Nas had such a mediocre career.
 

I listened to Nas' full discography the past week. Every album he released after Illmatic was more or less the same: a few great tracks to remind you of what he can do, a few God-awful singles to remind you that he's never going to make it superstar-level big, a few boring-ass songs where he tries to preach at you and a whole bunch of songs where the beats just sucked because he gave his career over to Trackmasterz and Salaam Remi.

There's so much inexplicable shit. Why did The Lost Tapes (recorded almost entirely in 1998 and 1999) have more good songs than I Am ... and Nastradamus (his albums from that era) combined? Why does he still keep trying to make radio-friendly songs with R&B hooks? How did he think following trash single "Got Ur Self A Gun" with "Made You Look" was good when they're practically the same?

If you put Nas' 20 best songs since Illmatic on an album, pretty much nobody could match it. But there's so much garbage in between. I love Mobb Deep, but there's no reason Prodigy should have had a so much more relevant career.

Illmatic is bonkers aside from that tho Nas mad boring to me

stillmatic is probably his best album imo

I personally think illmatic is a little better but the fact @Certain seems to have overlooked stillmatic completely makes me want to rip his throat out.

<3

Lol'd at Prodigy had a more relevant career than Nas

Stillmatic is very unbalanced.

Great songs: “Stillmatic (The Intro),” “Ether,” “Rewind,” “One Mic” and “2nd Childhood.”

Good-enough songs: “You’re da Man,” “The Flyest” (which might be the worst AZ/Nas song ever) and “What Goes Around.”

Shitty songs: “Got Ur Self A…,” “Smokin’,” “Destroy & Rebuild,” “Braveheart Party,” “Rule” and “My Country.”

I have no idea how you could think any song on Illmatic is worse than any of the songs on that last list.

you're da man, the flyest, and what goes around are all great songs i think

got urself a gun is good enough. likewise with destroy and rebuild, even though it's noticeably worse than the former.

smokin, rule, braveheart party, and my country are all shit songs.

there's also 4 more songs on stillmatic than illmatic, so if we factor out these 4 shitty songs, they're more or less equal.

This thread is now a cry for help.

illmatic, stillmatic, and lost tapes.

fuck everything else.

illmatic alone puts nas in a special place though. as soon as i hear the beginning of ny state of mind that entire album plays in my head. and lord did it encompass the feeling of being in urban ny/nj

It's all colored by how great illmatic is. Where do you go from there? Can't top that shit bruh. Lost Tapes, stillmatic, God's Son are dope imo.

Plus he pays a ridiculous amount of child support to Kelis so it's not all bad for Nasir.

yeah god's son wasn't bad either just too much braveheart nonsense

heaven is a great track off of there.

Agree with Certain

Legit thread

Lol thread

"My Country" is just so fucking bad. Maybe the worst hook Nas has ever used, which is saying something. I have very little tolerance for Nas trying to preach or drop political or historic knowledge. He's just wrong so often. ("I Can" was a really, really obnoxious example of that.)

Nas is one of my favorite rappers ever but makes terrible, terrible choices for producers (pretty much every track he's ever recorded with DJ Premier or Large Professor is fire, yet he keeps going back to Salaam Remi) and collaborators (Bravehearts make Outlawz look good by comparison), and he can't make a radio/club song but keeps trying.

WHEN GOLD WAS CONVERTED TO MONEY IT ALL CHANGED

He has historical understanding on the level of an average sixth grader. From "What Goes Around":

YEAH MOTHERFUCKER I LEARNED THAT IN FOURTH GRADE AFTER MAKING HAND TURKEYS.

as far as Remi goes (and bravehearts for that matter), i always assumed they had a close friendship that superseded Nas's better musical judgement.

And that sucks for fans.