Review Summary: A gritty, grimy insight into hood life in the 1990's that is absolutely out of this world. One of THE essential hip hop albums.
Those who have not heard the name Nas at least once during their life are either living under a rock or have taped both their ears shut. The man is infamous within the hip hop genre for having released at least two albums considered to be among the best in the genre, and he has sold over thirteen million records purely within the United States. He was born into an already musical family, with his father being a successful jazz musician, and lived in Brooklyn for a while before his family moved to the Queens are of New York. It would be a safe comment to make that Queens made Nas. His family's next door neighbor there persuaded him to listen to hip hop records that were popular at the time whilst the gang culture surrounding the young Nas would go on to influence the success he would eventually become. In 1994, Nas' debut dropped, and since then life was never the same for the rapper.
Few albums can claim to be as brutally honest and open as Nas' seminal debut Illmatic is. Wheres most rappers enjoy bragging about the hood life and how many bitches they're getting and what guns they carry, Illmatic is an album that goes straight for the throat with its almost conversational approach. This is an album that clocks in at a rather short time for the hip-hop genre but in this space of time, Nas really does hit home the truths of life on the streets. Ten tracks make up this masterpiece and of those ten one is only a brief introduction. This album has become famous over the years as being one of the finest that the genre has ever produced and also contains some of Nas' staple tracks such as NY State Of Mind and Life's A Bitch. Whilst this album never topped the Billboard 200 in America, it sold over a million copies domestically and was also certified Gold in Canada after selling another 50,000 copies there.
The one thing that will strike the listener from NY State Of Mind (the first proper song on the album) through to the closing chapter of this release is how gritty everything sounds. The beats are very well put together and a tight production job ensures that so much grime is washed all over every note that it becomes hard to distinguish whether you are listening to a studio record or whether you are actually being taken on a tour through the gang-infested streets of Queens. This point is further reinforced by the actual sounds of the beats themselves. NY State Of Mind in particular feels as though you are taking a walk through New York, with the bass essentially sounding like footfalls whilst Nas raps over the top about the various dealings that were going on at the time. His overly-confident, cocky voice coupled with the low-end thudding of the bass and mixture of instruments scattered throughout makes for one of the most unsettling rides in hip hop and adds to the genuine feel of it.
Another factor that contributes to the masterclass in hip hop that Illmatic is is just how much is going off at once. It truly would be the little things that make Illmatic. Nas' own father makes an appearance on the track Life's A Bitch, providing a fantastic trumpet section that could not have better closed off the album, whilst the heavier, more mysterious beat that opens up Halftime kicks it off magnificently. It is rumored that Nas had never rapped over the beat to NY State Of Mind before, and the introduction almost confirms this, giving it a shocking feel to it and will make your jaw drop in amazement. Couple this with the absolute finest moment of the album on that particular song, where suddenly the bass is fazed out of the beat as Nas declares that he is the "smooth criminal of beat breaks", and one truly begins to understand how much effort went into the creation of this album.
Of course, no hip hop album would be complete without some intelligently crafted lyricism. Similes and metaphors are used in abundance here, with lines such as "more kicks than a baby in a mother's stomach" standing out as some of the better ones here. Each of these tracks is a magnificent insight into the hustling and grime of hood life in the 1990's, and this stands as testament to hip hop lyricism at its best. The flows are immaculately composed, with Life's A Bitch making perfect use of a guest appearance from fellow rapper AZ whilst on One Love, Nas feels perfectly at home among the softer beat. Even the spoken introductions to each individual track adds to the genuine, over the top and yet truthful nature of Illmatic and just adds the bells and whistles to this release.
Hip hop without Illmatic is essentially like shoot-outs without guns. Whereas so many of Nas' fellow rappers were rapping in either a very over the top, unbelievable style about life on the streets or else were inventing their stories, Nas is the real deal and for this reason, Illmatic is an absolute classic that is utterly perfect in every sense of the word.
