Hip-Hop developed in the 70s when
DJ’s started playing remix’s of popular songs through the use of turntables.
When the use of turntables became popular, artists started using them to make
beats to their songs. This is where hip-hop started. Artists would rap over
these synthesized or instrumental beats to produce what was known as early
hip-hop. Fast-forwarding 20 years later, the game was forever changed.
Nas’s debut album “Illmatic” made
an explosion onto the music scene in 1994. The whole idea behind the album can
be seen by looking at the cover. What you will see is picture of the
seven-year-old Nas fused with a picture of his hometown. Through this, Nas is
showing the focus of the album is his roots. Its about the life he lived, the
place he grew up, the way it really was. It was not an easy place to grow up,
but Nas wasn’t there to just point out flaws. He accepts it has part of him,
but shows its problems. With this concept in mind, Nas utilizes iconic beats combined
with incredible lyrics to create an album that people should not stop listening
to. Twenty plus years have passed and this album still stands stronger than ever.
It is still well renowned for the quality of the songs, but also for being a
staple of what hip-hop was and what it allowed it to become.
The album by Nas pulls from sounds
of the past in order to make a finished product completely different from what
has been previously been made. Even though this album was written in the
nineties, many of the songs utilize aspects from the seventies as well as other
decades. The rhythms and beats of some songs have a jazz and blues influence
coming from the earlier decades. However, with the older instrumental sound
that has been used in very early hip hop such as Run-D.M.C, does not result in
something that hip-hop has heard previously. Run D.M.C, used similar beats, but
had a very different sound. They rapped much more harshly, each line was
treated like its own sentence, and there was a sharp contrast between the
instrumentation and the lyrics. They Nas expands on this and makes it into his
own. He uses very repetitive beats made with very simple instrumentation. Using
sounds and beats that Run-D.M.C became famous for he a whole new sound through
his quick transitioning and powerful voice. This creates a unique sound that transcends
time. His voice and the overall sound of the album starts to sound like more
modern day hip-hop where the voice has a fairly stable tone and uses the
background music to create excitement. Nas seems to do two things at the same
time. He moves toward the future in the sound he presents, but pulls from the
past on the instrumentation. This is a culmination of reminiscing on childhood
musical sounds combined with the sounds of hip hop in the present times and
what he wants hip-hop to head towards.
What Nas did with this album that
was so revolutionary is that he combined the types of rapping. The songs all
have this stylistic combination in them, but “New York State of Mind” shows this
combination of styles to its fullest extent. Nas raps, “I never sleep, cause
sleep is the cousin of death/I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier
times/Nothing’s equivalent to the New York state of mind.” In this song, Nas
manages to show his lyrical genius and uniqueness. He shows his lyrical
complexity through the double meanings and metaphors, his connection to
gangster rap with the topic of the rap, and his ability to tell a story, as
these lines act as a conclusion to his story. This song alone is everything
that hip-hop encompasses all at once. At
the time of the albums release there were distinct differences in rap styles.
There were the gangster rappers, lyricist, and the storytellers. The gangster
rappers spoke about the drug and poverty life and had a style that was harsh.
The lyricist uses clever lyrics to display a message. Finally, the storytellers
like to set their songs up as narratives. Throughout the album, Nas shows his
ability to take this one step further. Not only does he use similar styles as
other hip-hop artists, but he fluently combines the styles into a style that
you cannot simple put into a single category. Nas creates a sound in this album
that encompasses everything I love about hip-hop.
I don’t think this combination came
by chance. Nas grew up with a musical background with his father playing jazz
and blues music, playing the trumpet and hip-hop music being played on boom
box’s in the projects that he lived. With this you can already see some of the
conflicting styles. His knowledge of more traditional music and growing up in
the projects gives way to making something that other artists could not. With
“Illmatic”, Nas wanted to tell it how it was and how he grew up. To give the
audience a better, more intimate idea he rapped about things in a story format,
but rapped about topics that gangster rappers did as he grew up in the
projects. It wasn’t enough for him to tell a story, but he utilizes intensely
deep lyrics. It seamlessly combined the styles of rapping which paved the way
for the next generation of hip-hop artists to pull from.
Much of what we hear in todays hip-hop
has been influenced by this album. In 2014, after the debut of his hit album m.A.A.d
City, Kendrick Lamar told a BET journalist that “I wouldn’t have been able to
do that [elevate his mind a little bit further] if it wasn’t for that album
[Illmatic] truthfully.” It is not enough to just say that people respected this
album and like the elements in it, but that it actually influenced their music even
as far as twenty years later. Just as Nas used older Jazz sounds and put a new
twist on lyrical side of it, Kendrick Lamar uses old jazz instrumentation and
raps over it to give it a whole new twist. It is about the uniqueness of the
album that drove Kendrick to do things his own way and not try to follow any
script that the music This is something that came from Nas and “Illmatic”. This
albums influences are endless.
This album isn’t just about the innovativeness it
brings to the hip-hop industry or the twist it puts on older styles, but in the
end it is about he incredible music all these things help to create. Nas was
saying and doing things that have never been done before and it is only fitting
that the album ends “Nas’ raps should be locked in a cell, it ain’t hard to
tell.”
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