Illmatic

Product Information

May as well have been recorded in a crappy sounding arena, because you would never believe it was done in an acoustically sound amphitheatre, as it was. This sounds insane in hindsight. When people start making greatest rapper lists you can't count to five before Nas' name is mentioned. The kid who went to hell for snuffing Jesus has become a sacred cow. Twenty years deep, he's nominated for a Grammy and is in Gap ads with his dad. There was the album with Damian Marley, the feud with Jay-Z, there was Belly. Nas is firmly entrenched in VH1 Special territory. He has crossed over enough without ever making radio hits, save for "Oochie Wally", in which he is out-rapped by his bodyguard-- all for oochie. B2 - Produced by Q-Tip for A Tribe Called Quest, Inc.. Recorded and mixed at Battery Studios, NYC. Contains sample from "Smilin Billy Suite Pt. II" as performed by The Heath Brothers and written by J. Heath. One Time 4 Your Mind" produced for Paul Sea Productions, Inc. Recorded and mixed at Chung King Studios, NYC. Contains sample from "Walter L" as written by G. Burton. NY State Of Mind" produced for Works Of Mart Productions. Recorded and mixed at D&D Recording, NYC.

Thanks for supporting my small business, all made in my workshop at Papamoa Beach in the beautiful Bay Of Plenty The phrases and images are so deeply rooted in rap consciousness to have become cliché. Over the last 19 years, a million secret handshakes and scratched hooks have been executed to lines from Illmatic: I woke up early on my born day; I sip the Dom P, watching Gandhi 'til I'm charged; you couldn't catch me in the streets without a ton of reefer, that's like Malcolm X catching jungle fever; I'm an addict for sneakers, twenties of Buddha, and bitches with beepers; vocabulary spills, I'm ill; life's a bitch and then you die. But Nas uses Illmatic as more than a vehicle to escape. The styles and stories that formed him fuse into something that withstands outdated slang and popular taste: it is a story of a gifted writer born into squalor, trying to claw his way out of the trap. It's somewhere between The Basketball Diaries and Native Son, but Jim Carroll and Richard Wright couldn't rap like Nas. B3 - Large Professor Music Ltd. / EMI April Music Inc. / III Will Music, Inc. / Skematics Music (ASCAP)Selected items are only available for delivery via the Royal Mail 48® service and other items are available for delivery using this service for a charge.

Ill Will Music, Inc./Skematics Music/Minder Music (USA) (ASCAP)/Taking Care Of Business Music/Total Experience Music Publishing Co. (BMI) Halftime" produced for Paul Sea Productions, Inc. Recorded and mixed at Chung King Studios, NYC. Contains samples from "Dead End", "Soul Travelin'" and "School Boy Crush". Large Professor Music Ltd./EMI April Music Inc./Ill Will Music, Inc./Skematics Music/Minder Music (USA) (ASCAP) Memory Lane (Sittin' In Da Park)" produced for Works Of Mart Productions. Recorded and mixed at D&D Recording, NYC. Contains sample from "We're In Love" as performed by Reuben Wilson and written by R. Wilson and P. Barsella. EMI Unart Catalog Inc./Ill Will Music, Inc./Skematics Music/Gifted Pearl (ASCAP) If you listen to it enough names start to pop out: Fatcat, Alpo, Grand Wizard, Mayo, the foul cop who shot Garcia, Jerome's niece, Little Rob, Herb, Ice, and Bullet. The entirety of "Represent". You start to wonder where they are now, or if they are. The album's lone guest AZ, lays it down flat: he's destined to live the dream for all the peeps who never made it.Removed from context, they seem unremarkable. When spit with criminal smoothness over beat breaks, they became iconic. If Rakim was rap's Woody Guthrie, Nas was the Dylan figure expanding the possibilities and complexity of the form, twisting old fables to match contemporary failings, faithful to tradition but unwilling to submit to orthodoxy. Memory Lane (Sittin' In Da Park)" produced for Works Of Mart Productions. Recorded and mixed at D&D Recording, NYC. B1 - Produced by DJ Premier for Works Of Mart Productions. Recorded and mixed at D&D Recording, NYC. Contains sample from "We're In Love" as performed by Reuben Wilson and written by R. Wilson and P. Barsella. This resourcefulness carried on into my adult years, leading to a passion for turning rubbish or discarded items into art or fixing them up and onselling.

One Time For Your Mind" produced for Paul Sea Productions, Inc. Recorded and mixed at Chung King Studios, NYC. I was the person every Sunday going through your inorganic rubbish on the kerbside looking for "gold" One Love" produced for A Tribe Called Quest, Inc. Recorded and mixed at Battery Studios, NYC. Contains sample from "Smilin' Billy Suite Pt. II" as performed by The Heath Brothers and written by J. Heath. Ill Will Music, Inc./Skematics Music (ASCAP)/MJQ Music, Inc. (BMI).The recording of the concert itself sounds amateurish. Orchestra is way too quiet, has no presence, no depth, no imaging. The vocals are boomy, and twice as loud as the music. Defeats the purpose of the entire event if the instruments never shine through. Contains sample of "We're In Love" as performed by Reuben Wilson and written by R Wilson and P. Barsella. The enduring vision of Nas: a baby-faced Buddha monk in public housing, scribbling lotto dreams and grim reaper nightmares in dollar notebooks, words enjambed in the margins. The only light is the orange glow of a blunt, bodega liquor, and the adolescent rush of first creation. Sometimes his pen taps the paper and his brain blanks. In the next sentence, he remembers dark streets and the noose.