Nas Quotes

#1. No temporary chaos is worth your sanity. Just knowing that whatever happens, it happens to the best of them too.

Nas

#2. What you call a infinite brawl, eternal souls clashin
War gets deep, some beef is everlastin

Nas

#3. You're supposed to be who you are. You're supposed to make music that is true to you.

Nas

#4. I think hip-hop could help rebuild America, once hip-hoppers own hip-hop ... We are our own politicians, our own government, we have something to say. We're warriors. Soldiers.

Nas

#5. The flaws, the mistakes I make - that's the real me.

Nas

#6. Rule No. 1 is you can't be fake. If you're fake, you become a gimmick and you're selling a gimmick; a little gimmick is cool, this is entertainment. But when you base your stuff on mostly real stuff, you never run out of it because every day is a different adventure.

Nas

#7. Whenever I received too much praise, it just didn't feel right to me - ever.

Nas

#8. I don't get jealousy, I don't get how people hate each other - I never did.

Nas

#9. I'm capable of anything, my imagination can give me wings

Nas

#10. Life is short is what some niggaz said; not if you measure life - by how one lives and what he did.

Nas

#11. Use your own intuition. You are tomorrow.

Nas

#12. You lose money chasing women;
Never lose women chasing money.

Nas

#13. Dogs live longer than rappers.

Nas

#14. Man, me and Biggie were the biggest artists in New York. When he passed, I was so messed up. My attitude was messed up about him dying. There was an East-West thing back then, and I was in war mode.

Nas

#15. Used to ride with him to Brooklyn, Lewis and Halsey, co chocolate thai, vernon style and burn it down

Nas

#16. Street's disciple, my raps are trifle.
I shoot slugs from my brain just like a rifle.

Nas

#17. Every time I get in the studio, I feel like I wanna have some fun. My fun is not doing the easy work. My fun is doing what's me.

Nas

#18. Business, endorsements and things of that nature, I got into it kinda naturally. Those ventures materialised as a direct result of things that I was actually doing; all the partnerships have been organic and not necessarily etched out plans for monetary gain.

Nas

#19. When you're a teenager, you want to meet a lot of girls - you want to get the most girls. You don't know anything about respect; you don't know anything about being faithful and loyal to your girlfriend.

Nas

#20. Hip-hop is bigger than the South; hip-hop is bigger than New York.

Nas

#21. Hip-hop is really standoffish. It's really competitive and it's really about who's number one all the time. Sometimes it gets out of hand.

Nas

#22. You only have one first chance to make one first impression that lasts a lifetime.

Nas

#23. But uhh, a thug changes, and love changes
and best friends become strangers, word up

Nas

#24. Life is parallel to Hell but I must maintain and be prosperous, though we live dangerous.

Nas

#25. Let's not forget, art can sell. You ain't gotta front all the time on your records.

Nas

#26. My record company had to beg me to stop filmin' music videos in the projects. No matter what the song was about, I had 'em out there.

Nas

#27. Hip-hop is such an amazing thing that kids still want to do it. They're not saying, "Ugh, that's the old people's music." No, they're younger than they've ever been that want to get into hip-hop music.

Nas

#28. A lot of times it seems like, you ain't gon' make it where you wanna be in life. But, yo if you got a plan, believe me you gon' get there. You gon' get everything you ever wanted

Nas

#29. The sound of the '90s, to me, is a combination of soul and street - it's a feeling.

Nas

#30. I think I've had the longest career of strength, focus, and still being able to sell records. I think I'm that guy. I'm still blessed with the opportunity to make music and pass out a message like, 'Life is good,' to the world.

Nas

#31. I know i can, be what i wanna be, if i work hard at it, I'll be where i wanna be

Nas

#32. Respect all fear none my pride is everything

Nas

#33. I had been through, of course, the divorce and I had been hit with some taxes that really showed me to be careful who's working with you and your money, and you have to be the one that is responsible for your money - you can't trust anyone and I did and I ran into a problem.

Nas

#34. Born alone, die alone, no crew to keep my crown or throne

Nas

#35. Play it cool, that's the old school rule man ...

Nas

#36. You have to keep your vision clear, cause only a coward lives in fear.

Nas

#37. N.Y. hip-hop is ok, but we gotta become brave again; we have to be brave enough and do something new - that's what New York is about ... New.

