Nas (rapper)

Nas in Paris (2014)

Nas (born September 14, 1973 in Brooklyn , New York City ; real name Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones ) is an American rapper . His career began in Queensbridge , a social hotspot in New York with a high crime rate. Illmatic , his debut album from 1994, is now considered a milestone in the hip-hop scene.

Nas belongs to the group of lyricists and sees himself as a modern poet . Nas stands both as an abbreviation for his first name Nasir as well as for " N igga A gainst S ociety" and for " N ot A ll S urrender". Due to his political way of thinking and his achievements for hip-hop, he is one of the most important contemporary rappers. He worked u. a. with Damian Marley , son of reggae legend Bob Marley .

biography

Nas (1998)

Childhood, Adolescence and Early Career (1973–1992)

Nas was established in 1973 as the son of jazz musician Olu Dara (III born Charles Jones * 1941) and the postmistress Fannie Ann Jones (born Little, † 2002 * 1941) in the district of Crown Heights in New York District Brooklyn born. He has a younger brother named Jabari, nicknamed " Jungle " because he was born in the Congo . Nas' real name is Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones. The name Nasir means something like "the helper and protector" in Arabic . Bin is a component of male Arabic names that means "son of". The Jones family lived in Crown Heights for the first five years after Nas was born before moving to a block of flats in Queensbridge, Queens borough . Olu Dara left his wife in 1986 when Nas was 13 years old. Ann Jones then raised the two sons alone. Shortly after his parents separated, Nas became more and more immersed in African culture and wrote short stories about it. After eighth grade, he dropped out of school and started selling drugs on the streets. He learned autodidactically about Africa and its civilization, the Koran , the Bible and the Five Percent Nation . He also studied the origins of rap music and listened to New York hip-hop radio stations.

Inspired by rap stars of the time like Rakim and Kool G Rap , he developed the desire for a career as a rapper. He made his neighbor and best friend Willy "Ill Will" Graham his DJ . Nas was initially known under the pseudonym Kid Wave until he finally renamed himself Nasty Nas. Nas and Graham soon met the producer and Queens resident Large Professor , who introduced the two youngsters to his group Main Source . In 1991 he got the chance to work on the main source album Breaking Atoms and was allowed to rap a verse on the song Live at the Barbeque as a guest . Despite the existing enthusiasm in the immediate environment, Nas was rejected by all major labels and did not get a record deal. Nas and his partner began to work together again, but it did not last because Graham was shot dead by an unknown person on the street in Queensbridge on May 23, 1992.

The recording and publication of Illmatic (1992–1995)

In the middle of 1992, Nas met MC Serch from 3rd Bass , who became his manager and was able to get him a record deal with Columbia Records that same year. Nas made his solo debut with the single Halftime to the soundtrack of the film Zebrahead . Nas increased in his performance and he got another appearance in the song Back To The Grill from MC Serch's solo album, which increased the interest in Nas' upcoming album enormously. Nas' talent for words and rhymes impressed the entire hip-hop community in and around New York.

In 1994 the time had come - Illmatic was released. The album is now considered a milestone in hip-hop history and the criticism back then was mostly positive. Many have called it a masterpiece or even a “blueprint” - as a template for other rappers. Illmatic contains texts that reflect overwhelming images that have never been seen in this form before. At the controls were the best producers of the time, including Large Professor , Q-Tip , Pete Rock , DJ Premier and LES , a long-time friend and companion of Nas. Overall, only two guests appeared on the album. In the song Life's a Bitch , Nas' friend AZ takes over the first part and his father Olu Dara plays some pieces on the trumpet . In addition to Halftime , Illmatic released three more singles . Due to the low commercial marketing, Illmatic was initially not a box-office hit, but was later awarded the platinum record for over a million records sold .

After Illmatic , Nas returned the favor at AZ by supporting him on his debut album Doe or Die . He also started making first contacts with other rappers and worked with the rap duo Mobb Deep on The Infamous and with Raekwon for the album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… . Nas was the first MC outside the Wu-Tang Clan to appear as a guest musician on an album by a clan member. All three projects that Nas was involved in from 1994 to 1995, including his own work, received five mics from hip-hop magazine The Source for the best possible album rating, which to date has only awarded 43 albums . The guest appearance on Raekwon's debut was the start of his "Escobar" phase, in which he presented himself as a mafioso and named himself after the Colombian drug baron and multi-billionaire Pablo Escobar .

