Nas says the spirit of HipHop is alive

[dead prez]

Scratch what I said about Obama being a pioneer, being the first in something makes him innovative by defintion, but being elected into office isn't a conscious stylistic choice, just like making sales is.

For example The Low End Theory and Da Endtroducing are far more innovative than R2D/Illmatic/SSLP, despite the latter three being buttloads more popular.

[TommiTMX]

Nas is not the one to go to to ask, "Is Hip Hop Alive".....his last album was mediocre....and he is basically non-existent in the hip hop community

Had you said "in my opinion his last album was mediocre" then I wouldn't mind because Distant Relatives might not have been your cup of tea...but to just state it was mediocre is ignorant, sure I could read in-between the lines but I remember a lot of people (and a lot of people in this thread too) noting how awesome Distant Relatives was...and I love it by the way.

[stillmatic]

lol @ Nas being non-existent...

lol for real.

lol the explanation for Distant Relatives being weak - 'I was talking about Distant Relatives, and it was too poetic and political for my taste' just made me think of the hook to Lupe's 'Dumb it down' the entire time.

[mcZu]

^Lol, yeah, same thought. Lupe's Dumb It Down record is one the best songs of the last decade.

[MikeNUFC]

Have you ever heard of an emcee called Lowkey from the UK?

Erm, I’m not sure…

Okay, I was just saying ‘cos he’s kind of a political activist in the UK so I thought you might have reached out to him a little bit…

I’m sure I will, I’ll be trying… I’ll look him up now!

I picture Nas watching the Terrorist video and going "Hey, someone find this guy, we need to collab this instant"

I can dream, right?