Line #39 Music/Nas


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/oie_24215036jUyaZWjv1_1600.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:He never sleeps, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death.]]
3
4	->''"[[BadassBoast Name a rapper that I ain't influenced.]]"''
5	-->-- '''"Ether"'''
6
7	Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones (born on September 14th, 1973), more commonly known by his stage name Nas (formerly Nasty Nas), is a popular rapper based in [[BigApplesauce New York]].
8
9	After his childhood in the Queensbridge housing projects, Nas entered the rap scene with his debut ''Music/{{Illmatic}}'' in 1994. Critically acclaimed due to its educated lyrics, flawless delivery, and innovative beats, the album was an instant classic and thrust him into the critical spotlight. He was also part of the hip-hop group The Firm. His albums since then have mostly been big hits with the critics and public, [[ToughActToFollow although many still point]] to ''Illmatic'' [[FirstInstallmentWins as his best]].
10
11	Aside from his rapping, Nas is best known for his feud with Music/JayZ, both of them inserting jabs at each other in their songs, most notably Nas' "Ether" on ''Stillmatic'' and Jay-Z's "Takeover" on ''The Blueprint''. However, they formally ended their rivalry around October 2005, even performing together at concerts sponsored by hip-hop radio stations based in New York.
12
13	----
14	!!Discography:
15	* ''Music/{{Illmatic}}'' (1994)
16	* ''It Was Written'' (1996)
17	* ''The Firm: The Album'' (as a member of The Firm) (1997)
18	* ''I Am...'' (1999)
19	* ''Nastradamus'' (1999)
20	* ''Stillmatic'' (2001)
21	* ''The Lost Tapes'' (recovered material) (2002)
22	* ''God's Son'' (2002)
23	* ''Street's Disciple'' (2004)
24	* ''Hip Hop Is Dead'' (2006)
25	* ''Untitled''[[note]]It was originally to be titled [[spoiler:''Nigger'']], but was officially changed to have {{no title}} following public controversy[[/note]] (2008)
26	* ''Distant Relatives'' (with Damian Marley) (2010)
27	* ''Life Is Good'' (2012)
28	* ''Nasir'' (2018)
29	* ''The Lost Tapes 2'' (2019)
30	* ''King's Disease'' (2020)
31	* ''King's Disease II'' (2021)
32	* ''Magic'' (2021)
33	* ''King’s Disease III'' (2022)
34	* ''Magic 2'' (2023)
35	* ''Magic 3'' (2023)
36	!!Nas provides examples of:
37	* BlasphemousBoast: Nas has a tattoo saying "God's son" on his stomach, which he references numerous times in his discography, most memorably in the title of his sixth album and in "Ether".
38	-->''God's Son across the belly, I prove you lost already.''
39	* BlatantLies: The video for "Hate Me Now" begins with a disclaimer stating it does not depict the death of Jesus. Cut to Nas wearing a crown of thorns.
40	* CallBack
41	** One of his earliest tracks, "One Love", from ''Illmatic'', has a few lines in the third verse addressed to ghetto ne'er-do-wells, telling them to at least try to avoid catching innocents in the crossfire: "tough luck when niggas are struck, families fucked up, could've caught your man, but didn't look when you bucked up; mistakes happen, so take heed: never bust up at the crowd, catch him solo, make the right man bleed". "Accident Murderers" from his later album ''Life Is Good'' is addressed to someone who did not take heed at this advice: "Accident murderer, act like you killed on purpose, liars brag, you put work in; you ain't mean to murk him, your guns are virgin".
42	** "The Flyest" from ''Stillmatic'' is a musical callback to "Life's a Bitch" to ''Illmatic''. In addition to reuniting Nas with AZ, both tracks share the same producer (L.E.S.), and "The Flyest" contains several reflections on how both the rap scene and Nas and AZ's place in it have changed since "Life's a Bitch". The song also generally takes a more relaxed and optimistic tone than the bittersweet lament of "Life's a Bitch".
43	* CanonDiscontinuity: The track "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qUHU32QH68 Braveheart Party]]" was removed from ''Stillmatic'', apparently at Mary J. Blige's request. Both the fans and Nas have ignored this song's existence.
44	* CoverVersion: "If I Ruled the World (Imagine That)" is actually a cover of Kurtis Blow's own hit single "If I Ruled the World".
45	* CrossReferencedTitles:
46	** ''Illmatic'' was his first album, ''Stillmatic'' was his comeback album.
47	** ''Nastradamus'' served as the replacement for the scrapped second disc of ''I Am''. In conjunction, their titles can be read as ''I Am... Nastradamus'', indicating the project's original concept.
