MUHAMMAD: So it's kind of crazy, cause I was waiting to get to you to talk to you to see if you were putting together —
NAS: Now I know your pain. Now I know what it must have been like. Even though I didn't have a crazy guy like Mike Rapaport, you know, throwing cameras around me, I had a pretty cool group that put this film together. I had nothing to do with it; I have nothing to do with it. I just, I came on late, like last year. They had everything almost done, I guess. It was a little bit easier for me, I guess, probably. I don't know what y'all experience was. But I remember Tip and Mike Rap getting ready to fight.
MUHAMMAD: Yeah, it got bad.
NAS: I know just telling your story is not easy. We tell it through music, but to sit down and tell your story, that's not easy. That's one of the hardest things I ever did.
MUHAMMAD: When is your documentary going? Is there a calendar on it?
NAS: Yeah. It plays in New York at the Tribeca Film Festival.
MUHAMMAD: Are you still interested in doing — you have a film production company?
NAS: I have Illmatic Films.
MUHAMMAD: So you gonna be doing some directorials? Or what's up with that?
NAS: Since documentaries are one of the things that I like to watch — I like docs. It's one of my favorite things to watch, since I was a kid. I'm going to produce a couple. I'm working on a couple this year. One's coming up called
Shake the Dust. It's about hip-hop in all kinds of other countries, in poor countries, third world countries, and how they use hip-hop as a way of freedom, a way of escaping their realities. And it's amazing — there's some amazing things. And there's a couple more that I'm working on right now that's really, really cool. So, yeah, I'ma throw my hand in that for a little bit and see what I feel like doing.
MUHAMMAD: I like you in that — not to take you away from — I think your voice is so important still to hip-hop, now, 2014, as it was back in 1994. And not to take you outside of that, but I think as a visionary and as a person who understands culture, from the film perspective, I love you being in that position. Because you definitely was a big spark for
Beats, Rhymes & Lifedocumentary to happen.
Even hearing about
Shake the Dust and knowing from my own experiences of going to different countries and seeing what it is for people and how hip-hop has transformed and it is their only thing — how it used to be for us here in America. Just knowing the way you view things, and you really thorough. I like you in that position because I think there are other stories that should be told that just need that visionary.
NAS: I'm happy in this space. I'm happy. I'ma try not to let you down, man. But I really am happy in that space, you know. I have nothing to do with this one coming out. But these guys — I think it's their first film. And they did a great job. But I'm definitely working with more people who are trying to do what I'm trying to do. We trying to touch on some topics that people will really dig. Yeah, for sure.
MUHAMMAD: Have you found — in the business side of things, have there been any experiences you look back on, you go, "That was a bad position I was in." Or a bad deal. Or has everything been pretty much pretty decent and fair?
NAS: No, I've been lucky, man. I gotta say, man, luck's been on my side in that. I seen things that I've only dreamed about, you know. I would say in the beginning — I knew in the beginning it would be crazy because it's the first time you signing a contract. I'm just trying to be fair to everybody. I signed with Serch, I signed with Ruffhouse, then Columbia. All of these companies were wrapped up in my deal.
I knew that it would all pan out in the long run, but I knew I had to get it going. I had a lot of interest in me from all these people and that was cool. So I found a way to make everybody involved and then keep going so I can get the record started. But of course when you do that, there's a lot of people cutting into what's yours. I didn't mind that, to tell you the truth, because, you know, the opportunity was bigger than a few dollars right then. The opportunity to get out there was everything.
MUHAMMAD: I ask you that because I know that it's never-ending where there's the younger kids and they want to get into the business and they're presented with being in situations where it could be a huge production company like with Timbaland, with Dr. Dre or any other production house. They're being presented with contracts like, "Yeah, you gotta give up half your publishing." And that's the standard, if they want to be in it. I'm wondering what your experience was in having to make a sacrifice, giving up percentages — I don't know what it is and you don't have to speak to that — but what would you say to that young kid coming up and being presented with giving up a big portion to get it started. Or maybe there's some other direction that they may want to go into.
NAS: When you a new artist, as you know, you really don't have that much leverage. And when you dealing with experienced producers, 100-year-old, huge record company worth billions of dollars and lawyers who have a firm on Fifth Avenue, you just coming into this thing so you don't really want to piss nobody off. You just like, "I'll do whatever you guys say. If whatever you guys say about this contract is right, I'll trust you." That's what most young guys will say.
But you gotta know your worth. You gotta know what's fair. You gotta ask those guys, "Is this fair? Is this fair? Like, really, at the end of the day, is this contract — do you feel good about having me sign this, Mr. Producer?" "Do you feel good, as my lawyer, having me sign this deal this way? Something seems a little off." You gotta make these questions; you gotta even, if you can, get a second opinion. But lawyers are crazy, man. You gotta watch them, too. Sometimes they're really on — they won't have your best interest at heart because they've been doing business with the record company longer or the producer longer, and you could be a fly-by-night artist that comes and goes. They don't really know if they gonna have they loyalty on you, so that's a lot of pressure as a new artist.
