Dj Premier Remembers a Recording Session With Nas

Dj Premier, the legendary rap beat maker/producer, remembers a recording session with Nas; the session that birthed "New York State of Mind", a classic track from Nas's debut album, Illmatic (1994). If y'all didn't know, nas was the golden child of hiphop back then- the new messiah of rap, and every dope beat maker wanted to work with him; that's why, on illmatic, you have production from Dj Premier (he produced 3 of the 9 songs on that album), Pete Rock, Qtip, L.E.S and Large Professor- all these people were big in the early/mid 90s.

Read what Dj Premier had to say below-

“NY State of Mind." “Shout to Showbiz, Showbiz from D.I.T.C. was there that day. It was Showbiz, Biggest Gord, me and Nas had a whole bunch of his friends with him from Queensbridge,” he recalled. “Back then, he used to roll real thick with a lot of dudes. Big crew. We all had posses. I used to have 100 people on stage with me. I made the beat on the spot, right there at D&D studios, and he likes to sit at the head of the control board and rhyme like this, with his hand over his mouth like he can only hear himself while the beat plays.”

He remembers Nas struggling to start the verse, and how it naturally flowed out. “You hear him say ‘I don’t know how to start this shit.’ [...] What it is, he’s looking at the paper because he’s trying to figure out how to format coming on the beat, but I’m counting going ‘1, 2, 3’ and at the last minute, he’s looking at the paper going, ‘I don’t know how to start this shit,’” he continued. “I guess out of the corner of his eye saw me going ‘1, 2, 3’ because my booth is where we can see each other. So it’s always amazing that he did that whole verse in one take, non-stop. Very impressive.

WOW! Nas did that on one take, that's great; i always wondered why he said what he said at the beginning of the song.