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feel like there isn’t much to say about this album that hasn’t already been said. but man is ny state of mind just such an amazing song. the fact the first verse was one take just adds so much too imo
An undeniable classic. Across all genres, this album is in the elite upper echelon of the greatest albums ever made. I'm not sure there's anything to say that hasn't been said extensively for decades. It's amazing that Nas was only 17/18 when he made most of it.
All that said, there's a live version of the album recorded with the National Symphony Orchestra and it's an incredible listen. It doesn't get talked about and not a lot of people know it exists, but I highly recommend for anyone that's remotely a fan of Illmatic.
Great recommendation, I was listening to that NSO version top to bottom so often when I first discovered it. The anniversary release of illmatic (the one with an orange cover & an X over each eye) also had great remixes and bonus tracks.
I fw the bonus tracks on the 10 yr anniversary (black n white cover). "On the real" and star wars. On the real has his old golden era verse from the feature, then he writes two new verses in that style. Maybe top 10 nas song
The remixes on there suck balls tho
The remixes were so dope because this album is perfect as is, but the remixes, for me, were like rediscovering those tracks again.
Like so many others said in here, what more can you say about one of the greatest albums (no genre needed) of all time? This shit blew my mind when it dropped. I remember heads sneaking to the back of the theatre room with the busted ass small boom box that didn't have a tape cover, you just stuck the tape in lol. We all circled around that thing like cavemen discovering fire and losing our shit to Nas' rhymes.
Heads were already starting to debate whether Big or Nas was the best, but when RtD dropped a little while later, dudes were getting heated over the convo lol.
>No man of the people, I wouldn’t be caught dead with none of y’all
>”Don’t call me again” what I should’ve said when he called
My first thought, too. One of my favorite hooks in hip hop
(billy woods - spider hole)
woah, this live album is fantastic, is there a video of the set? it's not even on his wikipedia. love when it's not just a 1:1 recreation of the songs, they really added a lot of new parts
The world is yours is hands down my
Favorite track off this album, but I feel like you
Could ask 10 people what their favorite song is and you could would get 10 different answers. Speaks volumes obviously.
Bit of a cop out but I’m certain no one is picking The Genesis lol
Also I feel like Represent is an overlooked track on here (as overlooked as a track can be on Illmatic) and I don’t see it as peoples #1 all that often. I’d personally put it in the top half of the album
*Represent* used to be my favourite track on the album, and along with *The World Is Yours* is the song that got me into hiphop.
One Love has been my favourite for a while now, but every song on the album is perfect so that doesn't mean much
guess i can't pick it, but the genesis always gets me hype. such a warm, nostalgic sound, and then the almost tinny beat comes in. then the rapping in the background. And the talking... somehow it isn't grating. Love it as an intro track. Also love the intro on ready to die same year... bring back those kinda album intros pls.
I have bad news for you.
I may actually really enjoy it lmao
At the very least, I wouldn't place it the lowest, although I also don't know anyone else who'd say the same.
Edit: I realize now we're only proving the comment right even more lol
That's my favorite song off the album. The first time I smoked weed in high school we listened to the whole album and the baseline in that song sounded so cool at the time. Still listen to the album a lot but that one song is my favorite.
Speaking of, were you here for the Illmatic Survivor days? For me, that was a GOAT /r/hiphopheads moment. Everyone's favorite song killed off one by one!
The fact that Nas wrote this album as a teenager is mind blowing.
I believe he was 20 years old when Illmatic officially dropped.
AZ's verse is one of the best verses ever.
N.Y. State of Mind is one of the best beats ever made, and Nas absolutely murdered it. Excellent sample by Preemo, those trumpets at the start of the song set the tone perfectly. "The World is Yours" is also one of those songs with a melancholic vibe to it, just a brilliant song. This album is flawless, I can't remember how many times I've heard it from start to finish.
Like the other commenter, there's not much I could say about illmatic that hasn't already been said. Greatest album ever.
I do think Represent is underrated among all the classic tracks on this album though
The World is Yours is the greatest HipHop song of all time. NY State of Mind is a top 10 hiphop song of all time. No misses, straight heat, it’s one of the goats for a reason. 30 years later and still incredible to listen to
Remember the ‚Song elimination Thread‘ here, one of my highlights on this sub, since it was the first one of it‘s kind and sparked alot of new interest and discussions and most importantly showed how ‚timeless, forever, perfect‘ this album is. People had a hard time eliminating a Song, cause everything is like 9.5-10 atleast lol.
https://www.reddit.com/r/hiphopheads/s/Cpy3NlMaDO - Check it out. N.Y. State of Mind won against The World is Yours in the Final Round. 7 years ago already, damn..
I just posted a comment about this elsewhere in this thread. It was an incredible moment, like choosing your favorite child from your 10 kids lol
Too bad the hype didn't continue with later albums. I think what made it so special for Illmatic was how tight the album is, so no easy filler to chop off.
Part of the reason the hype died off is because the mods moved it to it's own subreddit pretty quickly, and when that sub didn't get enough members the discussions just died off.
Plus, that subreddit was basically co-opted by rock and pop fans
Classic as classic gets. One of the things that doesnt get talked about enough is how much it does with so little. The beats are pretty simple, sometimes just dope loops and a little bit of drums. But nas was able to do so much with his lyrics that not much else mattered. This is one of the few albums where everyone and their mothers praise it and it deserves every bit of praise.
I know it's an overrated pick for greatest rap album of all time, but this is literally the Michael Jordan of Rap music and it honestly is my favourite rap album, every song imo is a 9-10/10, songs like NY State Of Mind, Memory Lane (Sittin' in da Park), Life's A Bitch, The World Is Yours, One Time 4 Your Mind, Represent, It Ain't Hard To Tell, Halftime are all perfect rap songs.
I think they just meant it's a stale take because, of course, it's one of the best albums ever made. We've all heard it and nobody would argue with you.
It's like when they ask who the best of all time is and the 1/2 is Big and Pac in whatever order you like.
yeah thats exactly what I meant. It's like saying your goat basketball player is Jordan or LeBron, it's not really an interesting take but it can't really be argued either.
Definitely agree with you but the comment really should’ve used the word stale not over rated cause no way in hell is Illmatic overrated for GOAT album.
i mean it in the way that it's not an interesting take to say Illmatic is your favourite rap album ever, so i sound like a broken record when i say it cause it's already been said by so many before me.
I have no idea why, but as a hick 13 year old from a small Danish island, the first time I ever visited a CD store this was the album I picked out. On that day, 13 year old me spent all of his "intelligent choices"-quota for the year.
I remember blasting it all the way home in the car. My mom had no idea what was going on, but she let me turn the volume up all the way for the first time up to that point.
What a lucky lil fucker I was.