From It Was Written to The Firm (1996-1998)

Columbia Records urged Nas to start producing music that would make more profit in the market. Nas swapped his manager MC Serch for Steve Stoute and began preparing for his second album It Was Written , which was deliberately not produced in a mixed style. The album was mainly produced by the Trackmasters and the release took place in the summer of 1996. The two singles If I Ruled the World (Imagine That) with Lauryn Hill from The Fugees and Street Dreams , a remix with R. Kelly , were instant chart successes. There was a large budget available for the songs and the accompanying video clips were shot by Hype Williams . The album reflects Nas in his role as Escobar, in which he leads a life similar to Scarface , with cigars , beautiful women and lots of casino visits. Illmatic, on the other hand, is often associated with Nas in the housing projects as a teenager and compared to Scarface's time when he was a dishwasher and not a drug lord. It Was Written was also the birth of The Firm , a hip-hop crew made up of Nas, Foxy Brown , AZ and Cormega .

The Firm was founded by Dr. Dres label Aftermath Entertainment marketed and the work for the upcoming album took its course. During the production, Cormega was kicked out of the crew by Steve Stoute and replaced by Nature , as Cormega did not get a record deal . Queensbridge colleague Cormega accused Nas of not interfering and was one of his main opponents from that point on. This was followed by a real wave of diss on the part of Cormega, in which Nas, Steve Stoute and Nature were attacked. After The Firm: The Album was released in October 1997 and had poor sales, all members went their separate ways and focused on their solo careers. 1998 Nas played in Hype Williams ' film Belly , where, among others, DMX , Method Man and T-Boz from TLC were represented, the main role. During the same period, Nas signed an advertising contract with the fashion brand Willie Esco , which was dissolved in 2000 because Nas did not agree to the terms and conditions.

From I Am ... to Nastradamus (1998–2000)

In 1998 Nas started work on a double album , which was to be called I Am ... The Autobiography . The intent was to bring the two characters together from his previous albums of real street-hop and the latest club bangers. In early 1999 work on the album was completed and a video clip for the DJ Premiers single Nas Is Like was shot. Much of the tracks on I Am… were illegally offered on file sharing sites on the Internet , whereupon Nas and his manager decided to record replacement material and release these songs as individual singles. Songs popular on the internet include Amongst Kings , Blaze A 50 , Drunk By Myself , Hardest Thing to Do Is Stay Alive , U Gotta Love It , Find Ya Wealth , Project Windows , Fetus , Wanna Play Rough , Sometimes I Wonder , Daydreamin and Stay Scheming .

The album featured a packed guest list of Aaliyah , Scarface, and DMX, to name a few. The second official single for I Am… was Hate Me Now with Puff Daddy . In the song Nas accounts for all those who accuse him of having lost his credibility, and he is symbolically crucified in the accompanying music video, similar to Jesus Christ . After the video shoot, Diddy, for reasons unknown, requested that his scene during the crucifixion be removed. In the end, however, the video clip was broadcast uncut on MTV and received an award from TRL on April 15, 1999. According to headlines, Sean Combs and some bodyguards stormed into Steve Stout's office and hit him on the head with a champagne bottle. Nas' manager Stoute sued Combs for damages , but the matter was resolved out of court in June.

Columbia Records and Nas have agreed not to release the black copies of I Am ... as a separate album under the name The Lost Tapes until 2002. Within a few months, Nas managed to record a completely new album called Nastradamus , which went on sale in November 1999. Nastradamus' only hit was the song You Owe Me produced by Timbaland in collaboration with R&B singer Ginuwine . Of the original double album, only Project Windows with Ronald Isley of the Isley Brothers made it on Nastradamus . The album achieved low sales and was showered with negative criticism.

