Official Nas Thread

[JustCKing]

The Firm album was wild. It was all over the place. It was like a QB compilation before QB's Finest. It was billed as a group album, but felt more like a compilation.

The Firm really had something, and with better direction, it really could've been something that surpassed The Fugee's The Score. It dropped at a time when Nas and Foxy were both superstars. Dr. Dre was still struggling to redefine his sound (The Firm was his best work in the midst of that struggle) and The Trackmasters were giving their best to Will Smith.

Add to the fact that Mega was locked up. Nature felt like an unnecessary guest and even the album cover alluded to this considering the placement of him in respect to the rest of the members. The inside booklet and videos focus on Nas, Foxy, and AZ. Even the Source cover for The Firm. In fact, the album suffers because there wasn't enough Nas, Foxy, and AZ. It also needed more Dre. There was also the missed opportunity of a few more Nas and AZ joints.

There was also no Havoc production or at least a Prodigy feature.

Most of those unreleased Firm joints are better than what made the album.

 

[shawntitan]

The Firm album was wild. It was all over the place. It was like a QB compilation before QB's Finest. It was billed as a group album, but felt more like a compilation.

The Firm really had something, and with better direction, it really could've been something that surpassed The Fugee's The Score. It dropped at a time when Nas and Foxy were both superstars. Dr. Dre was still struggling to redefine his sound (The Firm was his best work in the midst of that struggle) and The Trackmasters were giving their best to Will Smith.

Add to the fact that Mega was locked up. Nature felt like an unnecessary guest and even the album cover alluded to this considering the placement of him in respect to the rest of the members. The inside booklet and videos focus on Nas, Foxy, and AZ. Even the Source cover for The Firm. In fact, the album suffers because there wasn't enough Nas, Foxy, and AZ. It also needed more Dre. There was also the missed opportunity of a few more Nas and AZ joints.

There was also no Havoc production or at least a Prodigy feature.

Most of those unreleased Firm joints are better than what made the album.

I believe Nas label limited how many appearances he could have on the Firm album.
I agree, some of the Firm Era freestyles and unreleased tracks are better than the album. If you take the best of all of them, you can put together a pretty solid Firm album.

 

[Piff Perkins]

I believe Nas label limited how many appearances he could have on the Firm album.
I agree, some of the Firm Era freestyles and unreleased tracks are better than the album. If you take the best of all of them, you can put together a pretty solid Firm album.

There's such an interesting, weird disconnect between the freestyles and the album. The freestyles and remixes were largely Queens shyt: rapping over r&b with hard snares or rapping over 80s rap beats. But the album is a lot of over produced mafioso shyt with acoustic guitars and shyt lol. I doubt Stoute would have allowed it since his priority was getting as many Trackmasters placements as possible but that album could have used a lot of other NY producers and I wish somebody would have convinced Dre that they didn't need a bunch of "cinematic" shyt - they needed beats like Express Yourself. Funky and smooth samples.

 

[L. Deezy]

The Firm album was wild. It was all over the place. It was like a QB compilation before QB's Finest. It was billed as a group album, but felt more like a compilation.

The Firm really had something, and with better direction, it really could've been something that surpassed The Fugee's The Score. It dropped at a time when Nas and Foxy were both superstars. Dr. Dre was still struggling to redefine his sound (The Firm was his best work in the midst of that struggle) and The Trackmasters were giving their best to Will Smith.

Add to the fact that Mega was locked up. Nature felt like an unnecessary guest and even the album cover alluded to this considering the placement of him in respect to the rest of the members. The inside booklet and videos focus on Nas, Foxy, and AZ. Even the Source cover for The Firm. In fact, the album suffers because there wasn't enough Nas, Foxy, and AZ. It also needed more Dre. There was also the missed opportunity of a few more Nas and AZ joints.

There was also no Havoc production or at least a Prodigy feature.

Most of those unreleased Firm joints are better than what made the album.

Nature was better than Cormega at that point.. but Cormega fit the esthetic of The Firm more. Nature was on fire.. The labels held Nas and Foxy back. Only could appear on a minimum amount of songs. I play the Firm album at least once a month.. shyt didnt disappoint me one bit