Nas "I Am" got 4.5 Mic when it came out. WHY DOES THE COLI&the internet HATE IT?!

[Homeboy Runny-Ray]

album was made specifically for '99 and was intended for Nas to keep up with the jones' - ruff ryders, rocafella, Noreaga, etc.

 

[Trace]

I still wish we got more answers about this era. Like what songs were left off, what was supposed to be and what wasn't.

A shame Nas probably don't even remember the songs at this point. I'm just happy we still getting that heat in the bag to this day though.

 

[JustCKing]

album was made specifically for '99 and was intended for Nas to keep up with the jones' - ruff ryders, rocafella, Noreaga, etc.

Nas was born a Jones. They were trying to keep up with him.

 

[altruicsense]

Dummy Question... but how where albums so easily bootlegged (In good quality) before the digital era?

Very good read, especially if you remember the OG ripping groups like RNS:

The Man Who Broke the Music Business

One Saturday in 1994, Bennie Lydell Glover, a temporary employee at the PolyGram compact-disk manufacturing plant in Kings Mountain, North Carolina, went to a party at the house of a co-worker. He was angling for a permanent position, and the party was a chance to network with his managers. Late in the evening, the host put on music to get people dancing. Glover, a fixture at clubs in Charlotte, an hour away, had never heard any of the songs before, even though many of them were by artists whose work he enjoyed.

Later, Glover realized that the host had been d.j.’ing with music that had been smuggled out of the plant. He was surprised. Plant policy required all permanent employees to sign a “No Theft Tolerated” agreement. He knew that the plant managers were concerned about leaking, and he’d heard of employees being arrested for embezzling inventory. But at the party, even in front of the supervisors, it seemed clear that the disks had been getting out. In time, Glover became aware of a far-reaching underground trade in pre-release disks. “We’d run them in the plant in the week, and they’d have them in the flea markets on the weekend,” he said. “It was a real leaky plant.”

 

[UglyCasanova]

ALL YALL NEED TO fukkIN REP THIS MAN.

Where is the other page? Only 3 songs are mentioned here. The review was 2 pages.

 

[JustCKing]

Where is the other page? Only 3 songs are mentioned here. The review was 2 pages.

I posted this pages ago.

 

[King Ming]

I AM = Classic!

 

[JMD]

gets way too much hate I agree...when it came out It Was Written was getting bashed by critics and now many consider it to be his best album

funny how that works sometimes

 

[JYoung24]

Life is what you make it and favor for a favor were both fire what are yall talking about

 

[JustCKing]

gets way too much hate I agree...when it came out It Was Written was getting bashed by critics and now many consider it to be his best album

funny how that works sometimes

I remember people actually putting I Am over It Was Written saying it was the balance between Nasty Nas and Escobar.

 

[T.he I.nformant]

Kind of a weird thread. Who says you have to share a magazine’s review/rating of an album? Also, it’s not revisionist if your opinion of an album changes as you and the album age. That’s more a reflection of whether something holds up over time. With that said, I Am... has some of Nas’s best work: NYSOMII, Hate Me Now, Nas Is Like, and Undying Love. It’s just uneven. There are other good songs but there’s also stuff that’s just ok.

 

[JustCKing]

Kind of a weird thread. Who says you have to share a magazine’s review/rating of an album? Also, it’s not revisionist if your opinion of an album changes as you and the album age. That’s more a reflection of whether something holds up over time. With that said, I Am... has some of Nas’s best work: NYSOMII, Hate Me Now, Nas Is Like, and Undying Live. It’s just uneven. There are other good songs but there’s also stuff that’s just ok.

I agree.

History was revised in regard to the review though. There were people who were running with the narrative that The Source gave the bootleg 4.5 mics and not the retail.

 

[T.he I.nformant]

I agree.

History was revised in regard to the review though. There were people who were running with the narrative that The Source gave the bootleg 4.5 mics and not the retail.

Well, yeah, you proved that wrong. Props on posting the actual review.

 

[feelosofer]

I know the OG version is legendary but even the retail version was a very solid album in it's own right. It had some so-so tracks but it also housed some of Nas's best songs.

 

[KravenMorehead™]

I always say it's better to say "I don't like majority albums from ___________ era", than to say such and such album was trash.

Cause the complaints I hear for say, Tical 2000: Judgement Day, and Doc's Da Name 2000/ Malpractise,

are the exact same complaints for the most part

and they all released within the same frame of months.

So it was mainly a wave of reinvention that early 90's artists were going as they transitioned to the bling era, rather than to look at each artists' career arc individually and say so and so fell off. Nah...