Nas' rivalry with Jay-Z and Stillmatic (2000-2001)

The beef between Nas and the Brooklyn rapper Jay-Z , widely spread by the media , arose out of a dispute between Nas and Jay-Z's protégé Memphis Bleek . On Bleek's debut album Coming Of Age was a song called Memphis Bleek Is , which corresponded to the concept of Nas single Nas Is Like . On the same album there was the song What You Think of That with Bleek's mentor Jay-Z, in whose refrain the line I'ma Ball 'Til I Fall / What You Think of That? occurs. Nas took this verse as the answer for his 1999 song Nastradamus , in which the line “You Wanna Ball Till You Fall, I Can Help You With That / You Want Beef? I could Let a Slug Melt in Your Hat ”, which was not directed to anyone specifically. Memphis Bleek found this verse unjustified and dissed Nas for it on his mixtape The Understanding on the song My Mind Right with the line "And Only a Few Fit In, Your Lifestyle's Written / So Who You Supposed to Be, Play Your Position" .

In 2000 the sampler QB's Finest was released on Nas' label Ill Will Records , on which many well-known rappers from Queensbridge, such as Mobb Deep, Nature, Capone , The Bravehearts , Tragedy Khadafi , Millennium Thug and Cormega, who had recently been with Nas had reconciled, were represented. The album also features Queensbridge legends such as Roxanne Shante , MC Shan and Marley Marl from the Juice Crew . Shan and Marley Marl are both featured on the first 2001 single Da Bridge , which is based on MC Shans and Marley Marls Da Bridge from 1986. On this song the counterstrike against Memphis Bleek takes place. Nas raps on his part “Oh You Didn't, Wanna Know Whose Life Was Written / The Life I'm Livin, The Ice, The Women” and “Jaws Is Broke, Your Whole Crew Is Coffin Bound / Your Ho, Your Man” "Lieutenant, Your Boss Get Found".

In 2001, Jay-Z responded to Nas' allusions during the Hot 97 Summer Jam concert in New York when he introduced his new song Takeover and cracked negative comments and jokes about Nas. Originally Takeover was intended as a diss track against the two rappers from Mobb Deep, but at the end of the song Jay wrote a verse against Nas.

Nas' answer to takeover was Ether . At the beginning of the track shots are fired from a pistol and Tupac Shakur's voice repeats the phrase "Fuck Jay-Z". Nas accused Jay-Z of stealing rhymes from The Notorious BIG (“How Much of Biggie's Rhymes Is Gon 'Come Out Your Fat Lips?”), The name of his album The Blueprint of having stolen from an existing KRS-One album, and that Jay-Z snuck into other rappers for his success (“My Child, I've Watched You Grow Up to Be Famous / And Now I Smile Like a Proud Dad "Watchin His Only Son That Made It"). Furthermore, Nas claimed that all songs on The Blueprint were inferior to the track Renagade with Eminem ("You Ass, Went from Jaz to Hangin with Caine, to Herb, to Big / And, Eminem Murdered You on Your Own Shit"). The title ether refers to organic compounds with an ether group as a functional group . In ether , about 80 percent of the lines are direct attacks against Jay-Z and Roc-A-Fella.

Ether was added to Nas' fifth studio album Stillmatic and subsequently released in December 2001. It wasn't supposed to be a comeback album, but it was still commercially successful, even if not quite as successful as, for example, I Am… The album went from number zero to number five in the album charts. The singles were Got Ur Self A… and One Mic . There was no winner in terms of sales, Stillmatic and The Blueprint by Jay-Z were both awarded double platinum and five mics, so both rappers managed to get one more place on the best hip-hop albums secure at all times. At the Summerjam 2002 Nas planned to lynch a straw doll with Jay-Z's face and burn it afterwards, but this did not happen because the organizer had banned the action at the last minute.

After Ether , there was another attack by Jay-Z called Supa Ugly . Jay-Z tells about sex with Carmen Bryan, the mother of Nas' little daughter Destiny. Nas commented and testified that he was no longer with Carmen during the time the affair was taking place. On his song Blueprint 2 Jay-Z says in one line: "I know I will not lose, but even if it were a defeat, this battle was still a valuable experience for me". A short time later, the New York radio station Hot 97 initiated a telephone poll to investigate which of the two was the winner. Nas won the battle with 58 percent of the vote, Jay-Z received 42 percent. The dispute demonstrated the widespread idea of ​​competition in hip-hop, in which conflicts that are partly personal in nature, partly only stylized, are transformed into a musical and poetic art.

