Image via Complex Original
In 1994, I was an intern at The Source magazine. My life as a writer, as an editor, as a blogger, as a cog in a wheel, as a contributor to a culture, as a woman with an opinion...all started there and then. And being assigned to review Nas’ debut album Illmatic and give it 5 Mics was one of my proudest moments. As Nas celebrates the 20th anniversary of the album that launched him to stardom, I realize how much I still love it. Illmatic represents the best that hip-hop can be, alongside one of the best judgments I ever had the honor to make, and all the special memories of a wide-eyed, un-jaded time in New York City life. I revisited my first review of Nas’ Illmatic over on MissInfo.TV, and compiled some of my favorite Illmatic moments here.
Written by Minya Oh, aka Miss Info, fka Shortie (@Missinfo)
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Favorite Beat
We appreciate the work that all Illmatic’s maestros put in: the Premos, the Q-Tips, and Large Pros and all. But context makes these beats even sweeter, so just wrap your mind around the fact that in 1994, during those Walkman days, almost everyone entered Nas’ world through a bulky, plastic, portable cassette or CD player, his rhymes pumped through some shitty sponge-capped headphones or buzzy boom box. But whether via Sony or Coby, Large Professor’s drums still wrapped you up in an invisible hood, those 808s filling your cochlea, shaking your brain stem, snare drums tapping away at your molars. The beat pushed every other thought in your head to the side. Besides that, the horns on “Halftime” kept it trendy. All the masters from Eric B. to Pete Rock were doing them. But it’s Extra P’s jingling bells that were unique. That constant ringing, like a Salvation Army solicitation, was a reminder of Nas’ hunger.
Not to over think the thing, but “Halftime” was and is a beautiful thing to hear.
Favorite Song
My favorite track changes almost every time I listen to Illmatic. Some days it’s the rah-rah “Represent.” Some days it’s “It Ain’t Hard to Tell.” But “N.Y. State of Mind” is a crazy piece of work, especially when you imagine Nas going into DJ Premier’s booth and knocking it out on the first try. One Take Esco.
Even unrehearsed, these stories of crime and paranoia are so vivid. My writer Andy Bustard was a baby in Manchester, UK when Illmatic first dropped but he says discovering “N.Y. State of Mind” as a teen was like immersion learning. “Nas captured the ruthless, life-or-death nature of the projects...and teleported me into the heart of Queensbridge Houses,” he says. The same thing was true for me as a Korean-American teen from Chicago hearing it for the first time.
I also love that on “N.Y.” and really throughout Illmatic, Nas constantly salutes the music that raised him. Nowadays, artists practically rap through their address books, listing all their famous friends. Nas cited his heroes, not contemporaries, Mr. Magic, MC Shan, Fat Cat and Alpo. And on “N.Y. State of Mind” it feels like he accepts the mantle as Rakim’s “godson.” It’s there in the hook, and in the sample from Rakim’s “Mahogany."
Favorite Verse
My favorite verse is from “Memory Lane”:
My window faces shootouts, drug overdoses.
Live amongst no roses, only the drama, for real.
A nickel-plate is my fate, my medicine is the ganja.
Here’s my basis my razor embraces, many faces,
You’re telephone-blown, Black,
Stitches or fat shoelaces.
I love that Nas acknowledges his place, in the window. He’s doomed, but he’s self-aware.
And that last half is the best because it is so specific to New York City in 1994. If you were around, you remember kids carrying razor blades in their mouth, spitting them out in a crowded club with a puff of air, slicing another kid’s face from ear to the corner of the mouth… That’s why, contrary to what all the lyric websites tell you, Nas is not saying that his telephone is “blowing.” He’s saying “telephone blown,” meaning your face has been blown wide open with a telephone cut (also known as a buck-fifty, because of the number of stitches you’d need). The last line refers to your scar, either stitched up or left with a puffy “shoelace” keloid.
Pure head crack. You have to run to keep up.
Favorite Moment
The transition between the intro, “The Genesis,” and the first song, “N.Y. State of Mind,” is powerful because it’s like Nas’ cosmos. First that “Subway Theme” beat from the Wild Style movie soundtrack is rap primordial soup, then you hear Nas and his crew talking out their master plan, and then comes the voice of the future, “Straight out the fucking dungeons of rap…”
Favorite Storytelling Verse
This category is one of the few with an obvious winner. “One Love” is a song that starts out like the shout outs segment of “Video Music Box” and then turns into a vivid bedtime story for child sociopaths.