48	** "Nas is Good", the last song on ''King's Disease II'', echoes and builds on the name of ''Life is Good''.
49	* CrucifiedHeroShot: Nas is depicted being nailed to the cross through the rest of the music video for "Hate Me Now". Originally, the video showed Puff Daddy also nailed to the cross along with him, but because Puffy is Catholic, he wanted his crucifixion scene excised from the video. However, the wrong edit was sent to Creator/{{MTV}} and Total Request Live and aired on April 15, 1999, and that was when [[http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/nas-greatest-hits-a-track-by-track-journey-with-the-pride-of-queens-20071106 the crudstorm between Puffy and Nas' manager Steve Stoute]] [[ExecutiveMeddling began to escalate]]...
50	* DueToTheDead: The first and second verses of "We Will Survive" from ''I Am...'', paying dues to [[Music/TheNotoriousBIG Biggie]] and Music/{{Tupac\|Shakur}} respectively.
51	* EpicRocking: "Everything" lasts over seven and a half minutes.
52	* GangstaRap:
53	** ''Illmatic'': Blue Collar
54	** ''It Was Written'': Mafioso with shades of Commercial.
55	** Subsequent albums: Blue Collar with shades of Commercial.
56	%%* GenreSavvy: Just listen to "Where Are They Now?"
57	* HesBack: ''Stillmatic'' was pitched as and turned out to be his comeback record following the mixed critical and commercial response to his previous album ''Nastradamus''.
58	* InsultBackfire: Like virtually any rapper in his position, Nas shrugged off Music/JayZ's "Takeover", which insulted him and fellow Queenbridge natives Mobb Deep, but as he pointed many times in later interviews, "The streets"' response to it was basically "You're gonna let him get away with talking shit about you". In fact, it's been argued that "Takeover" was the best thing to happen for Nas's career, as being the underdog for the first time in years quite possibly gave him the hunger he needed to strike back as strongly as he did.
59	* InTheStyleOf: With the help of Mr. Santana, [[Music/{{ACDC}} "Back in Black"]] in the style of [[Music/JayZ "99 Problems"]].
60	* LastSupperSteal: The cover of ''Street's Disciple'', with Nas posing for the central Christ figure as well as that of the Apostles.
61	* LonelyAtTheTop: The latter half of "A Queens Story" from ''Life Is Good'' carries this vibe, depicting Nas by himself in an upscale nightclub [[ToAbsentFriends toasting to the people from his childhood]] [[DueToTheDead who are not with him]].
62	* NewSoundAlbum: ''It Was Written'' shifts toward Mafioso Rap for the most part. ''King's Disease'' marked a shift toward Nas teaming up with Hit-Boy to produce his albums, which continued with its sequels and "Magic" a year later.
63	* NoTitle: His untitled 2008 album (after the original title, ''Nigger'', was withdrawn). Most online retailers simply title it ''[[SelfTitledAlbum Nas]]''.
64	* RatedGForGangsta: Played straight and inverted several times. From ''Illmatic'', to "Oochie Wally", to battling Jay-Z and declaring hip-hop "dead", to signing with Def Jam and Fila shoe endorsements; all the while collaborating with the entire gamut of hip-hop, from DJ Premier and Pete Rock to Trackmasters and Puff Daddy to even non hip-hop artists such as Music/{{Korn}}, Damian Marley, and Carlos Santana. He also wrote "Getting Jiggy Wit It" for Music/WillSmith and recorded a song with the Music/SpiceGirls' Victoria Beckham (wife of soccer player David), named "Full Stop" as well as a song with pop singer Music/JustinBieber named "We Are".
65	* RecordProducer:
66	** ''Illmatic'' popularised in hip-hop the practice of using multiple producers for albums, rather than a single producer or production team. It was primarily produced by a combination of DJ Premier, Pete Rock, Large Professor, L.E.S. and [[Music/ATribeCalledQuest Q-Tip]], all of whom would become regular producers for Nas over his career.
67	** Much of his 90s output, including the majority of ''It Was Written'' and ''I Am...'', featured beats from production team The Trackmasters.
68	** ''God's Son'' saw Nas begin a collaborative relationship with Salaam Remi, who produced at least one track if not more on every Nas album from then until ''Life is Good''.
69	** ''Life is Good'' was largely produced by Remi and veteran hip-hop producer No I.D., best-known for his work with Music/KanyeWest.
70	** Kanye himself, who had earlier produced "Still Dreaming" from ''Hip Hop is Dead'', produced the entirety of ''Nasir'' as one of five albums from his prolific 2018 sessions at his Wyoming ranch, along with his own ''Ye'', ''Music/KidsSeeGhosts'', Pusha T's ''Daytona'' and Teyana Taylor's ''K.T.S.E.''.