On Jay-Z's next album in 2002, The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse , Jay-Z mentions again on the song Blueprint 2 that he doesn't care what happened in the battle and that he doesn't copy anyone. Jay-Z also criticized Nas that he was hypocritical and recorded tracks like Black Girl Lost , but soon afterwards the track You Owe Me (a track that discriminated against women) could be heard on his album. “Nas is currently only in the spotlight because, thanks to me, he is getting attention from the media,” Jay-Z said in an interview.

From God's Son to Street's Disciple (2002-2004)

Nas at a concert in Hamburg (2003)

In December 2002 the album God's Son was released with the single Made You Look . From now on, Nas describes himself as a gift from God and as a “mastermind”, a person who does not have to use violence to reach his goal. The album only reached number 18 in the album charts in the first week. Still, New York's Time Magazine crowned it the best hip-hop album of 2002. By Vibe Magazine was God's Son four stars and The Source awarded four out of five mics. The second single on the album was I Can and is based on the melody of Für Elise , which comes from the German composer Ludwig van Beethoven . God's Son also includes songs that Nas dedicated to his mother, who died of cancer in 2002 . Nas showed his versatility in 2003 when he worked with the rock band Korn and recorded the song Play Me for their album Take a Look in the Mirror with them.

On November 30, 2004, Nas' first double album Street's Disciple was released. They came up with something very special for the spectacular album cover: As the name Street's Disciple suggests, Nas was disguised as a disciple and dined like Jesus at the Last Supper . The first two singles were Thief's Theme and Bridging The Gap in collaboration with his father Olu Dara. The album also features the track These Are Our Heroes , in which prominent athletes and actors such as Kobe Bryant , Tiger Woods and Cuba Gooding Jr. are criticized for leading a life like white hotel heirs and forgetting their African roots . Just a Moment with the rapper Quan was selected as the next single . The song is about life and death, deceased artists like Big L , Jam Master Jay and Big Pun , whose musical merits are recognized. Quan also mentions his sister, who is stationed in Iraq . Nas mourns his mother and his former friend and DJ, Ill Will, who was murdered in the early 1990s. The Bridging the Gap and Just a Moment video clips were played frequently on MTV. The album went platinum but wasn't as profitable as its predecessor.

On January 8, 2005, Nas married R&B singer Kelis Rogers after a two-year relationship with close friends and family in Atlanta , Georgia . They met at P. Diddy's aftershow party in New York and had worked together several times before. Nas is a guest on Kanye West's album Late Registration on the song We Major . Around the same time, he also worked with Damian Marley on Road To Zion and Lauryn Hill on It Wasn't You . June 2005 Nas published the Disstrack Don't Body Ya Self (MC Burial) for 50 Cent on the Internet. 50 Cent previously dissed him on the song Piggy Bank with the line "Kelis Said Her Milkshake Brings All The Boys To The Yard / Then Nas Went And Tattooed The Bitch On His Arm". Soon after, Nas held a free concert in Central Park in New York and concluded that 50 Cent did not value quality and did not make music for love, but only to make as much money as possible.

From Hip Hop Is Dead to Untitled (2005-2008)

Nas live in Ottawa (2007)

In the fall of 2005, Nas was named # 5 of MTV's greatest MCs of all time and his album Illmatic made it to # 2 of the best hip-hop albums of all time. In an interview, Nas said that at the beginning of his career he showed 50 Cent his first real Rolex , the first Bentley and diamonds , so it was a mystery to him why 50 Cent called him a window shopper in his song . In October 2005, Nas and Jay-Z made peace at the I Declare War - Power House concert . Instead of Jay-Z settling accounts with old enemies, he called Nas on stage with the words "It's Bigger Than I Declare War - Let's Go, Esco!" And they rapped some old songs together. In January 2006, Nas was signed by Def Jam Records . In the summer of 2006, Nas appeared on the albums of DJ Hi-Tek and Busta Rhymes .

