Lately I've been reading a lot of
Michael Eric Dyson, who is rapidly becoming my second-favorite black public intellectual (big shout-out to
Mark Anthony Neal). Dyson's '
Holler if You Hear Me' is the best book ever written about Tupac by a wide, wide margin. (It's not like with the O.J. Simpson trial, where
Jeffrey Toobin's book is the best, but
Vincent Bugliosi's and
Larry Schiller's are, y'know, in the vicinity.) 'Holler if You Hear Me' makes every other Tupac book I've ever seen look like the
Randi Reisfeld Tiger Beat ephemera that they are. Dyson's biography is an interesting one. Here's the short version: his teenage babymama was getting
WIC while he worked two shit jobs. Then, years later, he got a Ph.D. from
Princeton.
One thing I just learned about Dyson is that, trying to get his academic life in order before going off to college, he attended one of Detroit's best schools,
Cranbrook. "Cranbrook," I thought to myself. "Where have I heard that name before? Ah, yes, in '
8 Mile.''' That's the alma mater of the Eminem character's nemesis,
Papa Doc (just another MC in a long line of Third World dictators like
Noreaga, Tragedy
Kadafi and Tupac homie
Kastro). Em (uh, I mean B. Rabbit) brings it up during the climactic battle scene. 'But I know something about you/ You went to Cranbrook/ That's a private school' (and, a few bars later, my favorite line in the whole movie: 'And Clarence's parents have a real good marriage.')
Eminem seems to agree with
Mobb Deep: there ain't no such thing as halfway crooks (in fact, it seems to be a major theme in '8 Mile.') I wonder what Dyson, the tenured professor whose brother is in prison for murder, thinks about the topic. And speaking of Mobb Deep, Prodigy and Havoc met at Manhattan's Graphic Arts High School,
and they had a bit of a feud with Jay-Z. (Check the non-Nas verses in '
The Takeover.' Nice Doors sample, by the way.)
I've also been listening to some 'rap beef mixtape,' source unknown, that details the Nas/Jay-Z story, starting with their first guest shots, on '
Live at the BBQ' and '
The Originators,' and wrapping up with 'The Takeover,' '
Got Ur Self A...' '
Ether,' '
Super Ugly' and '
The General' (incidentally, Thirstin Howl III's '
Osama Spit Latin,' which jacks the beats from 'Takeover' and the flow from 'General,' is worth hearing (aside to an aside: Thirstin also recorded '
Watch Deez' with Eminem back in the pre-Dre days), and a clip from some radio station of Nas winning their call-in poll right as Jigga walks in the building.
And the people were right, I think. Nas' dis songs, with the exception of 'The General,' are much better than Jay's, with the possible exception of 'Super Ugly.' If that makes any sense. Or, to put it more simply, 'Ether' is the best dis song either one of them has ever done, though Jay gets mad points for calling out Nas' homophobia in 'Super Ugly.' Or his reliance on cheesy faggot rhymes, anyway. Still, though, Nas gets the title. 'How many more of Biggie's rhymes are gonna come out your fat lips?' Damn.
The thing is, though, I think Jay might've--well, I don't want to say he threw the battle, but I don't think he gave it 110% either. To paraphrase what Moe said after the
Duff Bowl, Nas wanted it more. Listening to that beef mixtape makes it perfectly clear that Jay was more commercial right from the getgo, while Nas, like 'Pac, was consumed with thuggisms (weird example: at some point, he identifies
his father as a blues musician, instead of the avant-garde jazz player he is--the former's harder, right?). And the 'I... will... not... lose' chorus in 'Ether' couldn't be much clearer. He delivers that line with more sincerity than he summoned for several of his albums put together.
Nas' most commercial songs, like '
Hate Me Now' (favorite tidbit: the video ran with a Michael-Jackson's-Thriller-style disclaimer), '
Nastradamus' and '
Oochie Wally,' are mostly junk, while Jay's commercial songs are the best things he does. And Jay's own rhymes on '
Moment of Clarity,' on the
Black Album, to say nothing of his continual upping of things like the
Robb Report (and, face it, his entire ouevre), strongly suggest that he's just in it for the money. Is it a stretch to say that Jay popularized the 'game' metaphor that's so ubiquitous nowadays?
Jay was battling Nas to sell records, while Nas was trying to protect his reputation. It's no surprise who won. (Though if Nas really wanted to protect his reputation he would've gotten shot immediately after releasing '
Illmatic.')
(Bonus Eminem/Nas/Jay connections: Em produced a track on Nas' 'God's Son' album. He also appears on Jay's song '
Renegade.' But just ask Nas, who says 'Eminem murdered you on your own shit.' He also calls Jay a 'Stan.' Nice.)
