Featuring Nas - Which is Better??

As Raekwon's new album Shaolin Vs. Wu-Tang is about to drop officially, I thought this was appropriate. This highly anticpated track featuring Nas of which a snippet was released a while back is available in full now. The song, called "Rich & Black" has Chef and God's Son trading bars over a track dominated by a haunting string section.

But, I knew I had heard Nas spit on that beat before. I thought back not too long ago, and remembered Sha Stimuli had a ridiculously dope track w/ Nas on his Overtime tape called "Horrorglyphics" which I played over and over. I went back and listened. Yep, same track. Also featuring Nas. And the approach was the same w/ the two MCs going back and forth.

Nas' lyrics weren't all the same, but he did use some of the same lines on each.

So here are both songs. Which one do you like better??

I heard Sha's first (and many many more times at this point), so I'm gonna go w/ Sha. Plus, his title is better. I'd have to recommend both though.

Wu-Massacre

I wasn't as excited as some others when this project was announced. Mostly because Wu-affiliated projects have been hit-or-miss for some time now, in my opinion. I figured I'd just wait and see and not anticipate it too much beforehand. But, with Raekwon's triumphant return last year with OB4CL2, Ghostface's consistent offerings, and Method Man's ability to step up when he's challenged/inspired and deliver some darts I was feeling optimistic.

But, the finished product, aside from a few highs left me pretty underwhelmed for a lot of reasons. It didn't feel to me like a lot of time was spent on putting the Massacre together. It sounded kind of rushed and thrown together. For some reason, despite having three of the best emcees in hip hop from one of the greatest groups in its history, Meth, Ghost, and Rae still thought it necessary to have features on their project. Why? Someone please tell me why. I can't figure it out.

Plus, all three members of this collaboration didn't even appear on every track themselves. It made sense for "Meth Vs. Chef 2" obviously, and "Pimpin' Chipp" was definitely a dope song. But, when you take the time to make a smaller version of the Dream Team, why let anyone go at it alone for any song? Especially when there are only 10 songs on the album? I think all three of them only appeared on 3 songs together. Is that a group effort?

No doubt every fan looking forward to this album was dying to hear the three emcees trade bars with each other for an hour or so. And, that didn't happen here at all. They threw these tracks together, along with a pretty weak MJ-sampled RZA track, and called it an album. With a little more time and effort in the studio together, the Wu members could have truly produced (to borrow from The Beatnuts) a musical Massacre. Instead they supplied something that, despite its gems (and artwork), sounds uneven and incomplete as a whole. And, I feel let down.