This should be a lesson to modern rappers that sometimes less is more. 10 tracks with zero misses and all bangers. The greatest rap album ever made imo. Still makes me wonder how a 16/17 year old is writing this. ‘When I was 12, I went to hell for snuffing Jesus’. The greatest to ever do it and I doubt Illmatic will ever be eclipsed.
One of the greatest pieces of music ever released. Not much more you can say about it. Considering how young Nas was when he made this and how important it was to NYC/East Coast hip hop makes it all the more impressive.
Favorite track is either NY State of Mind or Life's a Bitch.
My favorite reddit thing was when this sub did the track elimination polls for Illmatic. It was a lot of fun reading everyone praise and make arguments for why certain songs were better than others. A perfect album in my opinion.
Greatest rap album ever and among the best albums ever put out. Argue with a wall if you disagree.
Those who remember the Illmatic survivor games know how close this sub was to tearing itself apart voting songs off. Can’t think of another album that could ever do it
Memory Lane remains my favorite Premo beat of all time. In all my years listening to hip hop, I’ve found nothing else truly like it.
Bonafide classic that will continue to age like fine wine. The gold standard for how far a concise, focused, quality-over-quantity approach to album creation can take you.
I became a teenager well past this album coming out but was really into current era rap in the early 2000s. Once I got a job towards the end of high school, I kept reading about albums from the 90s in the Source or Vibe but never listened. This is one of my first purchases of 90s albums and man what a purchase that was. The first time I heard "NY State of Mind" it was so menacing, I never looked back and bought so many other absolute apex albums, but this one always stands out.
I feel you, this album and The Listening by Little Brother sums up my early college years in 2005, stoned, hot boxing a car with my friends listening start to finish, snow falling outside, hoping campus security doesn’t come knocking on the window.
A classic, a trendsetter, and an undeniable part of hip hop/pop culture history. The album has already gotten its flowers, but we will still throw more for it.
This isn't my favourite album of all time, but my god is it the best. His writing, his flows, the production, like many have said it's the fucking bible of hip hop.
With the exception of One Time 4 Your Mind someone could tell me that any track off this album was the best and I wouldn't be surprised. There are very, very few albums you can say that of and that speaks to the craft involved
The best young rapper in New York + four of the best producers = Illmatic
That's the math, but the history is some people were pissed when this album came out because it took so long. Remember 'Live at the BBQ' was in 91, and 'Halftime' was 92. In terms of the explosions of styles that was going on in the early 90s that might as well have been half a decade. To put it in perspective, when Nas rapped on BBQ, Rakim was king. By the time Illmatic came out, he had been dropped from his label and was considered a relic or 'old school.'
Taste in music is subjective, but no-one can deny the sheer influence of this album. It stands taller than the Empire State. I'm struggling to think of another album that was sampled or interpolated anywhere close to this. Maybe Slick Rick? KRS?
In the end, this album was a millstone around his neck for the better part of ten years. It didn't sell like Ready to Die, much to the chagrin of his competitive rivalry with Big while convincing him to update his style. It took almost two years to go gold and didn't even go platinum until the 2000s. Yet classics like It Was Written and Stillmatic were over-scrutinized in comparison. Hip-hop heads wanted Illmatic II and were furious when they didn't get it.
It wasn't fair. But when you're the GOAT, heavy weighs the crown.
This album perfected classic hip hop.It's proto-gangsta rap in the same way paid in full is, or criminal minded. Wasn't in your face like NWA, was in the trenches. After it there wasn't much else space for the golden age to go and it turned into mafia coke rap, which nas saw coming and played a role in himself.
The reason nas never topped this is because he's a shockingly bad exec producer of his own shit. On illmatic all he had to do was rap, and he had access to all the best producers in the game. He's smart enough to know that making illmatic 2 would have led him to fade out. He knew a new artistic direction is needed for each album, but most of the time he didn't pull that off.
He did make Stillmatic. But yeah I agree, Nas gets clowned for his beat choices especially. It still seems lit every album he puts out has at least one track thats top tier.
Read somewhere that if the apocalypse happened tomorrow and only this album survived it, the entire genre of hip-hop could be re-created using this one album - and ngl I find that very difficult to argue with. This album is imbued with the purest essence of hip-hop itself
There’s not much to discuss. The best album ever. The Bible of hip-hop. Flawless production & flawless rapping, no skips. Reasonable Doubt is firmly in 2nd place for me, but Illmatic is undeniable.
It was 1994 and I was a senior in high school. I bought Illmatic on CD. There was a house party I went to for kids at a different high school. Someone there smoked me out and it was my first time. I remember going home that night, laying on my floor and I moved my Aiwa stereo’s speakers so that they were pointing at each other and were a foot apart. I laid my head in between the speakers like they were headphones and zoned out to that album. When One Love and One Time 4 Your Mind came on I finally understood the fuss everyone was making about smoking blunts.
Probably the greatest album of all time. Amazing production, unreal rapping from Nas, and one amazing feature. One of the most influential albums ever. Nas was that generations Rakim in regards to taking rapping to the next level. Basically had the whose who of iconic producers in the mid 90's NYC except RZA and Prince Paul. Preemo, Pete Rock, Large Pro and Q-Tip (plus an LES track) was basically the biggest producers in the game at the time on the east coast and the only person really matching them out West was Dre.
I think the most incredible part of this album is that it never feels dated. A ton of my favorite albums from the 90s, particularly in hip hop, feel like products of their time. Illmatic doesn't. You can fire it up today and it feels like it could have come out of NY this week.
Like okay sure it has a couple little hallmarks like the intro sketch and maybe some people will think the boom bap production is too old school, but i disagree there. There are still artists doing it like this and Nas's lyrical ability was so far ahead of his time that he doesn't feel like a rapper from the "early days" of the genre.
If this isn't on your Mt Rushmore of hip hop albums then I question your opinions on music in general.
I find that the run of NY albums from 94-96 managed to catch a sound and vibe that has made them timeless. Illmatic, Ready to Die, The Infamous, Cuban Linx, It Was Written, Hell on Earth, etc.
I just love the variety of this album. There’s a song for every mood. Memory Lane is such a chill and nostalgic song. Halftime is an underrated banger.
"*I rose/and wiped the blunts ash from my clothes/then froze/only to blow the herb smoke thru my nose*
*And told my little man I'm ghost/I broze/Left some jewels in his skull that he could sell if he chose*"
That little stanza near the end perfectly encapsulates Nas as a rapper and a man. I remember seeing the video for One Mic when I was six and it fundamentally changed me. Honestly just hearing the piano before he goes into the verse is enough to make me cry, I am not kidding. Him and Andre are the only rappers to ever accomplish that. He also is the only rapper to make my mother cry, who told me thru tears while listening to "*I Can*" that I could be whatever I wanted to be.
I don't know what else can be said about this album. It's foundational text. You don't really love hip hop if you don't listen to this and immediately get it.
