![gang starr zip hard to earn gang starr zip hard to earn](https://i.redd.it/ointtoo9ktl61.jpg)
There's no way to catch "Illmatic" in just a few listenings, either. " Among the album's 10 cuts, the nostalgic "Memory Lane" and anger-tinged "Represent" (both with DJ Premier) are also standouts. Stay civilized/ Time flies/ When you incarcerated/ Your mind dies. "You'll be out soon/ Stay strong/ In New York/ The same (expletive) is going on/ The crackheads stalking/ The loudmouths talking. " Nas raps, with Q-Tip guesting on the chorus effectively borrowed from Bob Marley.
GANG STARR ZIP HARD TO EARN PLUS
No time for looking back/ It's done/ Plus congratulations/ You know you got a son/ I heard he looks like you. It's an open letter to imprisoned brothers that serves up news (good and sad) from home. You hear that in the track "One Love," produced by Q-Tip.
![gang starr zip hard to earn gang starr zip hard to earn](https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1741/5543/products/HARDTOEARN_18fb1db5-2106-4791-b061-02876c72121b_large.jpg)
More importantly, he recognizes the older, deeper culture of familial community that is poverty and racism's first casualty. It's up to you/ The world is yours." That's Nas: balancing limitations and possibilities, distinguishing hurdles and springboards, and acknowledging his own growth from roughneck adolescent to a maturing adult who can respect and criticize the culture of violence that surrounds him. And it's followed by the roiling, scratching Pete Rock track "The World Is Yours," its jazzy piano-fueled pulse underscoring this affirmation: "My son is starting to be my resurrection. " Twice, he refers to his shattered peace of mind, rapping "Never sleep/ 'Cause sleep is the cousin of death/ Beyond the walls of intelligence/ Life is defined/ I think of crime/ When I'm in a New York state of mind." But against DJ Premier's terse setting, Nas also adds: "I got so many rhymes/ Don't think I'm too sane/ Life is parallel to Hell/ But I must maintain/ And be prosperous/ Though we live dangerous." There's a fatalist despair to "Life's a Bitch," with its chorus of "Life's a bitch/ And then you die/ That's why we get high/ 'Cause ya never know/ When you gonna go." A solid track produced by L.E.S., it features a muted trumpet line by Olu Dare - Nas's father. For instance, his "New York State of Mind" is quite different from Billy Joel's suburban idyll: "Check the prognosis/ Is it real or show biz/ My window faces shootouts/ Drug overdoses/ Live amongst no roses/ Only the drama. Taking gangsta rap's cherished notion of "street reporting" to a higher level, Nas insists that means more than covering just the crime beat. Coming out of New York's tough Queensbridge Projects - the country's biggest - 20-year-old Nas has with his producers crafted a "reality storybook" dense with social tragedy and violence, but also with resilience and renewal. Riding the auteurs' varied beats, Nas's raps explode in long, seemingly breathless lines crowded with precocious wordplay that's at once visceral and mesmerizing. Like Rakim's breakthrough efforts of the mid-'80s, "Illmatic" is a wedding of deft verbal construction and fluid vocal delivery that clearly takes things forward. What separates Nas from the pack is not only the consistency of his work, but its innovation. "Illmatic" (Columbia) proves Nas to be the exception. Then came his 1992 underground hit, "Halftime." But the anticipation was tempered by apprehension: After all, rap's archives are crowded with great singles that turned out to be one-shots rather than first-shots. It was the rush of Nas's words - convoluted, complex but always logical - and the fierce flow of his delivery that initially caught folks' ears. Rap afficionados got their first taste of Nasir Jones, then known as Nasty Nas, when he freestyled on Main Source's 1991 cut, "Live at the BBQ." It's also the first debut in five years to receive a rare "5 microphone" rating from the Source magazine, which recently dubbed "Illmatic" "a hip-hop classic." It could have earned most of those stars solely on the basis of beats and textures provided by a Dream Team of producers: Pete Rock Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest DJ Premier of Gang Starr and the Large Professor, formerly of Main Source.
![gang starr zip hard to earn gang starr zip hard to earn](https://sf.ezoiccdn.com/ezoimgfmt/hiphopgoldenage.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Jeru-The-Damaja-The-Sun-Rises-In-The-East-1994-Front.jpg)
What's one major difference between rap's commercial mainstream and its crucial underground tributaries? For the former, the most anticipated rap debut in recent years was Snoop Doggy Dogg's "Doggy Style." For the latter, it is Nas's "Illmatic." And years from now, it's the Nas album that's likely to be remembered as a signal event in the continuing evolution of rap.