip hop perfectly.
That’s why many YOUNGER dude say IWW is thier favorite Nas record cause it speaks to them more.
Like Common said “this ain’t 94 Joe, we can’t go back”....
chunky_mcdaniels
All Star
Go and enjoy the album, tbh I’m more inclined to not listen to Illmatic or IWW.
NAS Escobar . Nah. I’m good.
I don’t give a fukk if hip hop has sampled other genres, you’re completely missing what I’ve said.
Columbia/Stoute/Trackmasters reacted to what Bad boy was doing. NAS is too nice to have to react imo.
NAS Escobar . Nah. I’m good.
I don’t give a fukk if hip hop has sampled other genres, you’re completely missing what I’ve said.
Columbia/Stoute/Trackmasters reacted to what Bad boy was doing. NAS is too nice to have to react imo.
Self_Born7
SUN OF MAN
every album after illmatic was meh to me... especially the beats...
Piff Perkins
Veteran
IMO there is no argument for IWW being better lyrically (or on just about any level honestly). IWW is an incredibly one dimensional album. There are a couple shifts (I Gave You Power, Black Girl Lost) but overall it's nearly nonstop mafioso shyt. The lyrics are dope but...listen to Illmatic and how varied the content is.
Off top, the following songs are better, lyrically than anything on Illmatic:
I Gave You Power (just an overall incredible record period)
Take It In Blood
The Message
Affirmative Action
And there's a lot of variation on IWW.
Early 2000s Nikka
Rookie
Lyrically he stepped it up from illmatic.
Just listen to I gave you power or Black Girl Lost.
The Trackmasters/Steve Stoute creative direction with the beats/production was a step back from illmatic...overall.
People got spoiled with Illmatic. You had a dream team of producers on that....
Tip, Primo, Pete Rock, Extra P..
The Bad Boy/Biggie formula of balancing street/commercial was huge and a lot of people followed suit (no pun?).
Nas went that route with Trackmasters/Steve Stoute. Trackmasters had produced on Ready to Die, and they were going in the direction of looping obvious samples with commercial appeal like Puffy.
The core fans weren't happy about it. They wanted another critically acclaimed album, not a commercial one.
But it worked...IWW went double platinum
Nas knew he f*cked up with the core fans though.
That is why he came back with primo produced "Nas is Like" as the first single off "I Am" and video.
T.I produced for Nas.
Devil Plisken…CMS
Veteran
A case can be made that Machine Gun Funk was commercial. The flow is a great pace to follow and the GC horns in the OG version makes you want to move. It’s not a full on “Big Poppa” but it’s more so a “Who Shot Ya” or “Dreams”
If Bad Boy decided on a glitzy video with Hype nobody is saying it’s too rough
28 Gramz
How U Luv That???
There's nothing commercial about Affirmative Action that's a pure mid 90s NY mafioso track same with The Message. Street Dreams is borderline, if it had a different hook I wouldn't look at it as commercial. Those two songs are light years away from the glitzy Bad Boy singles that Mase and Puff put out.