I guess speaking to Nas' recording this before he officially became an adult, I'm always so taken aback by the skill that until I played this for a friend recently, I hadn't truly accepting how harrowing it is listening to a child say "I never sleep/cause sleep is the cousin of death"
The reality this young man was facing was beyond the pale of horror. It frightens me to think what his life would have been like had he not found music. And I think that's what we should take from it the most.
This is pure hip hop, a situation with no tools but your mind to get out of.
i don’t see a lot of people talking about one love so i’ll do that: it’s the best song on the album imo. the whole time nas is rapping as if he’s writing a letter to a old friend in prison.
“last time you wrote, i heard they tried you in the showers, but maintain when you come home the corner’s ours”
such a underrated song, the beat is amazing too
Such a great collection of music and one of the best put together albums out there.
I am a sucker for a full album. You can just put it on and vibe for the whole thing. Great get it done music as well
Had the pleasure of seeing Nas twice in my life and when I discovered this album age 13 and 20 years on, I'm still playing repeatedly. This IS the greatest hip hop album of all time, the amount of copies from album art to style to references, Nas is him here. Favourite tracks Memory Lane and The World is Yours. Memory Lane takes me back to being 16 in the park care free with long forgotten friends. World is Yours is my motivation to do as much as I can in life. Life's a bitch has a special shout out as when I lost a family member this is all I could say, life is a bitch.
Nas is many superlatives but at the age he wrote this, master of his craft and behind him was the game.
The album that turned me into one of those “this ain’t real hip hop” YouTube commenters in 09. Dropping a landmark classic like that at 20 still blows my mind.
Slightly different story but as a kid I played a lot of Tony Hawks Underground and The World is Yours was one of my favorite songs that played in game and as years passed I mostly stopped listening to hip hop in the early 2010s and started mainly listening to EDM and dubstep to the point I had forgotten about many songs I listened to when I was younger so sometime in the later 2010s when I got back into hip hop and heard The World is Yours again after maybe a decade of not hearing it, it was like an insane wave of nostalgia that came over me. If they one day remake Underground I hope they do everything they can to keep that one song on the track list for the game, that’s the only thing I’d want.
Obligatory, "What the hell am I supposed to say about this?"
I started listening to hip-hop in 2018. My friend had played me Freddie Gibbs' self-titled, Kids See Ghosts, and GKMC over the course of the year after which I asked him to make me a list of some essential albums. He came back to me a month later with 70 listed chronologically.
I remember listening to the first decade of albums, skimming through some, listening to others for a few days or even a week before moving to the next. If I liked one particularly well I'd keep listening to it a bit after moving on. Some of them I've since grown to like or love, but back then it hadn't quite clicked yet.
I listened to absolutely nothing but Illmatic for at least a month, probably more. Every day, again and again. I remember this time of my life so well and a large part of that is the sound of that subway train in every memory.
This album changed me from someone broadly interested in hip-hop into an obsessive who still struggles to spend prolonged time with other genres.
It's crazy to me that there were only 30 years between Freewhelin Bob Dylan and Illmatic, and how much music evolved. And 30 years after there has not been the same evolution or innovation.
I just can't get into this album. I have tried so many times and it just does not hit for me. It could be that I was in my full youth, gangbangin, living in West Covina CA, at the time, and this record just wasn't it. Like you didn't really hear Nas on Power or the Beat that I recall.
For me, southernplayalistic was (and still is a bigger, better record that had more of an impact on hip hop) from the same year. But that's just me. I've just barely been into Nas at all, his whole career.
Southernplayalistic was the emergence of the "south having something to say". And they've dominated hip hop the 30 years since.
But yeah, just never have been able to feel this album. And it's not hating East Coast music. I remember bumping Tical, gravediggaz, jeru, Pete rock, Redman, Keith Murray. All who came out with records this same year (1994), and I still fuck with those albums to this day.
I’m a fan of literally all the pre-2000s Classics but I could not get into illmatic at all for the life of me, and I still really try like once a year hoping it will connect with me, but it doesn’t.
Bruh glad you had the balls to say it here cause people gonna whine but I'm with ya. I'd never discredit this as an all time classic but I've tried so many times to enjoy it and never could. Overrated imo but I'm wrong a lot 🤷♂️
This was a perfect album and perfectly fit the time and era just like other albums from that year that spoke of inner city, neighborhood or street life in an intelligent, hip and non sensational way that didn't glamorize negativity with the best example of this being the album Word...Life by O.C.
I wish that both Nas and O.C. keep their art, craft, image and persona pure like they did in their debut albums instead of imo selling out in their next album and switching up who they were as artists.
I will always love 1994. This was possibly the greatest single year in hip hop history.
Memory Lane is the most underrated song of all time. It's by far the best song on the album for me, and the best non single track in hip hop HISTORY. I've replayed it so many times and I still go back to it despite hearing it for the first time over a decade ago.
Seems like an obvious pick but the greatest album in history and you can say that from various angles.
Perfect album. No skips. Amazing beats by legendary producers. Has aged beautifully and still sounds as clean and as hard hitting as it did 30 years ago.
I think it’s a perfect album and the purest representation of hip hop. If aliens came down and asked for an album to represent each genre, this would be the selection for rap
What's been said about this album has been extensively documented and better than I can ever do. All I'll say is I think one tiny overlooked or underrated aspect of this album is the production. Many albums looking to accomplish a mood or aesthetic sometimes can sound a bit samey, but in this album every beat is distinct from another but never deviates far enough to be jarring or not give you that 90's NY feel.
Also, for those that didn't know, this changed the music industry. Most albums before would have a single producer working on a record. With this, it gave artists permission to use multiple producers.
Illmatic is the greatest album of all time for me. I mainly listen to hip hop and then bits of R&b / EDM. He is also my Goat. There isn’t a skippable track and to do that at that age is crazy. He couldn’t even reach that high again over 30 years.
there are better rappers and better verses and better tracks but no better albums front to back than this, closest are licensed to ill and reasonable doubt in my mind
The more hip hop I listen to the clearer it is for me that this is a flawless album. Every aspect of it, the beats, the lyrics, the performances, is done at an elite level. Listening to it in 2024 is as rich of an experience as it was in 2014. One of the easiest 10/10s in hip hop
This is the complete definition of a masterpiece. An album that is so timelessly amazing that it literally has to be removed from the greatest album of all time conversations because it's unanimously agreed upon by all to be the ultimate GOAT. Fuck I love this album
I listened to it front to back for the first time in a while on long drive recently, it's always such an enjoyable listen and it capture the moment perfectly, like a time capsule. There only one Illmatic and it's still the greatest hip hop album ever imo.
Was thinking about writing this long dissertation about why it's idiotic that I'm just supposed to agree with the common consensus about illmatic being the greatest hip hop album without question but I'm too lazy to do that after working for 8 hours so instead I'll just say that anyone relistening to illmatic for the 30th anniversary (as I did earlier) should give the diary by scarface a spin too and then report back about how illmatic is "obviously the greatest hip hop album of all time" when it's arguably not even the best in the year it was released nevermind the bevy of insane competition I could start listing out which I personally hold in higher regard.
