Some thoughts about Life Is Good now that's its been over 2 months and I am actually starting to trust that this is a great album. That its surpassed R.A.P. Music as album of the year (which I thought was untouchable) and has very quickly moved to #3 on the list of Nas' best albums. Which, when you consider that this is decade 3 of Nas making albums, and this one jumps over all of the rest to a safe spot next to It Was Written, well, its worth acknowledging. And, while it probably would have served him better to make an album of this caliber maybe 6 or 7 years ago, its never too late, and perhaps it could have only happened now as he has matured, divorced and shook some old bad habits. He got back to basics. Even the title is simple and not some over the top statement that the songs don't actually live up to and comes across as gimmicky.

We've been there before, the Nas diehards, convincing ourselves "he's back" and rationalizing the flaws of his albums (poor beat selection, lame hooks, desperate attempts at commercial appeal etc) because of the underlying fact that Nas rapping, period, is generally better than just about anyone else rapping.

As much of a devout fan I am, I parted ways with other diehards over Untitled. It had moments of what I described above, and like most Nas fans I appreciated the stout political content and the generally high quality of lyricism, giving him a free pass for at times far-reaching theories and statements that at worst resemble the cringeworthy rants of KRS-One, but at best have us reciting rhymes and being glad he's writing with urgency. I do my best not to be too nostalgic for the 90's and realize for artists to make an impact now they have to sound current etc. Nor do I have anything against club music that bumps (I love a lot of it), we know that Nas at his best is not meant for the club, not the whip, not the radio - but the headphones. I rarely even listen to music on headphones anymore. (I'm not one of those people that walks around with headphones on. I'm too paranoid to zone out in public like that and still too curious about the world around me to mute it).

Nevertheless, I put Life Is Good to the test. I put on my headphones and took the subway from The Bronx to Brooklyn (a long fuckin' ride that I know all too well, having family in the respective boroughs). With bonus tracks galore, the album was just about the duration of the commute itself, and it was like hearing it for the first time, with the subtleties of the production announcing themselves clearer than before, and Nas' cadence, flow and lyrics resonating in a more powerful way than I have experienced since my teenage days in the mid-90's when his seemed like the voice of the subway tunnels.

"This is the one." This is actually the great album we've been waiting for. But what's weirder is, its the album we gave up waiting for a long time ago. Hearing it is like seeing an old friend: you may have no intentions of becoming close again, but its still great to see them and know they're doing well.

Who should we thank more for Nas stepping it up: Kelis or Damian Marley?

Lastly, what's with bonus songs anyway? Is it just me or are these bonus tracks some of the best Nas songs in recent memory? Nasty, The Black Bond, Roses, Where's The Love?
I mean, lets put Summer On Smash on the bonus track list (I don't dislike the song as much as has been expressed in here). Lets say we put

Accident Murderers, Reach Out, Summer On Smash & World's An Addiction as bonus tracks.

and we put Nasty, The Black Bond, Roses & Where's The Love on the album proper.

I suppose this is somewhat arbitrary. And I don't dislike any of the album tracks really. But the bonus tracks are so strong imo - dope beats, sparse hooks, dark and complex rhymes.
And by default, if you like playing albums from beginning to end as I do, you're going to hear Accident Murderers a lot more times than Where's The Love, and perhaps get a bit tired of it.
But if we rearranged the sequence so it was something like this:

1. No Introduction
2. Loco-Motive (feat. The Large Professor)
3. A Queens Story
4. Nasty
5. Daughters
6. The Black Bond
7. Roses
8. Where's The Love (feat. Cocaine 80s)
9. You Wouldn't Understand (feat. Victoria Monet)
10. Back When
11. The Don
12. Stay (feat. The Large Professor)
13. Cherry Wine (feat. Amy Winehouse)
14. Bye Baby
bonus tracks:
15. Reach Out (feat. Mary J. Blige)
16. Summer On Smash (feat. Miguel, Swizz Beats)
17. Accident Murderers (feat. Rick Ross)
18. World's an Addiction (feat. Anthony Hamilton)
19. Trust

Better than It Was Written.

i still play it regularly, at least twice a week.

to me, it's got classic Nas flow and uncanny rythym over really strong production throughout which is what makes it one of his better albums. Nas' problem has always been with picking beats that he wants to make sound legendary, but when he does that without having the guide of a top producer, alot of times the result falls flat.

i still can't figure out what makes the bonus cuts, bonus cuts. they are all better than alot of the featured songs on the album. (Summer on Smash, the Mary joint, etc.) i guess they made them bonus cuts so that the die hard fans (like i ended up being, once I learned Nasty wasn't on the regular release.) would buy the deluxe version rather than regular version. i guess it boosts the amount of money made per download, but i think the better album would have included the bonus cuts on the regular album.

i can't see this album being over It Was Written or Illmatic, but it's definitely better than any other album since God's Son.

Nas ought to be proud of this album and I know I'm going to be looking forward to his new one now.

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http://www.twitter.com/chriscjamison/

People who don't take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year.

Peter Drucker

I made an 11-track playlist of the album, and all 4 of the made it. It's also currently my album of the year, with the only songs I really could do without are "Reach Out" (one of the worst hooks of all time) and "You Wouldn't Understand". The others I left off my playlist just essentially didn't make the cut because I like to make album playlists with 10-13 tracks. I actually like "Summer on Smash", like I understand it's a "bad" song, but fuck it, it's a guilty pleasure. I love the "Life is good, life-life is good" sequences.

