Nas' "Greatest Hits": A Track-By-Track Journey With the Pride of Queens

Today, the pride of Queens, Nas, drops a Greatest Hits album that spans from 1994's Illmatic — probably the best debut in hip-hop history — to 2004's Street Disciple. No tracks from his most recent album, Hip Hop Is Dead, were included (his last label, Columbia, put out the Hits package), but Nasir says not to worry. "I think it's better to start off slow," he explains in an exclusive RS track-by-track analysis. "I'm thinking about doing it again and taking it to another level with a box set. I don't think there's a box set in hip-hop. Maybe mine will be the first." Also missing is "Ether," the MC's brutal takedown of Jay-Z. " 'Ether' is a battle record that was not really appropriate right now," he explains. "That's not where my head is. I was in a different place. The Greatest Hits was about a career, and that's just one piece, so I didn't want to mess it up with that song."

The microphone fiend took us through each track on Hits, from the only new song, "Surviving the Times," on which he recounts the notable people and moments of his career, to "Bridging the Gap," a collaboration with his jazz musician father, Olu Dara.

"Surviving the Times"

"Actually, I had it done a good while ago. I forgot I had the record. It was just perfect to go with the Greatest Hits. It just came from a conversation. I needed people around to remind me of certain things that happened, so I got a lot of information from somebody that was hanging around while I was in the studio. It's crazy, because when I talk about people from a whole other rap era, I don't know if people understand how much that meant to me, just coming up around legends like Kool G Rap and Eric B and Large Professor and people like Akinyele who was around in the early stages that I met through Large Professor from a rap group named Main Source that most cats today never even heard of."

"Less Than an Hour" from Rush Hour 3

"I thought that Rush Hour 3 was dope, and there was no soundtrack — that was a track in the movie, and there was no way for people to get it other than the DVD when they watch it, so I felt like giving that record a home."

"It Ain't Hard to Tell" from Illmatic

"That was one of the records that jump-started the commercial success for me on my first album, the Michael Jackson sample ['Human Nature']. That was my introduction to the world, my first official single, so I had to do that."