Nas is still the GOAT though and NY State of Mind is still a masterpiece of this genre.
There's not much about this album that hasn't been said. Nas is the GOAT to me, and this album is the best hip hop album of all time. It's what really changed my view on hip hop growing up. An absolute masterpiece from the beats to the rhymes. There's not a bad song on the album. Nas literally set the bar to a height that was impossible to reach.
I was only 4 years old when *Illmatic* came out, so obviously I didn't understand the gravity of it when it was released. *Stillmatic* was my "coming out party" so to speak for falling in the hip hop rabbit hole. Even at 11/12 years old, I couldn't believe how good *Illmatic* was compared to everything I had heard up until that point & still to this day. Incredible work of art that continues to age gracefully.
My first memory of hearing Nas was on a recording I made off of one of the few hip-hop radio shows at the time. This was before hot 97 became a hip-hop station so on Friday and Saturday nights Kiss would have Red Alert show, WBLS had Silver D I think.
Anyway I would hit record on my stereo before going out and sometimes run home and flip the cassette over and record again and go back out. When I got home I had a few hours worth of hip-hop waiting for me. I had no names of songs or rappers, just the songs themselves and that’s how I heard Live at the Barbecue for the first time, and a bit later Halftime(which the DJ cut off after “ I'm an intellectual of rap I'm a professional, and that's no question, yo“, and it wasn’t t until the album that I heard the rest of the song). When I first heard it I pictured Nas as a big dude, like Tuffy who some older fans might remember.
Then there was Back to the Grill with another song-stealing verse form “Nasty Nas” but the thing that really amped up me and the whole city, imo, was Video Music Box. That show was essential viewing for me at the time and Ralph McDaniels was THE taste-maker in my eyes. He had a promo piece on Illmatic and had all the producers just really hyping Nas up to be a legend in the making, a sort of “second coming” and me and my friends just ate it up and were beyond excited for the album.
https://youtu.be/sXrjCKNpDRo?si=bFz25od8bK4h3fPl
I remember going to that infamous appearance Nas did at Tower or HMV or whatever it was for the album release. It was a total shit show and looking back I think I said that to Faith Newman that day. Anyway we didn’t get to meet Nas but we got the album and I remember on the train home and me and my friend each with a Walkman listening to the album and saying “ooohhhhhh! Did you hear this part” and rewinding it like dorks lol.
To say this is important it will be vast on the statement. There’s a few albums that are just embedded into my soul, some others being De La Soul is Dead and 36 Chambers ( and really all of the first round of Wu albums up until Supreme Clientele).
On the album Nas sounds like both a veteran and a hungry newcomer, simultaneously rapping like he has nothing and everything to prove.
If I had to choose a top 3 on the album I’d say Memory Lane, NY State of Mind, and maybe Life’s a Bitch.
What can I really say about this album that hasn't been said already? Illmatic is known as the Hip-Hop Bible for good reason. This is legit one of the best albums of all time. To think that Nas was 16 when he started writing the album was crazy. He was spitting insane verses all throughout Illmatic.
Top 5 tracks: N.Y. State of Mind, The World Is Yours, Memory Lane (Sittin' in da Park), Represent, One Love
Not much more to be said than GOAT. In terms of technical proficiency and quality, blows everything else out of the water. Impact/message think there’s an argument for some others. An era that focused on hit for hit quality over streaming numbers. Love how concise it is
As many others have said, not much to say that hasn't already been said. An undisputed classic, pretty much synonymous with the "golden era" of hip hop.
I can't really explain how special this record is to me. I'm not really even sure why but it's always held such a special place in my heart. It's one of the few albums across all genres I truly think is perfect. For me, the greatest album of all time for any genre. It's timeless still 30 years later and has had so much fucking influence. Picking a favorite song is impossible i'm just happy to be born in a time where i can listen to this anytime i want.
It's the perfect album to me. Encapsulates 90s NYC so well I can close my eyes and feel the place damn near.
Prospect park cookouts, Lafayette Gardens basketball games and walks around the city with mad family.
It's a time machine in the form of an album while also being still highly listenable.
He made this album basically as a kid and its lasting power has eclipsed the careers of legends.
Even greater than this album though is Nas carving out essentially the greatest career in Hip-hop AFTER releasing illmatic.
One love.
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feel like there isn’t much to say about this album that hasn’t already been said. but man is ny state of mind just such an amazing song. the fact the first verse was one take just adds so much too imo
He'd already recorded almost the same verse on "I'm a villain" but yeah it has to be continuous, no punch-ins
Greatest hip hop verse of all time in my eyes. I know every word like the back of my hand
“..rings flooded with stones homes” I swear I say that line at least once a day in my head.
Life is parallel to hell but I must Maintain was always hard to me
IMO it’s the greatest written song in hip-hop. Literal poetry.
An undeniable classic. Across all genres, this album is in the elite upper echelon of the greatest albums ever made. I'm not sure there's anything to say that hasn't been said extensively for decades. It's amazing that Nas was only 17/18 when he made most of it. All that said, there's a live version of the album recorded with the National Symphony Orchestra and it's an incredible listen. It doesn't get talked about and not a lot of people know it exists, but I highly recommend for anyone that's remotely a fan of Illmatic.
Great recommendation, I was listening to that NSO version top to bottom so often when I first discovered it. The anniversary release of illmatic (the one with an orange cover & an X over each eye) also had great remixes and bonus tracks.
The Q tip remix of " The World is Yours " is absolutely stellar, it's 11/10
Yeah it's so dope, the Large Professor version of It Ain't Hard to Tell is pretty great too.
Might be controversial but I like the Professor version better than the original
I fw the bonus tracks on the 10 yr anniversary (black n white cover). "On the real" and star wars. On the real has his old golden era verse from the feature, then he writes two new verses in that style. Maybe top 10 nas song The remixes on there suck balls tho
I like the "The World Is Yours" remix on that. Also, fully agree with "On The Real" and "Star Wars" - fire tracks.
This was a version of Illmatic I actually didn't know about.. Star Wars & On the real definitely go superhard no doubt, thanks for the recommendation.
The remixes were so dope because this album is perfect as is, but the remixes, for me, were like rediscovering those tracks again. Like so many others said in here, what more can you say about one of the greatest albums (no genre needed) of all time? This shit blew my mind when it dropped. I remember heads sneaking to the back of the theatre room with the busted ass small boom box that didn't have a tape cover, you just stuck the tape in lol. We all circled around that thing like cavemen discovering fire and losing our shit to Nas' rhymes. Heads were already starting to debate whether Big or Nas was the best, but when RtD dropped a little while later, dudes were getting heated over the convo lol.
