Nas: My Life in 20 Songs

God's Son (2002)

Yeah, sometimes I tell stories, man, and I’ll use my imagination just for the sake of putting a good rhyme together and a good song. But sometimes, like with this one, the songs are just very literal.

[The song references, in part, Nas' public feud with Jay Z in the early 2000s.] 

Tupac and Biggie never lived to see the impact that they were going to have. If [Jay and I] learned anything from that, it was that this had to be different. We owed it—not just for me and him, but to everybody in rap—to those huge, game-changing artists to carry on this thing the right way. It was good that it never got to violence.