In April, the rapper Nas' debut album "Illmatic" will turn 30. But those of us who participated in the 1990s DJ-mixtape economy knew what was about to drop months before the official drop date. And to my ear, it hasn't aged a day. "Illmatic" is much more than a classic rap album. It is a piece of art that changed the way we saw ourselves, our communities and the world we young street kids were set to enter.
Nasir "Nas" Jones exploded onto the scene a few years earlier with his breakout feature on the 1991 Main Source song "Live at the Barbeque," jumping on the track to spit, "Verbal assassin, my architect pleases/ When I was 12, I went to Hell for snuffin' Jesus/ Nasty Nas is a rebel to America/ Police murderer, I'm causin' hysteria".