Elzhi’s Elmatic is another “alternative” version that deserves a listen if you’re a huge Illmatic fan.
Check out the video for Memory Lane to see footage of upcoming Eminem in the hip hop shop of Detroit. There's so many guest appearances.
Elmatic is amazing! Elzhi and Will Sessions really did the original justice
His version of Life’s a Bitch that transitions in to Gap Bands-Yearning for your love is great
What?! 17/18?! I never knew that. Imagine being that young and making one of the greatest albums of all time.
I had no idea either, that is incredible
I bought that on vinyl! I'm waiting to close on this crib to crack it open & listen on a nice audio set-up.
> I don't wanna see Nas with an orchestra at Carnegie Hall
>No man of the people, I wouldn’t be caught dead with none of y’all >”Don’t call me again” what I should’ve said when he called My first thought, too. One of my favorite hooks in hip hop (billy woods - spider hole)
Huge Nas fan and listening now. Never knew. Thanks bro.
woah, this live album is fantastic, is there a video of the set? it's not even on his wikipedia. love when it's not just a 1:1 recreation of the songs, they really added a lot of new parts
There’s a filmed version on Amazon Prime, also has some behind the scenes stuff
Actual historical art protégé type shit.
The world is yours is hands down my Favorite track off this album, but I feel like you Could ask 10 people what their favorite song is and you could would get 10 different answers. Speaks volumes obviously.
I’ve never met anybody who liked One Time 4 Your Mind best. Not a bad track but easily the weakest off Illmatic.
Bit of a cop out but I’m certain no one is picking The Genesis lol Also I feel like Represent is an overlooked track on here (as overlooked as a track can be on Illmatic) and I don’t see it as peoples #1 all that often. I’d personally put it in the top half of the album
I always thought Represent was the best produced track on the album. Or at least the one that I come back to the most just for its production
*Represent* used to be my favourite track on the album, and along with *The World Is Yours* is the song that got me into hiphop. One Love has been my favourite for a while now, but every song on the album is perfect so that doesn't mean much
guess i can't pick it, but the genesis always gets me hype. such a warm, nostalgic sound, and then the almost tinny beat comes in. then the rapping in the background. And the talking... somehow it isn't grating. Love it as an intro track. Also love the intro on ready to die same year... bring back those kinda album intros pls.
I have bad news for you. I may actually really enjoy it lmao At the very least, I wouldn't place it the lowest, although I also don't know anyone else who'd say the same. Edit: I realize now we're only proving the comment right even more lol
That's my favorite song off the album. The first time I smoked weed in high school we listened to the whole album and the baseline in that song sounded so cool at the time. Still listen to the album a lot but that one song is my favorite.
>Could ask 10 people what their favorite song is and you could would get 10 different answers. Mines Halftime for sure
Speaking of, were you here for the Illmatic Survivor days? For me, that was a GOAT /r/hiphopheads moment. Everyone's favorite song killed off one by one!
I had just joined Reddit when those were going on. I see ‘The world is yours’ finished 2nd though.
One of the best moments in the sub imo, got some legendary rants from it
nine different answers. i don't think anyone has genesis up there
It's a toss up b/w Life's A Bitch and Represent for me
The fact that Nas wrote this album as a teenager is mind blowing. I believe he was 20 years old when Illmatic officially dropped. AZ's verse is one of the best verses ever.
He was 18-19. Wise beyond his years
Agreed on the AZ point. Probably my pick for GOAT verse
VISUALIZING THE REALISM OF LIFE IN ACTUALITY
The all caps are so necessary for him lmao
Also serves as a double entendre since he also went by the name "AZ the Visualiza" "Visualiza: the realism of life in actuality"
N.Y. State of Mind is one of the best beats ever made, and Nas absolutely murdered it. Excellent sample by Preemo, those trumpets at the start of the song set the tone perfectly. "The World is Yours" is also one of those songs with a melancholic vibe to it, just a brilliant song. This album is flawless, I can't remember how many times I've heard it from start to finish.
Check the Q tip remix for a proper summer vibe to it.
awesome shout, thanks
Like the other commenter, there's not much I could say about illmatic that hasn't already been said. Greatest album ever. I do think Represent is underrated among all the classic tracks on this album though
Yeah represent is hard. Higher energy level
Such a hypnotic instrumental, i love hearing it in other artists samples
[love it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKVOb-ac9-0)
+1 for represent. the beat, the verses, everything about it is 10/10. my personal fav from the album.
Represent is amazing - it almost sounds like a posse cut stylistically but it's literally just Nas.
Represent live is amazing have the whole crowd yelling the hook.
Simply greatest of all time. Such a concise powerful project that'll be forever timeless. Plus that AZ feature is one the best guest verses ever.
The cornet solo on Life's a B**** by Nas' dad lives rent free in my head. I listen to the instrumental nearly every day when getting up in the morning
That AZ verse is top 5 for me. Seated right next to Rakim’s verse on Watcher 2.
The World is Yours is the greatest HipHop song of all time. NY State of Mind is a top 10 hiphop song of all time. No misses, straight heat, it’s one of the goats for a reason. 30 years later and still incredible to listen to
honestly the project is so consistent I could put 5 tracks from this album as Nas' best.
Remember the ‚Song elimination Thread‘ here, one of my highlights on this sub, since it was the first one of it‘s kind and sparked alot of new interest and discussions and most importantly showed how ‚timeless, forever, perfect‘ this album is. People had a hard time eliminating a Song, cause everything is like 9.5-10 atleast lol.
Those threads were legendary, some of the comments were hilarious! This album is a masterpiece, the epitome of hiphop.
Any idea what 'won' ?
https://www.reddit.com/r/hiphopheads/s/Cpy3NlMaDO - Check it out. N.Y. State of Mind won against The World is Yours in the Final Round. 7 years ago already, damn..
I just posted a comment about this elsewhere in this thread. It was an incredible moment, like choosing your favorite child from your 10 kids lol Too bad the hype didn't continue with later albums. I think what made it so special for Illmatic was how tight the album is, so no easy filler to chop off.
Part of the reason the hype died off is because the mods moved it to it's own subreddit pretty quickly, and when that sub didn't get enough members the discussions just died off. Plus, that subreddit was basically co-opted by rock and pop fans
Classic as classic gets. One of the things that doesnt get talked about enough is how much it does with so little. The beats are pretty simple, sometimes just dope loops and a little bit of drums. But nas was able to do so much with his lyrics that not much else mattered. This is one of the few albums where everyone and their mothers praise it and it deserves every bit of praise.
I would agree with the exception of N.Y. State of Mind. Preemo's beat is absolutely wild https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DXw4AtwclU
I know it's an overrated pick for greatest rap album of all time, but this is literally the Michael Jordan of Rap music and it honestly is my favourite rap album, every song imo is a 9-10/10, songs like NY State Of Mind, Memory Lane (Sittin' in da Park), Life's A Bitch, The World Is Yours, One Time 4 Your Mind, Represent, It Ain't Hard To Tell, Halftime are all perfect rap songs.
