The Lost Tapes
label: columbia

producers: alchemist, precision, hill, deric angelettie, trackmasters, others.
year of release: 2002
website: iamnas.com
 
The legends, rumors and excuses were always the same and always quite comforting for Nas: "Sorry that the album sucks, but the best songs were left off the album." Why? That's a fill in the blank with some of the options are a) stupid A&R pulling the strings, i.e. they are no hit records they can sell to twelve year old fade fans; b) pre-release leakage; c) sample shenanigan; d) if you don't know, you'll never know. With the release of "The Lost Tapes", none of that these options are good anymore (but we can offer you e) out of the context of its initially recorded for album, it just sounds baaaad; f) the remix/mastering/rerecording just fucked up the song), as this album brings you all those songs that caused the pre-album hype, and that had the fans excited when "I Am" and "Stillmatic" were about to drop. What means that your mix tape that featured that song and your white label bootleg release that featured the other songs, will be less cherished, and your chance to make a pretty ebay dollar with 'em are over too.
So this must be Nas at his most prolific as a writer, as well as Nas as one of the few lyricist that knows a good beat when he hears it ("Illmatic" was drowned in classic beats), so we don't expect nothing else but. And there's a whole lot of but on here, while Nas might not be able to fully stray away from the nothing else.

tracklisting
1. Doo Rags
2. My Way
3. U Gotta Love It
4. Nothing Lasts Forever
5. No Idea's Original
6. Blaze A 50
7. Everybody's Crazy
8. Purple
9. Drunk By Myself
10. Black Zombie
11. Poppa Was A Playa
Thus listen to "Doo Rags", one of the best songs, as Nas speaks on what he sees, in interesting ways, being the commentator he's supposed to be. On the beat tip, here as most of the time, Nas opts for smooth beats that contain a certain sorrow in their courage to continue. What once more is an odd description for something good, and that's also valid for "My Way" that boarders the flossing. While there's a lot of reasoning why a person like Nas considers the bragging about all these things, just the proof of his accomplishments. There's also the reflecting part "Mama told me from weed, I would switch drugs / to cocaine and hit clubs and deep-dish dubs / how would she know unless she hit the clubs, got her mack-on / back in the 60's with an afro and her platforms / bopping to the Supremes, smoking joints / that's cool, but I'ma live how I want".
Even when Nas is going for more straight street matters, like on "Nothing Lasts Forever", he manages to spit his verses eloquently, rather than clumsily blatant. Parts of Nas' creative genius(?) is expressed in the quickly moving around content of "No Idea's Original" where the door into Nas' brain is kept open, and we don't even need to sneak in, as he's actually welcoming us, to hear his pondering: "it's like God or guns / which is better protection? Can't decide, that's a hard one." The beat built off a effective sample, that works better than the less production on "Blaze A 50" (a tale on a venomous female affair) and "Everybody's Crazy". The tale on "Purple" then again speaks on fallen comrades and the catastrophes and adventures surrounding them dropping, over a simple piano driven beat.
The next highlight is "Drunk By Myself" where Nas expresses his struggle to come to terms with everything that hurts a thinking man. Hence his escapism is very much away from himself too: "I'm drunk by myself, gun under my seat / I don't want none of my peeps caught up in none of my beef / I'm a ride to the end of the road if I have to / praying no car speeds by for me to crash to" and "heard niggas hate me, but I hated too once / been in the shoes of a Wolf in the night when he hunts / for every shell niggas bust, we bust at ourselves / can't tell them niggas nothing though, bullets wake 'em up well / take them to hell" to then conclude in "I hate it when I'm like this" still finding his way home though. "Black Zombie" goes in a similar, while more general direction, as he's accusing as much the systems as themselves when he says "scared to do it for ourselves 'less we see somebody doing it first / we begged, we prayed, petitioned and demonstrated / just to make another generation - black zombies". Nas then gets very personal on "Poppa Was A Playa" when he start to talk about his relationship to his father, who he has critical words for, but also respect: "so many kids I knew, never knew what pop was / that's why I show my pop love / he was still around when I fucked up / he could have left my moms pregnant shock to death but stayed / watch me crawl till I took my first step, to the first grade / to my first fist fight / right behind me he would stand" over another soulful beat.
Finally rounding out this excellent album, is a hidden concept track that's of the style Nas is so good at. This time he's no bullet or gun, but he's himself, from conceiving to birth looking through his mothers bellybutton window. The beat is so so, the lyrics are very good, what at times is a synopsis for the whole album, that proves that Nas can still be the prolific writer "Illmatic" promised he would be. Now if only he'd get rid of all those pop shenanigans and face his burden of being a character actor and not an action hero, his status as being one of the best would be solidified.
review: tadah
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