71	** Beginning with ''King's Disease'', Nas began a more traditional artist-producer relationship with Hit-Boy, who has subsequently produced the entirety of every Nas album since, including both ''King's Disease'' sequels and the ''Magic'' series.
72	** The Firm's only, self-titled, album, was almost entirely produced by Dr. Dre, who had a major role in the group's formation.
73	* TheRival
74	** Jay-Z, at least until October 2005. They've since become friends and collaborated four times, on Nas's "Black Republican", Jay's "Success" and "BBC", and DJ Khaled's "SORRY NOT SORRY".
75	** Narrowly averted with Music/{{Tupac}}. Tupac thought Nas dissed him on "The Message"[[note]]He thought the opening line, "fake thugs, no love" was directed at him.[[/note]], which is why he attacked him on his final album, ''Don Killuminati''. However, Nas heard about the upcoming track through the grapevine and arranged to meet with Tupac in New York, where they cleared up the misunderstanding and Tupac promised to remove the offending line from his album. Unfortunately, the line was not removed as their encounter was mere days before Tupac's fatal shooting. Nas has since spoken of Tupac with a consistent level of respect in the years since, and it was alleged by some of Tupac's associates that he was listening to ''It Was Written'' for inspiration during his final days.
76	* RockMeAmadeus: "I Can" uses the beginning of Music/LudwigVanBeethoven's ''Für Elise''. Likewise "Hate Me Now" samples "StandardSnippet/OFortuna" from Karl Orff's ''Music/CarminaBurana''.
77	%%* RousingSpeech: "One Mic".
78	* ShoutOut: The album art for ''Stillmatic'' bares a pretty blatant resemblance to that of ''Music/TheGreatAdventuresOfSlickRick''; Nas, who admires Music/SlickRick greatly, had it made that way as an act of {{Homage}}.
79	** The ''It Was Written'', ''I Am...'', ''Nastradamus'', and ''God's Son'' covers have strong references to the Weldon Irvine album covers of ''Sinbad'', ''Cosmic Vortex'', ''Spirit Man'', and ''Music Is The Key'' respectively.
80	** And of course, the cover of ''Street's Disciple'' is a reference to ''Art/TheLastSupper''.
81	** The gunshots in "Ether" (ostensibly being aimed towards Jay-Z) are the same gunshots heard in Music/TheNotoriousBIG's famous "Who Shot Ya?", which Tupac thought was a diss track against him.
82	* {{Supergroup}}: The Firm.
83	* TheStoner: Has made several marijuana references, especially during his ''Illmatic'' days.
84	-->''You couldn't catch me in the streets without a ton of reefer. That's like UsefulNotes/MalcolmX [[WhereDaWhiteWomenAt catching the]] Film/JungleFever.''
85	-->--'''"Halftime"''
86	** ''N.Y. State of Mind'' has one of his most legendary {{Double Entendre}}s.
87	-->''It was full of children, probably couldn't see as high as I be.''
88	** The intro of "Nas is Coming" has him share a blunt with ''The Chronic'' master himself, Music/DrDre.
89	** "Smokin'" on ''Stillmatic'', naturally.
90	* TakeThat
91	** "Ether", aimed at Music/JayZ as a response to Jay's "The Takeover", which dissed him (along with Mobb Deep). Fans still debate as to who had the better diss track. But general consensus is that Nas won.
92	** "Destroy and Rebuild", also from ''Stillmatic'', is essentially a stern talking-down to Cormega, Nature, and Prodigy from Music/MobbDeep. Cormega and Nature had beef with Nas thanks to fallout from their membership in The Firm, and Prodigy got dragged into it due to his presence on a track with Cormega where Nas was dissed - although Prodigy had later gone on record as saying his verse wasn't targeted towards Nas, and got mistaken as such because Mega dissed him without his awareness.
93	* TallPoppySyndrome: Briefly discusses this trope in the context of the African-American community in general and in the rap music business in particular in "Carry On Tradition".
94	* TeenGenius: He was considered this after his verse on "Live at the Barbeque"(in which he was 16), his single "Halftime" (made when he was 17) and especially after the release of ''Illmatic'' (even though he was actually 21 when it came out, the recording itself took place while he was still in his teens). What's more ironic about this fact is that he's a ''middle school dropout''.
95	* ThemeNaming: The nicknames he adopted for himself, Nasty NASDAQ and Dow Jones, are both named after stock indices.
96	* WretchedHive: "N.Y. State of Mind", and "N.Y. State of Mind Pt. II" both paint New York as this.

Context Music / Nas