Nas - King's Disease III (Discussion Thread)

[Alexander Wiggin]

Both y'all takes are valid @Ziggiy and @Wavey Singh

I think that the alchemist we see now is way different that the alc nas worked with and that would be interesting to see them work again in 2023.
The thing is hit boy really pulled out something in nas that we rarely seen, you can see the trust nas have in hit boy and the new confidence he gave in to the point that he was able to really talk his shyt about him being the best.
But as much as I love their work, nas should not think that hit boy should produced all his music forever. Kd3 was the maximisation of their sound and it can't get any better. The danger is to get stuck to a formula.

Ima take 3 examples.

Eminem fell off on the production tip because Eminem Show was the peak of his sound (the 45 king/Dr dre/Eminem sound) and instead of going to another direction on Encore he got stuck and that didn't worked

Mobb deep had a formula on infamous and hell on earth but they brought alc on murda musik and that's why it was so good because it bring variety

Boldy and Freddie Gibbs both understood that you can't be produced by the same producer too much because whether you like it or not it's not good to get stuck in the same formula too long.

What started as a great risk talking for nas is starting to look like a confort zone.

I don't necessarily want nas and alc on a full album album but alc hit boy madlib and others would be a great thing

 

[kes929]

Make the EXACT same four albums and slap alchemist name on it and ya’ll would be creaming yall selves because for some reason ya’ll have been convinced that white boy makes the hardest shyt ever when its nothing different than what 95 Premo or 93 Pete Rock could do.

Hit Boy and Nas have literally made FOUR COMPLETELY DIFFERENT SOUNDING albums and people are talking generic? Stop it. Thats fukking crazy talk.

Hit Boy’s production is tailer made to both update Nas’s style for a modern era while still keeping him comfortable and familiar with the boom bap elements from which he came. There is NO OTHER producer that has shown they can do that consistently with 2000’s era Nas except for Salaam Remi, and many of ya’ll bytched about him too.

Ya’ll gotta face and come to terms with the fact that Alchemist, Premo, Pete Rock, and those other “throwback” producers aren’t gettin the consistent inspiration, creativity, and PRODUCTIVITY out of Nas in 2022 that Hit Boy is. Their beats ain’t hittin like that. Period. Premo ain’t making Legit in 2022. He had 20 years to loop the Five Heartbeats and never thought about it. Alchemist ain’t chopping up Michael & Quincy, it ain’t in him. Whoever else ya’ll wanna name, they ain’t cooking up Thun. They ain’t pushing and challenging Nas to spit Beef. They ain’t winning Nas no Grammys or getting him his 16th Top Ten billboard charting album. They don’t have the sauce. Hit Boy DOES.


Accept it

This is 100% accurate

 

[H.S.]

Both y'all takes are valid @Ziggiy and @Wavey Singh

I think that the alchemist we see now is way different that the alc nas worked with and that would be interesting to see them work again in 2023.
The thing is hit boy really pulled out something in nas that we rarely seen, you can see the trust nas have in hit boy and the new confidence he gave in to the point that he was able to really talk his shyt about him being the best.
But as much as I love their work, nas should not think that hit boy should produced all his music forever. Kd3 was the maximisation of their sound and it can't get any better. The danger is to get stuck to a formula.

Ima take 3 examples.

Eminem fell off on the production tip because Eminem Show was the peak of his sound (the 45 king/Dr dre/Eminem sound) and instead of going to another direction on Encore he got stuck and that didn't worked

Mobb deep had a formula on infamous and hell on earth but they brought alc on murda musik and that's why it was so good because it bring variety

Boldy and Freddie Gibbs both understood that you can't be produced by the same producer too much because whether you like it or not it's not good to get stuck in the same formula too long.

What started as a great risk talking for nas is starting to look like a confort zone.

I don't necessarily want nas and alc on a full album album but alc hit boy madlib and others would be a great thing

These are really bad examples.

Eminem moved away from the Bass Brothers for Encore.

Alchemist only produced a couple songs on Murda Musik, and those songs while great didn't provide variety. Havoc provided the variety for that album. Plus no one thinks Murda Musik is a better album than The Infamous and Hell On Earth (still classic though). Most people think Nas and Hit have gotten better every album.

Boldy has more projects with Alchemist than Hit has with Nas. And his best projects are definitely with ALC. And the other producers he's worked with recently are derivative of ALC anyway.

