Nas new album : N*gger

After the recent controversy surrounding Nas title choice for his new album, many were asking if Nas would be able to have his album out in stores.

In a recent interview by RollingStone, Nas adressed the resistance put up by New York assemblyman Hakeem Jefferies to stop Universal to release an album with this title as he requested that Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli withdraw the $84 million that New York’s state pension fund has invested in Universal and its parent company, Vivendi.

Here is what Nas answered : "It’s the new act of hate," he said, "and probably because of Barack Obama, people’s ignorance and fear and jealousy is creating an outrage throughout the country, and people are reacting by putting nooses up. It’s been a really serious year."

"It’s probably going to make people uncomfortable," Nas said of his upcoming album entitled N*gger. "I don’t expect a lot of people to sell a record called N*gger. Hopefully, people can open their minds up and lose some of their fear and deal with it. It’s just an album. It’s one piece of the many things I do, and this will be one of my favorite pieces."

"It will be certain record stores that will be scared to deal with it. The record label is gung ho, and it’s ready to go."

As we first reported, Antonio L.A. Reid, Chairman of the Def Jam Music Group has been backing Nas artistic choices : "We support everything our artists do, everything ! We stand firmly behind and beside our artists with pride and with pleasure. Anything Nas wants to do, I completely stand beside him. Nas is prolific, he’s prophetic, he’s a genius, an amazing artist of respect. So, while I’m not sure exactly all that [the title] entails, I know it’s smart, so I stand behind him. That’s real."

No profanity, or inaproppriate remarks.

Nas keeps his new album title, by kris [2008-05-10 09:46:04]

what is the nas song.. in the video he is with his dad ?

Nas keeps his new album title, by h yildiz [2007-11-23 12:53:50]

Nas is from Turkey song in nr.1 rapper. nas @ nr.1

Nas keeps his new album title, by dima-fucking-rie [2007-11-12 18:04:40]

who gives a flying fuck, it is just an album name im waiting for that sick ass music. i mean im sure no white (red neck person) w/e is really gon bug about listening to nas NAAA i live in the state where them rebels reside they to worried bout they country music lol..its all good..do ya thang nasirrr =D

Nas keeps his new album title, by r.c. Smith [2007-11-05 13:38:47]

hey nas ....skip the bullish and just rename it negrow or something people wont bug out about.

Nas keeps his new album title, by Malik Labron [2007-11-03 16:03:42]

Me , I just think it would be kind of ironic to hear a bunch of white racist individuals saying ," I heard that new N*gger album ? Dude , that boy is ... ! Dad ,listen to this n*ggers’song ." Besides I ain’t never ran from a n*gger , I just call’em what they are since they know and respond to their name. N*gger / N*gga ! I mean what could I say to a disc jockey riding in my car with my children listen to the radio and hear , " Here is the single ... from Nas’ new album N*GGER !" I love Hip Hop but whatever happened to real messages with real meanings . Damn Nas , I mean I can’t shot the gun before it’s loaded but, Damn, " Are you out of ammo ? " It is just an album but it could turn into something more so, if thats what he’s aiming for than "GO N*GGER GO !" I’m still one of your no.1 fans but I find it whether difficult to support this one . Good luck ! Peace ! And 1 Love !

Nas keeps his new album title, by Gabriel Busch [2007-11-03 15:02:22]

It’a a shame that we as hip hoppers are such fakers. When NWA was out, no problem. The N word’s in every song, no problem. An album title from the best to ever do it, problem ? Nah, fear. Fear that someone might notice the connotation of this term. Maybe we just feel guilty for using it ourselves. So we judge a black man for using the term nigger ? That’s a shame.

Nas keeps his new album title, by kanene Holder [2007-11-02 22:25:25]

Nas, Nigga and My Pro- “N” word Response Kanene Holder

In response to the 10/22/07 NY Times Article http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/22/anger-over-a-plan-to-title-a-record-with-an-epithet/index.html ?hp

As a graduate of Howard University a "black college", I NEVER use the "N" word, however people like Tom Aikins “How can anyone call these people “artists ?” They can’t sing, they can’t play a musical instrument and they can’t write music. And if they stopped using the n-word, bitch and ho, they wouldn’t have any lyrics for their songs” and others are prematurely jumping to ignorant conclusions with regards to Mr. Nasir Jones.