What you have to know — and this is crazy — you gotta kind of go in there knowing that what you're doing is gonna be so great that at some point, whatever this deal is, you're going to break through it — because that's how I felt. I said — in the beginning — I said, "No matter what, any kind of shadiness that's going down ..." Because I did learn a lesson from y'all: "
Industry rule No. 4080 / Record company people are shady." That's Tribe Called Quest, ladies and gentleman. When I went in there and signed my deal, I said, "It doesn't matter because it's gonna pan out in the end. And I'm gonna pass through anything that's wrong —" I don't want to curse. "Anything that's wrong, I'ma get through that." That's how I felt.
KELLEY: Can we talk about the lead-up to some of that? To the hype, to working with Large Professor, and being on "Live at the Barbeque"? How the hype builds, and how it spread? How'd you get on radio the first time?
NAS: Large Professor. "
Live at the Barbeque" is a song on the Main Source album,
The Main Ingredient.
KELLEY: '91?
NAS: That came in '91, yeah. That came out in '91. I knew some guys who knew some guys in the music business. Back then, Large, he was this cat — he had this song called "
Think" that I heard on the underground stations and this other song. He had the beat that later on, on Big Daddy Kane's second album, he used it on a song called "
Mr. Welfare," which is a cool record. But Large used it years earlier and he produced it.
My boy knew him. I needed somebody to do the beat — my DJ at the time, this kid Melquan, he was a DJ but he was too busy trying to make out of state trips doing this and doing that and not focusing on the records. And he was — he turned out not to be so great at the beats. He had a friend who knew how to get in touch with somebody who could do beats. And that was Large Professor. I know that's a lot.
KELLEY: No, no, I want to know —
NAS: I'm telling you all of this stuff about people that you don't know about.
KELLEY: All of it.
NAS: But boom, I'ma speed it up. So he introduced me to Large Professor. We went to pick up Large Professor from high school — his high school — and I had a few dollars and I'm like, "I want to go in the studio."
KELLEY: Wait, and so you are how old at this time?
NAS: Going on 17.
KELLEY: OK.
NAS: So I'm like, "Yo, let's get in the studio." He agreed to do it, because back then, everybody just wanted to work, you know? "Let's just work. Oh, a reason to go in the studio? Oh bet, let's go." "Oh, your man's nice? Alright, cool." He didn't really look at me like — he didn't know me from a can of paint — so he was like, "Who is this kid?" We go to the studio, I do my thing and afterwards he comes in, he's like, "Yo, let's get busy; let's do some stuff. I'm in the studio." I'm like, "Alright, bet." He's like, "Yo, I'm working with Eric B. and Rakim." I'm like, "What? What?" I'm like, "Wow!" Cause you know, Main Source album ain't come out yet. He's telling me who he's working with — this is, like Kool G. Rap. I'm like, "What?"
He gets me in the studio. We start working on stuff. Eric B.'s paying for the studio times and all of that stuff cause they had open studio sessions for their album but they wasn't working, so I was coming in there working. Large Professor had me coming in working on his time. So Large starts doing his album and saves me a slot on "Live at the Barbeque." I meet him, Joe Fatal, Akinyele — these the guys that's on the record. I penned some of Joe Fatal's verse for that. And Joe Fatal's just happy — he'd never rapped on a record before so he was just happy to do it. It was a good time. And I couldn't believe that Paul — Large Professor — Paul, I couldn't believe Paul put it on his album!
I thought it was a good song but I was just happy, like, "You really put it on your album?" "Yeah, it's on the album, dog. You need to go get this right and you gotta go get copyrights." That forced me to go get lawyered up. I was like, "OK. Oh, wow. OK." He's like, "Yo, dog, we need your information." I'm like, "Oh, wow! I'm a businessman now! Word." He made that happen.
I heard it on the radio one night — I don't know if it was Special K and Teddy Ted, I don't know who played it — but I'm walking through the projects late one night and I see these older dudes by the radio, by a car, they sitting by they car, talking, they were drinking beers and they were — late! They were playing the radio out they car. So I'm just sitting, I don't have nowhere else to go at this point. I ain't seen none of my boys so I'm just hanging out where they at — and then the record comes on.
So I'm like, "Oh." I'm in a trance. Like, "Yo, that's me! Yo, that's me!" I'm like, "Yo!" I'm trying to tell them, "Yo, that's me!" But they all in they conversation, they yelling and talking amongst each other, they not listening to the radio. I'm trying to tell them that's me, they're like, "Yeah, alright, alright." They not even — so I block them out. I'm in my zone, I'm listening to me. So that walk from 12th Street to Vernon, back to my block, I was in a trance, you know what I mean? I wanted to call Paul and say, "Yo, they playing your record," cause I would call him anyway if they were playing his record: "Yo, I heard your record. Yo, people like it," whatever, give him feedback. So I wanted to call him and say, "Yo, they played the record, dog! But they played THE record! The one I'M on."
From there, I was on. I felt like, "I'll be alright." It didn't happen like that, but I felt like I'd be alright. In the long run, it came together. Then I met Serch and he put me on "
Back to the Grill" which was like a Part 2 to "Live at the Barbeque," but I'm the only one from "Barbeque" on the song. He already had Chubb Rock on it, Red Hot Lover Tone, so he put me on it. Wow, this is a lot, dog! We getting in, we getting it in right here!