IWW had great beat selection.
You giving so much credit to this white lady is laughable, she did what A and Rs are supposed to do, she was no executive producer on the album though. Many of the producers on the album already had relationships with young Nas, i think three were from Queens one from QB himself.
Nas followed up Illmatic with another album in your top 20 list, so i don't know what you mean by beat selection went downhill, when he made another classic two years later.
Yeah the making of backstories always interesting and one common theme is, you always got multiple smart and talented people guiding the process. Same way having people at the label that's incompetent or don't understand the artist vision can fukk up a project. Only thing that actually matter is the music.
Funny thing is Mobb Deep trajectory from Infamous to Infamy is very similar to Nas from Illmatic to Nastradamus.
Illmatic and Infamous their consensus best projects and all time classics.
IWW and Hell On Earth classic follow ups that some fans prefer over the debut.
I Am and Murda Muzik both albums quality got hurt by heavy bootlegging before release, both still good albums with iconic songs that was well received in real time, but seen as a step down.
Nastradamus and Infamy both substandard and disappointing albums that someone in management or at the label should have hit the
on.
Difference is Nas had a major resurgence with the Stillmatic, Lost Tapes, God's Son run but Mobb never really recovered critically or commercially.
So I don't subscribe to this idea that Mobb Deep was some visionaries while Nas just got lucky to have smart A&R. That require you to ignore that Mobb debut was a critical and commercial dud. And it wasn't on some trying to appease the label and be commercial shyt like you saw with RZA. They had Premier and Large Pro and a very street oriented sound, it just wasn't that good. But two years later they geniuses with no help and guidance? Come on now.