Nas is an artist. His albums are PHENOMENAL... His father Olu Dara is a world renowned jazz musician and Nas’s lyric are haunting and spellbinding in their truth and wisdom. Note his lyrics in "I Can" from the God Son album......

"I know I can Be what I wanna be If I work hard at it You can be anything in the world, in God we trust…..”

and there are many other fabulous songs which people should listen to before rushing to judgment. In fact my 50-something year old father (National Endowment for the Humanities Grant winner and author of Classroom Calypso a book which posits “How can urban students become writers ?” and uses their “culture” as fodder) is also a HUGE Nas fan. He credits Nas’s One Mic with inspiring himself and his students to write critically and creatively about social issues. One Mic, 2004 “All I need is one mic.. that’s all I ever needed in this world to spread my voice to the whole world”

The “N”-word has found a cache... an in-crowd of discreditors who run towards its finish line. However this anti-“N” word movement though needed, lacks dimension. If there was a litmus test for “N”-word users and “N”-word abusers, Nas should be allowed to USE not abuse the “N”-word, unlike the usual suspects 50 Cent, R. Kelly, Snopp Dogg et. Al.

This anti-“N” word movement does not seem to accommodate its use for satire and social commentary. i.e Chris Rock “Niggas vs. Black People”, Nigger : An Autobiography by Dick Gregory, Nigger : The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word by Randall Kennedy and The Last Poets “Niggas is Scared of Revolution”. They are in a knee-jerk reactionary/put out the fire modality which is now coming off as a fad and a bit self-serving. The anti-“N”-word movement is becoming its own industry, which is actually keeping the "N" word alive and dare I say “for profit”.

And furthermore who green-lit the widespread use of the sanitized euphemism "N" word anyway ? It sounds very Big Bird/Sesame Street to me, as if my parents are talking, catch me eavesdropping and quickly lubricate their malignancy with "N" word banality because I am not old enough to be apart of the conversation.

I am superimposing, void of naivet ?, that Nas’s use of the “N” word will be epic and poetic, searing, a modern “THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLKS" if you will. In this era of Cosby vs. Michael Eric Dyson, and R. Kelly acquittals for molestation only to comeback as the “Pied Piper of R&B”, we need a break from surreality masquerading as mundane and instead of reacting, we should prevent “the dish from running away with the spoon, while the cow jumped over the moon”.

Nas’s Nigger or Nigga would not be blasphemy but a symphony or perhaps cacophony (jarring us to think- an oxymoron for commercial rap) but NOT a lullaby because unfortunately most mass-marketed rap has the “N” word as a through-line, an obligatory insertion on every song on an album with no critical engagement or analysis… as Wendy Williams would say “It is what it is”.

We need artists to be provocative, to question, to excite as well as entertain. Censorship of Nas is condescending and out of context of his artistic capabilities. He is not a coon, buffoon or sell-out. He does not profiteer from the musical depiction of black-on-black crime and he doesn’t have a clothing line selling in Macys with bullet-proof-vest embossed t-shirts. Nas is Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, most times he’s an activist speaking on behalf of political prisoners and the diasporic inhabitants of black Warsaws but occasionally uses “b” and “h”, (“So you ignant niggas hear me” as Lauryn Hill so elegantly rationalized) but so did Isaiah Thomas- he is still the coach of the Knicks and Nas should be able to say what he wants. Freedom of speech for artists not entrepreneurs ! Nas’s “N” word will incite an uprising, and it already has with the usual anti-“N” word suspects.

As Nas prophetically stated on God Son, 2004…. All I need is one mic.. WHAT I STAND FOR SPEAKS FOR ITSELF THEY DON’T UNDERSTAND Or wanna see me on top, too egotistical To the dismay of the anti-“N” word “establishment”….. t.b.c = to be continued……..

Kanene Holder sitchaassdown@gmail.com myspace.com/blackfacecrime