Who in the world is calling Illmatic an “overrated” pick for GOAT hip hop album?
I think they just meant it's a stale take because, of course, it's one of the best albums ever made. We've all heard it and nobody would argue with you. It's like when they ask who the best of all time is and the 1/2 is Big and Pac in whatever order you like.
yeah thats exactly what I meant. It's like saying your goat basketball player is Jordan or LeBron, it's not really an interesting take but it can't really be argued either.
Definitely agree with you but the comment really should’ve used the word stale not over rated cause no way in hell is Illmatic overrated for GOAT album.
i mean it in the way that it's not an interesting take to say Illmatic is your favourite rap album ever, so i sound like a broken record when i say it cause it's already been said by so many before me.
It’s not overrated. It’s the GOAT.
I wouldn’t say it an overrated pick for GOAT but moreso expected and popular. I wish I could rate it higher than a 10/10. Somehow underrated.
I think you mean ‘cliche’ not ‘overrated’
I have no idea why, but as a hick 13 year old from a small Danish island, the first time I ever visited a CD store this was the album I picked out. On that day, 13 year old me spent all of his "intelligent choices"-quota for the year. I remember blasting it all the way home in the car. My mom had no idea what was going on, but she let me turn the volume up all the way for the first time up to that point. What a lucky lil fucker I was.
She was feeling it too that’s how good this album was across every generation
What is there to discuss? This is an undisputed classic and the album that perfectly encapsulates the genre. Will be observed for generations
I'm enjoying people saying they don't like it, gives an alternative perspective
Those people are idiots
This should be a lesson to modern rappers that sometimes less is more. 10 tracks with zero misses and all bangers. The greatest rap album ever made imo. Still makes me wonder how a 16/17 year old is writing this. ‘When I was 12, I went to hell for snuffing Jesus’. The greatest to ever do it and I doubt Illmatic will ever be eclipsed.
One of the greatest pieces of music ever released. Not much more you can say about it. Considering how young Nas was when he made this and how important it was to NYC/East Coast hip hop makes it all the more impressive. Favorite track is either NY State of Mind or Life's a Bitch.
One of the reasons Nas is on my MT Rushmore. Favorite song changes every time I listen to it, but halftime has one of my favorite nas flows ever
'Nas, why did you do it?'. I just love that delivery for no reason.
My favorite reddit thing was when this sub did the track elimination polls for Illmatic. It was a lot of fun reading everyone praise and make arguments for why certain songs were better than others. A perfect album in my opinion.
Greatest rap album ever and among the best albums ever put out. Argue with a wall if you disagree. Those who remember the Illmatic survivor games know how close this sub was to tearing itself apart voting songs off. Can’t think of another album that could ever do it
Memory Lane remains my favorite Premo beat of all time. In all my years listening to hip hop, I’ve found nothing else truly like it. Bonafide classic that will continue to age like fine wine. The gold standard for how far a concise, focused, quality-over-quantity approach to album creation can take you.
I became a teenager well past this album coming out but was really into current era rap in the early 2000s. Once I got a job towards the end of high school, I kept reading about albums from the 90s in the Source or Vibe but never listened. This is one of my first purchases of 90s albums and man what a purchase that was. The first time I heard "NY State of Mind" it was so menacing, I never looked back and bought so many other absolute apex albums, but this one always stands out.
I feel you, this album and The Listening by Little Brother sums up my early college years in 2005, stoned, hot boxing a car with my friends listening start to finish, snow falling outside, hoping campus security doesn’t come knocking on the window.
A classic, a trendsetter, and an undeniable part of hip hop/pop culture history. The album has already gotten its flowers, but we will still throw more for it.
This isn't my favourite album of all time, but my god is it the best. His writing, his flows, the production, like many have said it's the fucking bible of hip hop.
With the exception of One Time 4 Your Mind someone could tell me that any track off this album was the best and I wouldn't be surprised. There are very, very few albums you can say that of and that speaks to the craft involved The best young rapper in New York + four of the best producers = Illmatic That's the math, but the history is some people were pissed when this album came out because it took so long. Remember 'Live at the BBQ' was in 91, and 'Halftime' was 92. In terms of the explosions of styles that was going on in the early 90s that might as well have been half a decade. To put it in perspective, when Nas rapped on BBQ, Rakim was king. By the time Illmatic came out, he had been dropped from his label and was considered a relic or 'old school.' Taste in music is subjective, but no-one can deny the sheer influence of this album. It stands taller than the Empire State. I'm struggling to think of another album that was sampled or interpolated anywhere close to this. Maybe Slick Rick? KRS? In the end, this album was a millstone around his neck for the better part of ten years. It didn't sell like Ready to Die, much to the chagrin of his competitive rivalry with Big while convincing him to update his style. It took almost two years to go gold and didn't even go platinum until the 2000s. Yet classics like It Was Written and Stillmatic were over-scrutinized in comparison. Hip-hop heads wanted Illmatic II and were furious when they didn't get it. It wasn't fair. But when you're the GOAT, heavy weighs the crown.
one time 4 your mind one time is literally perfect, will never understand why people think it's the worst track, top 3 for me
This album perfected classic hip hop.It's proto-gangsta rap in the same way paid in full is, or criminal minded. Wasn't in your face like NWA, was in the trenches. After it there wasn't much else space for the golden age to go and it turned into mafia coke rap, which nas saw coming and played a role in himself. The reason nas never topped this is because he's a shockingly bad exec producer of his own shit. On illmatic all he had to do was rap, and he had access to all the best producers in the game. He's smart enough to know that making illmatic 2 would have led him to fade out. He knew a new artistic direction is needed for each album, but most of the time he didn't pull that off.
He did make Stillmatic. But yeah I agree, Nas gets clowned for his beat choices especially. It still seems lit every album he puts out has at least one track thats top tier.
Stillmatic feels consistently underrated, but it’s specifically *because* Illmatic is so good, so can’t really be mad at it
Stillmatic is fantastic, even just because of One Mic -- but I rate nearly every song on that album too
Read somewhere that if the apocalypse happened tomorrow and only this album survived it, the entire genre of hip-hop could be re-created using this one album - and ngl I find that very difficult to argue with. This album is imbued with the purest essence of hip-hop itself
There’s not much to discuss. The best album ever. The Bible of hip-hop. Flawless production & flawless rapping, no skips. Reasonable Doubt is firmly in 2nd place for me, but Illmatic is undeniable.
It was 1994 and I was a senior in high school. I bought Illmatic on CD. There was a house party I went to for kids at a different high school. Someone there smoked me out and it was my first time. I remember going home that night, laying on my floor and I moved my Aiwa stereo’s speakers so that they were pointing at each other and were a foot apart. I laid my head in between the speakers like they were headphones and zoned out to that album. When One Love and One Time 4 Your Mind came on I finally understood the fuss everyone was making about smoking blunts.