Nas announced that his new album would be called Hip Hop Is Dead , and that there would be a track with Jay-Z on it. Columbia and Def Jam would share the profit for the album and Columbia could keep the rights of all previous Nas albums for themselves. Hip Hop Is Dead was supposed to be released on September 19, 2006, but was then postponed to December. Some southern DJs criticized Nas for calling his album that because it meant that down-south rap was destroying hip-hop. Hip Hop Is Dead was released on December 15, 2006 in Germany and on December 19, 2006 in the USA . In January 2007, KRS-One paid tribute to Nas in a song produced by Marley Marl and thanked Nas for his work.

In February 2007 Nas released three different remix versions of the song Where Are They Now? . Nas worked with artists such as Das EFX , Kool Moe Dee , Ice-T and a total of over 30 other old-school hip-hop legends, with the three official remixes Where Are They Now? 80's Remix , Where Are They Now? 90's Remix and Where Are They Now? Westcoast Remix were created.

Nas announced on 106 & Park in February that he would be launching his own shoe collection in June 2007. The sneakers would be called Disciples and manufactured in limited editions by the company 310 Global, which had already produced The Games Hurricanes . In the spring of 2007, Nas recorded the song Classic on behalf of Nike together with the New York rappers Rakim , KRS-One , Kanye West and DJ Premier on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Nike Air Force 1 sneaker.

Nas' planned appearance on September 6, 2007 at Virginia Tech as part of a memorial concert for the victims of the attack in April 2007 caused lively discussions in the run-up to the rapper's lyrics. Nas had already announced a new album with a track listing, which should be released on July 15, 2008. The album should initially carry the controversial title Nigger - in October 2007 Island Def Jam CEO LA Reid announced that he wanted to support Nas. As a result, the music company Vivendi threatened with a fine of 84 million dollars if Nas did not change the title. At the end of April 2008, the first single from the album called Be a Nigger Too was released on the Internet. On May 19, 2008, Nas retired the title Nigger . In June 2008, Hero followed as a second online release, produced by Polow da Don . In April 2009, Kelis filed for divorce from him.

Life Is Good and NASIR (2012-present)

Nas (2015)

As pre-singles for Nas' eleventh studio album Life Is Good , released on July 13, 2012, Nasty and The Don were released on August 17, 2011 and April 28, 2012. The last singles were Daughters on July 17, 2012 and Accident Murderers , a Collaboration with rapper Rick Ross on October 29, 2012.

After DJ Khaled released a song entitled Nas Album Done on his album Major Key in 2016 , Kanye West announced on Twitter in May 2018 that Nas' twelfth album would be released on June 15, 2018. The album title, NASIR (after Nas' first name) was only announced one day before the planned release . The album was produced by Kanye West, among others, and contains collaborations with Diddy and The-Dream .

Pseudonyms

Mostly he is simply called Nas, on albums his name is often shown as NaS . He used many names throughout his career. He used his first pseudonym Nasty Nas from 1992 to 1994 (Nasty means something like mean in German ). With the release of his second album It Was Written , Nasir slipped into the role of a mafia boss and called himself Nas Escobar or just Esco after the Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar . Nas wanted to pretend a criminal lifestyle, similar to The Notorious BIG , who called himself Frank White during his lifetime. In 1999, Nas made several allusions to the fact that he was the hip-hop messiah and the golden child. In the same year he changed his nickname from Esco to Nastradamus after the French prophet Nostradamus , who supposedly could foresee his own future (similar to Tupac Shakur with the 7 Day Theory ).

After the murder of Biggie Smalls, who for many years stood on the Olympus of New York hip-hop and was the undisputed King of New York , Nas and Jay-Z faced each other as rivals for his successor. Both were firmly convinced that they should be entitled to the title of King of New York from now on. In 2002 it was called Nas God's Son . It had no specific leitmotif, but a religious background (presumably related to Jay-Z, who called himself J-Hovah, which refers to Jehovah ). In the meantime, Nas also called himself QB's Finest , Thug Poet and Street Poet . In 2004 God's Son became a Street's Disciple , a disciple who learned his trade on the street. Nas still carries this pseudonym today.