Album should have kicked off with "Nasty" then right into "Loco-Motive" which always felt like "NY State of Mind (Part 3)".

That seems to me like one of the essential tracks on this album. Grown up Nas, smooth, cool hook. I love that joint. It reminds me of the laid back latter-day Nas songs that I enjoy, but maybe better e.g. Reason, Still Dreaming

Typically a skipper, unless I'm playing my customized playlist which it's absent from.

>Typically a skipper, unless I'm playing my customized
>playlist which it's absent from.

The fuck?

Oh, you're just kidding

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Young Broadway Star Urgently Needs a Bone Marrow Donor. Is it you? http://MatchShannon.com/







O_E: "Acts like an asshole and posts with imperial disdain"




"I ORBITs the solar system, listenin..."

(C)Keith Murray, "

saw loco-motive is coming soon

so he's got official videos for Nasty, The Don, Daughters, Bye Baby, Cherry Wine

put a substandard song by everyone's acounts to try to get a hit with Summer on Smash but didn't do a video or release it and now summer's over so wtf was that doing on the album

anyway, just weird spending money on videos when nobody watches them anymore and don't think its gonna bump album sales up at all

SMH @ niggas talking about how well it holds up two months after the shit dropped

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CHOP-THESE-BITCHES!!!!
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Garhart Ivanhoe Poppwell
Un-OK'd moderator for The Lesson and Make The Music (yes, I do's work up in here, and in your asscrease if you run foul of this

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20 is over kill for anyone.

Very few artists can pull it off.

Gang Starr did with Moment of Truth but I could argue that the album would be better if cut down to 16.

I'm not counting interludes as songs either...so for these albums with like 24 tracks including 8 interludes...that doesn't count as a 20 song album.

And I definitely agree with you in regards to the bonus tracks as well as the tracks to cut.

But I don't think I would put any tracks on as bonus cuts...maybe just Trust.

I played with the sequencing and came up with a good flow here...

1 Nasty
2 Back When
3 The Don
4 A Queens Story
5 Loco-Motive
6 Black Bond
7 Roses
8 Daughters
9 You Wouldn't Understand
10 Where's The Love
11 Stay
12 Cherry Wine
13 Bye Baby

Put that in the playlist and ride it out.

I really don't like No Introduction enough as an opener. It's too long and it goes for the dramatics too much. Nasty to me is a perfect, let's cut to the chase and get down to business. I'm sure the fact it was released so long ago kept it from being on the album let alone the opener. But we're going for quality here and that joint is still raw as fuck.

Back When is the perfect joint after Nasty. Maybe my favorite on the album...it really plays well at that 2 slot.

I think the album with this track listing and sequence is better than It Was Written.

This track listing keeps the album cohesive where as Reach Out, Worlds An Addiction, Summer On Smash kind of stuck out in that cluster. And I don't even dislike those songs like everyone else. But I don't think they're needed. None of them were singles so the album would survive without them. Nasty is still there as the street single. the Don is still there as the club single. Daughters is still there as a good single and Cherry Wine is the one to take the album over the top.

Needless to say, the people marketing the album missed these marks lol.

Put it together, let it play and let me know.

Edit: I would've had AZ on either You Wouldn't Understand or Where's The Love.

I still think it's a 4.5/5 LP and the LP of the Year. With that being said, take Reach Out and Summer on Smash off, change sequence and add AZ instead of Rick Ross...lol..Classic...lol..lol

"Highly developed spirits often encounter resistance from mediocre minds."-Albert Einstein

http://twitter.com/#!/TonyHanesPoetry

BTW up until my computer getting wiped last year I had "In My Lifetime Vol. 1 (Anonymous)" playlist with a sequence of that album you had posted before that was infinitely better than the actual album sequence.

I'm glad you liked the Jay sequencing. I did the same to AZs Pieces of A Man.

I wish I could be the sequencing champ for all hip-hop releases lol.

Granted I do it after sitting wih the album for a little while but I didn't need too much time with the Nas album to know what the best choices of songs are and sequence is.

I agree about Nasty as the opener. How epic is that "y'all ready for Nas? Queensbridge, are y'all ready for Nasty Nas" as an opening to a return to form album. And then the ending where he says "make room for the king" right into Back When is just ridiculous.

Any other albums you want me to touch up for you?

You fuck with the entire intended purpose of the work.

Its like drawing a mustache on mona lisa and shit...but thats just me

I am very used to the sequence of the album so I prolly won't try this but great write up nonetheless

(Reach Out, Worlds an Addiction, Summer on Smash)

Which on the one hand is kinda ugly, I guess, to skip 3 tracks in a row. But on the other, I let 1 thru 5 ride and then 9-18. Not bad at all.

As far as the 3 I skip, I don't hate "Reach Out", I just find the sample tired, along with the Mary J. hook, but sometimes I let it go.

"Worlds an Addiction" is interesting, I just wish drums came in at some point, tho.

"Summer on Smash" I TRIED to get into lol, but as soon as I hear "bad b*tches", I make an unhappy face and reach for the skip button. I don't like Swizz and whoever that other joker is. I'm so sorry.

But otherwise, it's one of the year's best and his 3rd best album ever.
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I don't like the beat anymore because its just a loop. ALC didn't FLIP IT ENOUGH!

Flip it enough? Flip these. Flip off. Go flip some f*cking burgers.(c)Kno

Allied State of the National Electric Beat Treaty Organization (NEBTO)