In an era before Gmail and Facebook, Nas makes “One Love” a sort of musical message board. He speaks to his friends in jail, with their fascinating New York ’90s nicknames: Black, Cormega (foreshadowing future collabo with Cormega and Kamakazee, Nas raps “on the reals, all these crab n----s know the deal…”), Herb, Ice, Bullet, Born, Lake Lucciano, Big Bo, Oogie. He fills them in on the latest gossip, documents their daily routines, uses all the coded lingo that jail mail requires. But the best imagery comes in the third verse:
I sat back like the mack, my army suit was black…
We was chilling on these benches where he pumped his loose cracks
I took the L when he passed it, this little bastard
Keeps me blasted, and starts talking mad shit
I had to school him, told him don't let n----s fool him
Cause when the pistol blows the one that's murdered be the cool one
Tough luck when n----s are struck, families fucked up
Coulda caught your man, but didn't look when you bucked up…
Shorty’s laugh was cold blooded as he spoke so foul
Only twelve, trying to tell me that he liked my style
Then I rose, wiping the blunt’s ash from my clothes
Then froze only to blow the herb smoke through my nose
The picture painted is so crisp, it’s no surprise it ended up in Belly. I always loved the idea of a hardened 12-year-old and Nas talking about the “bad old days.”
Most Underrated Song
Illmatic has been both highly rated and underrated at the same time. For an album that has been included on nearly every “greatest album” list since it came out in 1994, it took seven years to go platinum, and only ever reached 12 on the Billboard 200 chart. None of the mainstream success that Snoop’s Doggystyle debut had one year earlier.
So, to me, it seems like all of the songs were underrated. But I guess since I have to pick one, “Represent” is one of my favorites off the album and I rarely hear people say the same. This song, especially with all the call-and-response from Nas’ crew throughout, feels like an Illmatic mission statement. It’s a chain gang anthem, a locker-room pep rally, a gang initiation ceremony, a college fight song. Nas is in the middle of the huddle but we’re all going to sing along when the chorus comes.
Favorite Punch Line
I have so many favorite verses from Illmatic, but not many that I consider “punch lines.” Punch lines insinuate a joke is being told, and as sharp as Nas is on every line of this album, I don’t think he’s making jokes. He’s not trying to be clever. There are no triple entendres.
When I asked my team, they love the “Halftime” line: “You couldn’t catch me in the streets without a ton of reefer/That’s like Malcolm X, catching the Jungle Fever.”
I’m a fan of a verse that isn’t funny but still compelling: “When it’s my time to go, I wait for God with the .44…” (“Halftime”)
Favorite Sample
Again, when I took the consensus from the MissInfo.TV team, both Mikey Fresh and Andy Bustard said they loved how Large Professor flipped Michael Jackson’s “Human Nature” on “It Ain’t Hard To Tell.”
And I understand the choice, that song gave fans who were new to Nas a comfortable bridge to an MJ classic they already loved. But my favorite was another soul music sample…L.E.S.’ use of The Gap Band’s song “Yearning For Your Love (Keep Running)” on “Life’s a Bitch.” I only knew the 1990 Guy remake of the song when I heard Illmatic at the time—I was a big New Jack Swing fan—but the original is what gives AZ that smooth surface to shine on.
Favorite Slang
I could go on for days talking about all the incredible slang on Illmatic. So many of Nas’ words and phrases have become embedded in our collective vernacular. “I’m a Nike head,” “disciple of the street,” “Afro-centric Asian, half-man half-amazing” and “sleep is the cousin of death” have been referenced and sampled to exhaustion (some of the time, by Nas himself).
But my favorite Illmatic lingo are the words that are frozen in time. Exquisite corpses of the early ’90s. Like referring to your head as a “cabbage.” Calling your friend “baby paw.” Ending a list with “this, that, and the third.” Describing yourself as “lamping big willie style.”
And even better are Nas’ humble street dreams…
On “Represent,” Nas brags that when it comes to his personal style, his gear is “never nothing less than Guess.” What’s that jacket? Margiela? No, it’s acid-washed denim from Manhattan Mall!
On “The World Is Yours,” Nas brags about “...cruising in a six cab or Montero jeep.” Nowadays, D-list rappers claim to have Bugattis and private jets. Back then, Nas was proud to not be taking the subway. He’s luxuriating in a gypsy cab or a Mitsubishi SUV, a P.O.S. so out of favor, they were the standard car rental when I was in Nicaragua last year.
But far from being signs of struggle or unsophistication, Monteros and Guess clothing and John Jay college as a place to pick up chicks...these are the tiny details that make Nas’ debut so real and so moving. As instant and endless as a Robert Frank snapshot of Vernon Boulevard in 1994.