With the German rapper Kollegah he also released a feature called "Continental" on the album "Monument "

Discography

→ Main article : Nas (rapper) / discography

Studio albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1994	Illmatic	-	-	-	UK57 gold (1 week)UK	US12 × 2 Double platinum (20 weeks)US	First published: April 15, 1994 Sales: + 2,100,000
1996	It Was Written	DE16 (18 weeks) DE	AT38 (7 weeks) AT	CH25 (19 weeks) CH	UK38 gold (10 weeks)UK	US1 × 2 Double platinum (34 weeks)US	First published: Jul 2, 1996 Sales: + 4,100,000
1999	I am…	DE16 (18 weeks) DE	-	CH38 (7 weeks) CH	UK31 gold (6 weeks)UK	US1 × 2 Double platinum (25 weeks)US	First published: April 6, 1999 Sales: + 2,100,000
	Nastradamus	DE45 (3 weeks) DE	-	CH92 (1 week) CH	UK90 silver (1 week)UK	US7th platinum (26 weeks)US	First published: November 23, 1999 Sales: + 1,060,000
2001	Stillmatic	DE64 (7 weeks) DE	-	CH56 (10 weeks) CH	UK92 gold (1 week)UK	US5 platinum (38 weeks)US	First published: December 18, 2001 Sales: + 1,100,000
2002	God's Son	DE89 (2 weeks) DE	-	CH56 (4 weeks) CH	UK57 gold (17 weeks)UK	US12 platinum (28 weeks)US	First published: December 13, 2002 Sales: + 1,100,000
2004	Street's Disciple	-	-	CH27 (5 weeks) CH	UK45 silver (6 weeks)UK	US5 platinum (20 weeks)US	First published: November 30, 2004 Sales: + 1,060,000
2006	Hip Hop is Dead	-	-	CH22 (10 weeks) CH	UK68 silver (7 weeks)UK	US1 gold (16 weeks)US	First published: December 15, 2006 Sales: + 560,000
2008	Untitled	-	-	CH10 (9 weeks) CH	UK23 (3 weeks) UK	US1 gold (15 weeks)US	First published: July 11th, 2008 Sales: + 500,000
2012	Life is good	DE24 (2 weeks) DE	-	CH8 (7 weeks) CH	UK8 (4 weeks) UK	US1 gold (15 weeks)US	First published: July 13th, 2012 Sales: + 500,000
2018	Nasir	DE59 (1 week) DE	AT49 (1 week) AT	CH12 (1 week) CH	UK16 (2 weeks) UK	US5 (4 weeks) US	First published: June 15, 2018
2020	King's Disease	-	-	-	UK24 (... weeks) UK	-	First published: August 21, 2020

Filmography

Movies

• 1998: Belly
• 1999: In Too Deep
• 2001: Sacred Is The Flesh
• 2001: Ticker
• 2003: Murda Muzik
• 2003: Uptown Girls - A bitch rarely comes alone
• 2010: Hawaii Five-O
• 2013: Black Nativity
• 2016: The Get Down

DVD material

• 1999: Nas: Video Anthology Vol. 1
• 2000: Nas & Mobb Deep - Queensbridge Motherfuckers
• 2002: Made You Look: God's Son Live
• 2006: Beyond Beef: Jay-Z & Nas

Web links

• Sony / Columbia website
• Nas at laut.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Nas Biography. In: last.fm . Retrieved May 31, 2017 . 
2. ↑ News: Fox News against the appearance of Nas at Virginia Tech ( Memento of September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
3. ↑ Nas Sets July 15 Date For Untitled Album. Retrieved January 15, 2020 . 
4. ↑ LA Reid Stands 'Firmly Behind' Nas Over LP Title; 50 Cent Calls It 'Stupid' , on mtv.com
5. ^ Nas Controversy Continues, NY Politician Says Change Album Title Or UMG Loses $ 84 Mil ( October 29, 2007 memento in the Internet Archive )
6. ↑ Kelis files for divorce (May 1, 2009) ( Memento of May 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
7. ↑ Michael Rubach: Kollegah secures a feature with one of the greatest rappers of all time. November 9, 2018, accessed January 21, 2019 . 
8. ↑ Chart positions: DE AT CH UK US
9. ↑ 37. The 50 Best Selling Rap Albums of All Time , on complex.com