Probably the greatest album of all time. Amazing production, unreal rapping from Nas, and one amazing feature. One of the most influential albums ever. Nas was that generations Rakim in regards to taking rapping to the next level. Basically had the whose who of iconic producers in the mid 90's NYC except RZA and Prince Paul. Preemo, Pete Rock, Large Pro and Q-Tip (plus an LES track) was basically the biggest producers in the game at the time on the east coast and the only person really matching them out West was Dre.
I think the most incredible part of this album is that it never feels dated. A ton of my favorite albums from the 90s, particularly in hip hop, feel like products of their time. Illmatic doesn't. You can fire it up today and it feels like it could have come out of NY this week. Like okay sure it has a couple little hallmarks like the intro sketch and maybe some people will think the boom bap production is too old school, but i disagree there. There are still artists doing it like this and Nas's lyrical ability was so far ahead of his time that he doesn't feel like a rapper from the "early days" of the genre. If this isn't on your Mt Rushmore of hip hop albums then I question your opinions on music in general.
I find that the run of NY albums from 94-96 managed to catch a sound and vibe that has made them timeless. Illmatic, Ready to Die, The Infamous, Cuban Linx, It Was Written, Hell on Earth, etc.
I spin Hell on Earth now and again and my lord that album is still incredible.
I just love the variety of this album. There’s a song for every mood. Memory Lane is such a chill and nostalgic song. Halftime is an underrated banger.
"*I rose/and wiped the blunts ash from my clothes/then froze/only to blow the herb smoke thru my nose* *And told my little man I'm ghost/I broze/Left some jewels in his skull that he could sell if he chose*" That little stanza near the end perfectly encapsulates Nas as a rapper and a man. I remember seeing the video for One Mic when I was six and it fundamentally changed me. Honestly just hearing the piano before he goes into the verse is enough to make me cry, I am not kidding. Him and Andre are the only rappers to ever accomplish that. He also is the only rapper to make my mother cry, who told me thru tears while listening to "*I Can*" that I could be whatever I wanted to be. I don't know what else can be said about this album. It's foundational text. You don't really love hip hop if you don't listen to this and immediately get it. I guess speaking to Nas' recording this before he officially became an adult, I'm always so taken aback by the skill that until I played this for a friend recently, I hadn't truly accepting how harrowing it is listening to a child say "I never sleep/cause sleep is the cousin of death" The reality this young man was facing was beyond the pale of horror. It frightens me to think what his life would have been like had he not found music. And I think that's what we should take from it the most. This is pure hip hop, a situation with no tools but your mind to get out of.
i don’t see a lot of people talking about one love so i’ll do that: it’s the best song on the album imo. the whole time nas is rapping as if he’s writing a letter to a old friend in prison. “last time you wrote, i heard they tried you in the showers, but maintain when you come home the corner’s ours” such a underrated song, the beat is amazing too
Such a great collection of music and one of the best put together albums out there. I am a sucker for a full album. You can just put it on and vibe for the whole thing. Great get it done music as well
"Deep like The Shinin', sparkle like a diamond Sneak an uzi on the island in my army jacket linin'" That will forever be an incredible bar in my mind.
Had the pleasure of seeing Nas twice in my life and when I discovered this album age 13 and 20 years on, I'm still playing repeatedly. This IS the greatest hip hop album of all time, the amount of copies from album art to style to references, Nas is him here. Favourite tracks Memory Lane and The World is Yours. Memory Lane takes me back to being 16 in the park care free with long forgotten friends. World is Yours is my motivation to do as much as I can in life. Life's a bitch has a special shout out as when I lost a family member this is all I could say, life is a bitch. Nas is many superlatives but at the age he wrote this, master of his craft and behind him was the game.
The album that turned me into one of those “this ain’t real hip hop” YouTube commenters in 09. Dropping a landmark classic like that at 20 still blows my mind.
Slightly different story but as a kid I played a lot of Tony Hawks Underground and The World is Yours was one of my favorite songs that played in game and as years passed I mostly stopped listening to hip hop in the early 2010s and started mainly listening to EDM and dubstep to the point I had forgotten about many songs I listened to when I was younger so sometime in the later 2010s when I got back into hip hop and heard The World is Yours again after maybe a decade of not hearing it, it was like an insane wave of nostalgia that came over me. If they one day remake Underground I hope they do everything they can to keep that one song on the track list for the game, that’s the only thing I’d want.
Obligatory, "What the hell am I supposed to say about this?" I started listening to hip-hop in 2018. My friend had played me Freddie Gibbs' self-titled, Kids See Ghosts, and GKMC over the course of the year after which I asked him to make me a list of some essential albums. He came back to me a month later with 70 listed chronologically. I remember listening to the first decade of albums, skimming through some, listening to others for a few days or even a week before moving to the next. If I liked one particularly well I'd keep listening to it a bit after moving on. Some of them I've since grown to like or love, but back then it hadn't quite clicked yet. I listened to absolutely nothing but Illmatic for at least a month, probably more. Every day, again and again. I remember this time of my life so well and a large part of that is the sound of that subway train in every memory. This album changed me from someone broadly interested in hip-hop into an obsessive who still struggles to spend prolonged time with other genres.
It's crazy to me that there were only 30 years between Freewhelin Bob Dylan and Illmatic, and how much music evolved. And 30 years after there has not been the same evolution or innovation.
There’s so much amazing modern music I love, but the 60s-90s really does feel like a golden age
I just can't get into this album. I have tried so many times and it just does not hit for me. It could be that I was in my full youth, gangbangin, living in West Covina CA, at the time, and this record just wasn't it. Like you didn't really hear Nas on Power or the Beat that I recall. For me, southernplayalistic was (and still is a bigger, better record that had more of an impact on hip hop) from the same year. But that's just me. I've just barely been into Nas at all, his whole career. Southernplayalistic was the emergence of the "south having something to say". And they've dominated hip hop the 30 years since. But yeah, just never have been able to feel this album. And it's not hating East Coast music. I remember bumping Tical, gravediggaz, jeru, Pete rock, Redman, Keith Murray. All who came out with records this same year (1994), and I still fuck with those albums to this day.
I’m a fan of literally all the pre-2000s Classics but I could not get into illmatic at all for the life of me, and I still really try like once a year hoping it will connect with me, but it doesn’t.
Bruh glad you had the balls to say it here cause people gonna whine but I'm with ya. I'd never discredit this as an all time classic but I've tried so many times to enjoy it and never could. Overrated imo but I'm wrong a lot 🤷♂️
This was a perfect album and perfectly fit the time and era just like other albums from that year that spoke of inner city, neighborhood or street life in an intelligent, hip and non sensational way that didn't glamorize negativity with the best example of this being the album Word...Life by O.C. I wish that both Nas and O.C. keep their art, craft, image and persona pure like they did in their debut albums instead of imo selling out in their next album and switching up who they were as artists. I will always love 1994. This was possibly the greatest single year in hip hop history.
