God's Son

Nobody’s ever questioned Nas’ skills on the mic. The Queensbridge MC’s 1994 debut, Illmatic, threw down the lyrical gauntlet with smart, gritty, heartfelt tales of street life, but his later albums have been drowned in thug rhetoric and silly pop crossover attempts. God’s Son finds him trying to remedy the problem. The opener, “Get Down,” backed by a lively James Brown sample and an enchanting, downbeat guitar loop, is an impressive start. “Last Real Nigga Alive” offers a surprisingly blazing history of Nas’ otherwise tired feud with Jay-Z, while on “Book Of Rhymes,” he pokes welcome holes in his own gargantuan ego, by emptying out his notebook of unfinished raps into a revealing cut-and-paste pastiche. Corniness prevails over good intentions though on both the stay-in-school flier, “I Can,” and “Dance,” his tribute to mom. On the Eminem-produced, “The Cross,” Nas admits, “I was the old king of the streets that y’all once hated,” before adding, “now I reinvented myself.” We don’t really hear that reinvention yet, but as they say, admitting you have a problem is the first step.