The second J Cole realised Nas was “one of the greatest”

J Cole has been a Nas fan for so long as he can keep in mind, however there was one second he got here to the realisation that he was higher than everybody else within the recreation. The Dreamville rapper was 9 years outdated on the time Illmatic — broadly thought-about to be one of many best albums of all time — got here out, so it wasn’t that undertaking that did it for him.

As a substitute, it was the time his cousin made him take heed to ‘I Gave You Power’ from It Was Written that modified his world. In that second, he realised he wanted to wash up on Nas’ catalog, paving the way in which for him to then uncover Illmatic.

”When this album dropped I needed to be 9, so I give myself a cross for lacking out on this at first,” he instructed Advanced. “It wasn’t until my cousin forced me to listen to ‘I Gave You Power’ off of It Was Written that I realised Nas was one of the greatest, and I had some homework to do! Illmatic is one of those albums that demonstrates the highest level of lyricism possible!”

DJ Premier produced ‘I Gave You Power’ for Nas’ second studio album in 1996, having already produced classics equivalent to ‘N.Y. State of Mind’, ‘Represent’ and ‘Memory Lane (Sittin’ in da Park)’ on Illmatic. Cole holds Nas’ opinion so excessive that he even named a song ‘Let Nas Down’ after studying the Queensbridge rapper was unimpressed with ‘Work Out’ from his debut album Cole World: The Sideline Story. ‘Work Out’ happened after Cole listened to Kanye West’s The Faculty Dropout and felt like he wanted a tune with the identical power.

“One night I was in this hotel room after a show, and I was listening to The College Dropout, as I do,” he mentioned throughout a listening session. “And on the worst song on that album — which is my favourite album, so I’m not dissing — but on the worse song on that album, ‘The New Workout Plan’, I heard the shit that I had been hearing for like eight years now.

“I heard it different as a producer, like, ‘Oh shit.’ Made a rough version of the beat right there in the hotel room. By the time I got back to Europe a few days later I had ‘Work Out’.”

J. Cole’s aim was successful, with ‘Work Out’ changing into the most important tune from that album, peaking at quantity 13 on the Billboard Scorching 100. Nonetheless, shortly after it dropped, Cole acquired a name from producer No I.D. telling him that Nas hated the only. This prompted him to jot down a tribute to Nas within the type of ‘Let Nas Down’, detailing how dissatisfied he was with himself.

Because it turned out, J. Cole releasing ‘Let Nas Down’ labored to win again Nas’ approval, with the latter tweeting, “You made me proud man,” following its launch. Cole as soon as named Nas as one in every of his prime 5 rappers alongside 2Pac, Biggie Smalls, Jay-Z and Eminem, with André 3000 simply lacking out on his elite record.

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