 

[kes929]

I don’t know how on earth anybody can hear Michael and Quincy in some quality headphones and tell me Hit Boys beats are generic. I guess that’s the new term hit boy haters are going to say to downplay hit boy “generic”. Did y’all not hear Nas effortlessly floating over 30, reccesion proof and reminisce??? Don’t even get me started on Thun.

 

[H.S.]

Double

 

[HNIC973]

Nas+ ALC would be classic their track record is legendary don't get it fukked up. If they lock in for a entire project ALC is the only other producer I'm confident would make a Nas classic. No Ideas Original, My Way, Honeymoon is over, Revolutionary Warfare, Mastermind, Book of Rhymes, My Way, just some examples of their classic track record. Alc not going to give Nas an album full of beats like Benny Broken bottles or Conway Piano love. He knows Nas has more range than both . Both ALC & HB have legendary Nas songs just HB got the albums. No need to downplay ALC to big up HB c'mon people

 

[kes929]

And while we are at it. Some of y’all need to get out more. That Nas and 21 song bangs!!!!!!

 

[JustCKing]

I think all Nas fans know what ALC brings to the table, but all we can do is speculate what an entire album would sound like. Again, there's reasons why Salaam Remi was doing a lot of tracks across God's Son and Street's Disciple and then Life Is Good. Salaam had the range and versatility as does Hit Boy. Same goes for when Nas locked in with No I.D. Think about it, up until Nasir, EVERY Nas album had multiple producers. Nas loves to experiment with different sounds and take his music in different directions.

 

[Piff Perkins]

No way in hell. MAYBE Magic. I get u not really feeling this album but some of the shyt yall saying is wild. The second half of WTF SMH bodies ur argument itself.

I feel and like the album, I'm talking moreso about lyrics and subject matter on some of the tracks. Second half of WTF SMH is good, but that first part...I just can't rock with that and would have cut that from the album. Second half reminds me of Ugly which is a top 5 song for me, out of all the Hit Boy projects. The other ones I'm not into are Serious Interlude and Beef. Neither are bad, they're just eh to me. I may have felt that way about one of the love songs on KD1 but KD2 and Magic were pretty consistent outside of YKTV. And I like the beats on the other albums more.

It's a good album. But it def convinced me that I'd rather hear a different sound next time.

 

[H.S.]

Nas+ ALC would be classic their track record is legendary don't get it fukked up. If they lock in for a entire project ALC is the only other producer I'm confident would make a Nas classic. No Ideas Original, My Way, Honeymoon is over, Revolutionary Warfare, Mastermind, Book of Rhymes, My Way, just some examples of their classic track record. Alc not going to give Nas an album full of beats like Benny Broken bottles or Conway Piano love. He knows Nas has more range than both . Both ALC & HB have legendary Nas songs just HB got the albums. No need to downplay ALC to big up HB c'mon people

A Nas/ALC album has potential. My only concern would be the overall tempo of the album. Recent ALC production is usually slower paced and has a lot less bounce than his old slower work.

 

[Budda]

a was

Nas+ ALC would be classic their track record is legendary don't get it fukked up. If they lock in for a entire project ALC is the only other producer I'm confident would make a Nas classic. No Ideas Original, My Way, Honeymoon is over, Revolutionary Warfare, Mastermind, Book of Rhymes, My Way, just some examples of their classic track record. Alc not going to give Nas an album full of beats like Benny Broken bottles or Conway Piano love. He knows Nas has more range than both . Both ALC & HB have legendary Nas songs just HB got the albums. No need to downplay ALC to big up HB c'mon people

Yh Alc is top 5 rap producers of all time for me, HItboy is not at that point yet, but in 2022 or 2014 even he certainly has more diversity than ALC, this the same guy who made nikkas in Paris then made Racks in the Middle then made Burden of Proof with Benny, they are both great producers but wouldn’t mind seeing Nas switch it up and make music with the likes of Alc next release, I would say 4 near classic or classic albums with Hit-Boy is enough.

 

[Ziggiy]

Nas+ ALC would be classic their track record is legendary don't get it fukked up. If they lock in for a entire project ALC is the only other producer I'm confident would make a Nas classic. No Ideas Original, My Way, Honeymoon is over, Revolutionary Warfare, Mastermind, Book of Rhymes, My Way, just some examples of their classic track record. Alc not going to give Nas an album full of beats like Benny Broken bottles or Conway Piano love. He knows Nas has more range than both . Both ALC & HB have legendary Nas songs just HB got the albums. No need to downplay ALC to big up HB c'mon people

Remember when everyone KNEW beyond a shadow of a doubt that a Kanye/Nas album would be a classic?

