Rhyme and Reason

For the most part, mainstream rap has lost its lyricists. No one drops social commentary like Public Enemy back in the day, and only a precious few MCs even engage in meaningful wordplay. On the radio, it's all about shout-outs, catchphrases and random street talk. So when an artist comes along who can balance a potent flow with commercial appeal, hip-hop heads can't be blamed for overreacting. It was in this climate that twenty-year-old Nasir Jones was anointed as rap royalty on the strength of his 1994 debut, Illmatic. "The Second Coming," they called him. "The Real Deal," "The Truth," "The Rhyme God," "The Next Rakim." Critics and fanatics waited for Nas to lead rap to the promised land, but he quickly lost track of rhyme.

Abandoning his street-storyteller style, Nas adopted an ill-fitting gangsta persona, calling himself Escobar and dropping a string of increasingly disappointing discs (It Was Written, I Am and Nastradamus). He capped his losing streak with two poorly conceived side projects (The Firmand QB's Finest) and a miserable acting debut (in Hype Williams' wretched Belly). But despite the critical beatdowns and fanbase apathy, Nas doesn't feel he fell off, lyrically or mentally.

"I'm not sure if I've ever lost focus," he says, his voice slow and almost sleepy. "The writing has always been fun to me, and on each album, what I wrote meant what it meant."

But even if he was keeping it Sincere, to use the name of his Belly character, old-school fans craved a return to Illmatic form. Nas responded with last year's Stillmatic, a stirring reminder of his glory days. "Comin' full circle was real important to me," Nas explains. "I experimented with all kinds of music and worked with different artists. It was important to get back to my roots and take my music where I thought it needed to be."

On Stillmatic, Nas tones down talk of the gangsta lifestyle and playa privileges, instead delivering stellar editorials such as "Rule," on which he demands to know How can the president fix other problems when he ain't fixed home yet? He addresses such issues while managing to sound current, becoming one of the few links between the politically powered old-school and today's pimped-out new school.

Like his latest work, Illmatic combined playful displays of wordsmithing skills with straight talk about life in the hood. The album revived East Coast hip-hop, beating back the West Coast gangsta influence that was poised to take over the nation. Like most great albums (Marvin Gaye's What's Going On and the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, for example), Illmaticwas compact and filler-free -- just ten killer tracks full of sharp lyrics and brilliant beats. The 39-minute masterpiece earned hip-hop's highest honor, five mics from The Source magazine.

"The compliments and praise were everything you would want on your debut album," says Nas. "It all meant more to me than the sales. But afterward I saw the change in people's feelings, and instead of praise, they started comin' after me."

His most publicized antagonist, Jay-Z, scored a direct hit last year with "Takeover," a gloves-off assault that needled Nas' discography and questioned his credibility as a legitimate street reporter. On Stillmatic, Nas battles back with "Ether," rapping My child, I've watched you grow up to be famous/And now I smile like a proud dad, watchin' his only son that made it/You seem to be only concerned with dissin' women/Were you abused as a child, scared to smile, they called you ugly?/Well life is harsh, hug me, don't reject me/Or make records to disrespect me, blatant or indirectly.

Nas chalks up this war of words to hip-hop's long-standing tradition of battling. "A lot of guys today must not remember Roxanne and UTFO dissin' each other, Boogie Down Productions versus MC Shan or Dr. Dre against Ice Cube," Nas cites. "Battlin' is a part of hip-hop. This isn't the first battle or the last."

His current spats on wax certainly don't mark Nas' first battles. A product of the infamous Queensbridge housing project in Queens, New York, he dropped out of high school, but his ferocious appetite for reading helped him develop strong writing skills.

"My pops and mom had the books all laid out for me," he says. "They always told me what was up as I was growing up in the crib. Hopefully everybody has parents that teach them about their culture and what's really going on. I was fortunate enough to have that type of upbringing, because it made me more aware of the world and how things work."

Nas' father, Olu Dara, also introduced him to musicmaking. "My pops was a jazz dude, and he brought me into the game," Nas says. "If it wasn't for my pops makin' music, I wouldn't be makin' music. He brought me onstage when I was about four or five. He kept tryin' to get me into instruments. The way my pops approached the music was real and a lot more creative. I grew up with music, so I've always had an understanding of the power of words and what my voice represents."