One of the most fun and charismatic hip hop records ever. Q-Tip is the more lyrical one and Phife Dawg has a flow like butter, and their chemistry is the best thing about this album. It's so rich with personality and playfulness while also having some of the best production of the '90s to back it up.

Aside from the obviously god-tier rapping performances, I think RZA is operating at his absolute best here. Maybe beat for beat Only Built 4 Cuban Linx... is better produced but in terms of building a cohesive album and matching the style of its MC, I don't think he does it any better than on here. Rapping-wise, bar for bar, I don't think there's a single Wu-Tang project that even comes close. GZA's immaculate wordplay is given so much room to shine on here, with a lot of ... read more

The first few tracks are some hard-hitting political bangers that sound like they could've been ripped straight from Stillmatic, but then God's Son transitions into its own thing. I think this is his most vulnerable project yet and I love it for that, especially with Dance, which is such a heartbreaking song. At this point, Nas has long since mastered the craft of lyricism and still keeps his pen sharp with exciting new styles, directions, and concepts. Revisiting his discography is ... read more

By 2001, Nas wasn't doing so hot. The once legendary rapper's last three albums had mixed to bad reviews and it seemed like he just kept getting worse. On top of that, a new wave of rap music led by JAY-Z was overtaking his old school, boom bap style, and JAY-Z had just annihilated Nas earlier that year in his diss track Takeover. Just when it seemed like Nas was done for, he released Stillmatic and completely reclaimed his name and his legacy. He opened with Ether and immediately set ... read more

People usually cite the laughably bad tracks as reasons why this album isn't good, but the single worst thing about it is how boring most of it is. There's a few decent tracks (Last Words is underrated) and a few genuinely terrible ones (Big Girl), but most of the tracks are just frustratingly unremarkable.

In retrospect, it's really not that bad when taken in isolation. It's not bad, but it is a very significant downgrade from his previous two albums.

Maybe the only album that's arguably both the best rapped album of all time and the best produced album of all time.

Its biggest crime is not being Illmatic.

When I say the production on Illmatic is overrated I don't mean it's bad, actually quite the opposite. The beats on here are really good. I've just seen so many people praise the hell out of the Illmatic production like it's the best production of the '90s, and while that's a respectable take I have to disagree. I think a lot of Nas' contemporaries had better production than him, people like JAŸ-Z, Dr. Dre, the Wu-Tang Clan, Biggie, and A Tribe Called ... read more

One of the best displays of Nas' highly conceptual, vivid, and raw storytelling and lyricism. You can't listen to songs like Doo Rags, Purple, or Fetus and deny that he's one of the greatest rappers of all time.