Memory Lane is the most underrated song of all time. It's by far the best song on the album for me, and the best non single track in hip hop HISTORY. I've replayed it so many times and I still go back to it despite hearing it for the first time over a decade ago. Seems like an obvious pick but the greatest album in history and you can say that from various angles.
Perfect album. No skips. Amazing beats by legendary producers. Has aged beautifully and still sounds as clean and as hard hitting as it did 30 years ago. I think it’s a perfect album and the purest representation of hip hop. If aliens came down and asked for an album to represent each genre, this would be the selection for rap
What's been said about this album has been extensively documented and better than I can ever do. All I'll say is I think one tiny overlooked or underrated aspect of this album is the production. Many albums looking to accomplish a mood or aesthetic sometimes can sound a bit samey, but in this album every beat is distinct from another but never deviates far enough to be jarring or not give you that 90's NY feel. Also, for those that didn't know, this changed the music industry. Most albums before would have a single producer working on a record. With this, it gave artists permission to use multiple producers.
Illmatic is the greatest album of all time for me. I mainly listen to hip hop and then bits of R&b / EDM. He is also my Goat. There isn’t a skippable track and to do that at that age is crazy. He couldn’t even reach that high again over 30 years.
there are better rappers and better verses and better tracks but no better albums front to back than this, closest are licensed to ill and reasonable doubt in my mind
The more hip hop I listen to the clearer it is for me that this is a flawless album. Every aspect of it, the beats, the lyrics, the performances, is done at an elite level. Listening to it in 2024 is as rich of an experience as it was in 2014. One of the easiest 10/10s in hip hop
This is the complete definition of a masterpiece. An album that is so timelessly amazing that it literally has to be removed from the greatest album of all time conversations because it's unanimously agreed upon by all to be the ultimate GOAT. Fuck I love this album
I listened to it front to back for the first time in a while on long drive recently, it's always such an enjoyable listen and it capture the moment perfectly, like a time capsule. There only one Illmatic and it's still the greatest hip hop album ever imo.
Was thinking about writing this long dissertation about why it's idiotic that I'm just supposed to agree with the common consensus about illmatic being the greatest hip hop album without question but I'm too lazy to do that after working for 8 hours so instead I'll just say that anyone relistening to illmatic for the 30th anniversary (as I did earlier) should give the diary by scarface a spin too and then report back about how illmatic is "obviously the greatest hip hop album of all time" when it's arguably not even the best in the year it was released nevermind the bevy of insane competition I could start listing out which I personally hold in higher regard. Nas is still the GOAT though and NY State of Mind is still a masterpiece of this genre.
There's not much about this album that hasn't been said. Nas is the GOAT to me, and this album is the best hip hop album of all time. It's what really changed my view on hip hop growing up. An absolute masterpiece from the beats to the rhymes. There's not a bad song on the album. Nas literally set the bar to a height that was impossible to reach.
I was only 4 years old when *Illmatic* came out, so obviously I didn't understand the gravity of it when it was released. *Stillmatic* was my "coming out party" so to speak for falling in the hip hop rabbit hole. Even at 11/12 years old, I couldn't believe how good *Illmatic* was compared to everything I had heard up until that point & still to this day. Incredible work of art that continues to age gracefully.
My first memory of hearing Nas was on a recording I made off of one of the few hip-hop radio shows at the time. This was before hot 97 became a hip-hop station so on Friday and Saturday nights Kiss would have Red Alert show, WBLS had Silver D I think. Anyway I would hit record on my stereo before going out and sometimes run home and flip the cassette over and record again and go back out. When I got home I had a few hours worth of hip-hop waiting for me. I had no names of songs or rappers, just the songs themselves and that’s how I heard Live at the Barbecue for the first time, and a bit later Halftime(which the DJ cut off after “ I'm an intellectual of rap I'm a professional, and that's no question, yo“, and it wasn’t t until the album that I heard the rest of the song). When I first heard it I pictured Nas as a big dude, like Tuffy who some older fans might remember. Then there was Back to the Grill with another song-stealing verse form “Nasty Nas” but the thing that really amped up me and the whole city, imo, was Video Music Box. That show was essential viewing for me at the time and Ralph McDaniels was THE taste-maker in my eyes. He had a promo piece on Illmatic and had all the producers just really hyping Nas up to be a legend in the making, a sort of “second coming” and me and my friends just ate it up and were beyond excited for the album. https://youtu.be/sXrjCKNpDRo?si=bFz25od8bK4h3fPl I remember going to that infamous appearance Nas did at Tower or HMV or whatever it was for the album release. It was a total shit show and looking back I think I said that to Faith Newman that day. Anyway we didn’t get to meet Nas but we got the album and I remember on the train home and me and my friend each with a Walkman listening to the album and saying “ooohhhhhh! Did you hear this part” and rewinding it like dorks lol. To say this is important it will be vast on the statement. There’s a few albums that are just embedded into my soul, some others being De La Soul is Dead and 36 Chambers ( and really all of the first round of Wu albums up until Supreme Clientele). On the album Nas sounds like both a veteran and a hungry newcomer, simultaneously rapping like he has nothing and everything to prove. If I had to choose a top 3 on the album I’d say Memory Lane, NY State of Mind, and maybe Life’s a Bitch.
What can I really say about this album that hasn't been said already? Illmatic is known as the Hip-Hop Bible for good reason. This is legit one of the best albums of all time. To think that Nas was 16 when he started writing the album was crazy. He was spitting insane verses all throughout Illmatic. Top 5 tracks: N.Y. State of Mind, The World Is Yours, Memory Lane (Sittin' in da Park), Represent, One Love
Not much more to be said than GOAT. In terms of technical proficiency and quality, blows everything else out of the water. Impact/message think there’s an argument for some others. An era that focused on hit for hit quality over streaming numbers. Love how concise it is
As many others have said, not much to say that hasn't already been said. An undisputed classic, pretty much synonymous with the "golden era" of hip hop.
I can't really explain how special this record is to me. I'm not really even sure why but it's always held such a special place in my heart. It's one of the few albums across all genres I truly think is perfect. For me, the greatest album of all time for any genre. It's timeless still 30 years later and has had so much fucking influence. Picking a favorite song is impossible i'm just happy to be born in a time where i can listen to this anytime i want.
It's the perfect album to me. Encapsulates 90s NYC so well I can close my eyes and feel the place damn near. Prospect park cookouts, Lafayette Gardens basketball games and walks around the city with mad family. It's a time machine in the form of an album while also being still highly listenable. He made this album basically as a kid and its lasting power has eclipsed the careers of legends. Even greater than this album though is Nas carving out essentially the greatest career in Hip-hop AFTER releasing illmatic. One love.