How did THAT turn out?

Remember when everyone SWORE that DJ Premier had all the answers and that Nas working with him again would blow any and every producer that Nas had worked with across Hip Hop Is Dead, Untitled, and Life Is Good out the water?


How many spins have YOU given Break Beats this year? Do any of the blogs talk about it? Any of those so called Hip Hop “purists” like Elliot Wilson, Peter Rosenberg, or Flex adding it to they’re playlists or radio rotations?

Remember when everyone just KNEW that Lost Tapes 2 would be a genre defining classic that would shift the state of Hip Hop and bring Boom Bap back to the forefront?

It Never Ends has been on Youtube for THREE YEARS and has 477K views. Legit had been on Youtube for ONE MONTH and has 777K views.



The point is there ARE no guarantees when it comes to artist/producer pairings. The only thing we can do is trust that ARTIST knows what they are doing and the producer has what it takes to provide the sonics to bring that vision to life. Hit-Boy is who is bringing Nas vision to life, and the results speak for themselves.

Again, Nas isn’t selling out Madison Square Garden doing Alchemist only songs. He’s doing so with HIT BOY produced songs. Nas ain’t winning Grammys with Alchemist production, matter of fact he and Hit-Boy BEAT Alchemist & Freddie Gibbs at the Grammys. And @Wavey Singh it doesn’t matter what ludicrous conspiracy theories you concoct in your head, the FACT is that Nas’s Hit Boy produced album won that Grammy and Alchemist’s Freddie Gibbs produced album didn’t. Then to drive it hime that the partnership has been both creatively and industry wide successful, they were nominated for KD2 a year later.

Nas has proven time and time again that when he goes with his own inclinations he’s successful and when he tries to force things its not as successful as every armchair A&R thought it would be. FACT is that Alchemist beats aren’t moving Nas to the point where its inspiring him to even write a verse, let alone hook up with him for an entire project. Alchemist IS. NOT. THAT. GUY. And given that Nas has said him and Hit-Boy are kidnapping the game, I don‘t foresee him nor any other producer BEING that guy anytime soon. Hit Boy has given Nas the shot in the arm he needed and neither of them are looking back, and given the success of the projects, commercially and critically, there’s no reason to whatsoever.

 

[Piff Perkins]

I think all Nas fans know what ALC brings to the table, but all we can do is speculate what an entire album would sound like. Again, there's reasons why Salaam Remi was doing a lot of tracks across God's Son and Street's Disciple and then Life Is Good. Salaam had the range and versatility as does Hit Boy. Same goes for when Nas locked in with No I.D. Think about it, up until Nasir, EVERY Nas album had multiple producers. Nas loves to experiment with different sounds and take his music in different directions.

I'm a huge Alch fan and def think he's been the best producer for quite some time now...but I don't want to hear an Alch/Nas album. While I don't think he'd give Nas the type of beats he gives Spitta or Freddie Gibbs (or Cormegea), I just don't think he's in that "Nas/Lox/00s Prodigy/etc" space sonically anymore. The samples, drums etc he's on are just in a different lane/mindset. And while I'd imagine he has "Nas beats" stashed I don't think Nas is in that space either, for dark grimy samples and hard drums. Each of the KD/Magic albums has a couple tracks in that lane but overall I just get the impression he's into different vibes now.

 

[Ziggiy]

Has anyone ever called his punk ass out for the Jay Z stanning and Nas hate?

A few people have.


I forget his name but there was a young rapper on there who you’d think would be one of those “Nas isn’t relevant”’brehs who actually took Vlad to TASK about saying Nas picks bad beats. He was like “Don’t you EVER say that about Nas!” And cited Just A Moment as one of his favorite Nas songs

 

[spliz]

A few people have.


I forget his name but there was a young rapper on there who you’d think would be one of those “Nas isn’t relevant”’brehs who actually took Vlad to TASK about saying Nas picks bad beats. He was like “Do you EVER say that about Nas!” And cited Just A Moment as one of his favorite Nas songs

03 Greedo I believe.