Depending on the day, Nas is either in my top three or my number one, but I was never anticipating this too highly. Maybe if it was released when it was hinted at many moons ago I would've been, but Premo hasn't been a consistently dope producer for a long, long time. Many people say since 'PRhyme' or 'PRhyme 2' which was already 10 years ago, but I would say it goes further back than that. Nas has saved beats in the past, and he does his thing here, but I honestly think he was rapping better on many of his recent featuring verses and on albums like ‘KD3’ than he is across this whole project. Although a verse will always sound better over the beat to the instantly loveable 'u aint gotta chance' than most of what's on offer here. The rapping is still of high quality though, but the bars aren't that interesting at times. The hooks are again lacking, which is something I say a lot about modern hip hop and I also said on quite a few of Nas' albums with Hit-Boy. There are some original concepts, as you’d expect from Nas, but nothing here rises above good. There isn't one top tier Nas track and most of all that's down to the beats and lack of memorable hooks. A lot of blame has been put on Premo but there's no i in team. It's a collaborative effort and Nas should have a higher standard of what he raps over and should remember that choruses matter. Every song doesn't need one, but it would be advantageous to have a few. I criticise artists not changing up for the chorus a lot these days. I've seen people say you're just after pop records if you start talking about this topic in rap, but it's complete BS. Look at Jeru's 'Ain't The Devil Happy' produced by Premier. The melodic loop of the verses is stripped back for the chorus leaving the drums, adding scratching, and without that change it wouldn't be the great song it is and it's not difficult to add that variety to a song at all. It's missing so often here and in lots of rap. Apologists argue lots of things, like this is the sound they were going for. Or it has that '90s feel. Or what did you expect? Or it will be a grower. Most things are a grower if you listen to them on repeat... If you are saying it's meant to sound '90s, fine. But does this compare to the best '90s hip hop? No. So that argument is moot. There’s missed potential on several songs due to the lack of variety between verses and choruses. The long lists of shoutouts on ‘Writers’ and ‘Bouquet (To the Ladies)’ do nothing to improve their replayability. ‘Writers’, in particular, could have been the one clear standout worthy of a best of Nas playlist if it didn’t devolve into name-dropping. Overall, it’s a decent-to-solid project from two legends that shows they still love the art form, but song for song, the level just isn’t high enough to put this anywhere near the artists' best work. I’m probably not going out of my way to revisit it in the future. Beats: ★★★ Rapping/Bars: ★★★★ Hooks: ★★☆ Best Tracks: My Life Is Real, GiT Ready, NY State of Mind Pt. 3, Writers, Sons (Young Kings) 1. My Life Is Real I say this a lot with hip hop these days but the music under the chorus doesn't change enough from the verses and while the "Invisible fingers playin' chords on my haunted piano" part of the chorus is a nice hook, the rest of the chorus isn't catchy enough. Still, it’s a decent opener where Nas bigs up his contribution to hip hop. 2. GiT Ready A different kind of production that’s enjoyable, if not amazing. It feels like a modern take on ’80s hip hop. I wasn’t feeling the chorus at first, but it’s grown on me. 3. NY State of Mind Pt. 3 I don't understand the hate for this production. It feels dark like the originals and the change up (something producers forget to do these days) between the verses and hook is something a lot of songs on this album, and from hip hop as a whole, these days is missing. There are way too many lazy producers and artists who basically loop a few seconds worth of music for 3-4 minutes. At least there is variety. It has a lot to live up to after the first two parts of NY State of Mind but I like this one too. 4. Welcome to the Underground This one drags on. The beat doesn't change up enough, and as often from Premier, all the break we get is some vocal sample scratches, this time of Ice Cube saying "Comin' straight from the underground." 5. Madman Nas tells the story of his come-up over another dark, gritty beat. He’s rapping his ass off, but the production doesn’t do enough to make it truly memorable, with short vocal scratches standing in for a hook again. 6. Pause Tapes We get a history lesson about an early way of making hip hop beats. The opening interview excerpt should've been a separate interlude played prior to this. The beat is fairly uninspiring. 7. Writers Premier and Nas both mentioned this as one of their favourites. There’s a lot of name-dropping, similar to ‘Bouquet (To the Ladies)’, much of which won’t mean anything to most listeners. While I don’t agree with what Nas is promoting here (quite the opposite) it’s still a good song with one of the stronger choruses, until it unravels into shout-outs that limits its appeal which is a shame. 8. Sons (Young Kings) I predicted this one. I wrote in my review of 'Life Is Good' that, "He'll have to create a song about his son on his next album though. He can't show favouritism." Well, maybe not the "next album" part. I like the low-fi type of production here which makes for one of the more likeable beats. 9. It's Time Topically I think this is one of the least interesting here. I've spun this album lots to write this review and this song just feels like it's there. It doesn’t give me much of anything. 10. Nasty Esco Nasir Nas brings his alter-egos. A fun song and concept. 11. My Story Your Story This is the worst Nas/AZ collaboration that I've heard. From the forced-sounding intro and loooong outro, to the topics and the beat, I just don’t get this one. Again, there’s little to no change in the production during the hook. 12. Bouquet (To the Ladies) Nas spends the last 90 seconds shouting out almost every female rapper imaginable, regardless of quality or listener engagement. If you’re going to do that, rap it in bars - something like what Eminem did on ‘Yah Yah’ - and give it replay value. Before that, it’s a decent ode to the ladies. 13. Junkie Nas raps about his addiction to rap. Again the production during the chorus does pretty much nothing different to the verses. Some variety there would've improved this one. The, "I'm still sick, hello everybody," sounds awkward to me and would've worked better as the start of a verse. 14. Shine Together More just scratching vocals for the hook again... I like the production a little more than a number of other songs. 15. 3rd Childhood A sequel to a classic, but I’m not feeling this one. It’s one of the more lackluster tracks and doesn’t excite me.