Nas

#38. I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times, Nothing's equivalent to the New York state of mind

Nas

#39. If the truth is told, the youth can grow
Then learn to survive until they gain control
Nobody says you have to be gangstas, hoes
Read more learn more, change the globe

Nas

#40. I never see the whips niggas be claimin' they drivin,
I guess 'entertainment' means blatantly lyin'.

Nas

#41. I'm over dey heads like a bulemic on a seesaw

Nas

#42. 'Life Is Good' represents the most beautiful, dramatic and heavy moments in my life.

Nas

#43. In hip hop no one cares. No one stands up for it and it's a mess. We need order so we can all follow the tradition of where we came from. We need to keep referring to the pioneers.

Nas

#44. People have stopped battling in hip hop, in the primitive sense, and the focus of the competitive element has shifted to the music. It's less about bragging and more about being the best lyrically and poetically.

Nas

#45. I broke into shakespeare's tomb and stole his remains, grinded the bones, smoked it, then got in the game

Nas

#46. I don't kill soloists only kill squads

Nas

#47. On the reals, all these crab niggaz know the deal,
When we start the revolution, all they'll probably do is squeal.

Nas

#48. You got a handful of great guys - Ne-Yo, R. Kelly, Usher. You have a handful of great female artists. But for the most part the music world's changing and change is good. You have to make adjustments if you want to survive in that world.

Nas

#49. There was a lot of negative that was put on rappers for using the word, and I feel like we're just misunderstood. Most of us are; some of us is just plain wack.

Nas

#50. I like the way hip-hop is now. It's grown up enough so that it can get involved with politics if it feels like it.

Nas

#51. People give me a better understanding on things that I said, or a different way to look at it.

Nas

#52. I used to keep a dictionary and work with it and then I realized there are more words that exist in the English language than there are in this dictionary.

Nas

#53. I see N.Y. hip-hop like I see N.Y. streets. N.Y. streets are grimy; it's a grind. N.Y. rappers are hustlers - whatever sound is in, we can adapt to that; there's nothing wrong with that.

Nas

#54. When I made Illmatic, I was trying to make the perfect album. It comes from the days of Wild Style. I was trying to make you experience my life. I wanted you to look at hip-hop differently. I wanted you to feel that hip-hop was changing and becoming something more real.

Nas

#55. Props is a true thug's wife.

Nas

#56. Big up to Flex. Stop taking so much cizock in his mizouth.

Nas

#57. Every generation witnesses atrocities. People in power try to fulfill prophecy.

Nas

#58. It's a thin line between paper and hate,
Friends and snakes, nine millis and thirty-eights,
Hell or the pearly gates ... I was destined to come,
Predicted, blame God, He blew breath in my lungs.

Nas

#59. You can't count a man out because one record went different direction. You gotta count the things that scored, not the misses.

Nas

#60. I'm a firm believer that we all meet up in eternity,
Just hope the Big Man show me some courtesy

Nas

#61. Sunlight and seeing something that was a thought become a thing and materialize - that makes me come alive.

Nas

#62. 'Stillmatic' is the rebirth of 'Illmatic,' my first debut album to come out in 1994. 'Stillmatic' is me coming full circle in my career and with everything, and just bringing pure hip-hop back.

Nas

#63. When I try to sound like the contemporary sound, it never turns out that way. That's just me.

Nas

#64. My earliest memories of rap music was mixed with my earliest memories of reggae music. They were big sounds around the way, heavy bass lines, strong messages, definitely.

Nas

#65. Mind's in another world thinking how can we exist through the facts

Nas

#66. For my hustlers, here's some motivation: He who has begun is half done.

Nas

#67. I'm a storyteller and the Bible is a bunch of stories about life and things that took place here on planet earth. It's a great example to use and a great reason to be happy about being a storyteller because the lessons of the land are always in stories.

Nas

#68. And the stuff that I write, is even tougher than dykes

Nas

#69. Your look reflects what's happening in your mind. You gotta have some swag to you.

Nas

#70. I want to sound like an instrument. I want my voice and my words to marry the beat. I go with the rhythm of it and the words start to come to my mind and those words could be based on things that's been on my mind for the past year, the past month, the past week, whatever; I write it.

Nas

#71. You can't please everybody. You'd be crazy if you're trying to. So take some time out to do some things for yourself.

Nas

#72. I've been called everything. Gangsta rap. I've been called conscious rap. You know, everything. Whoever feels like calling it whatever they want to call it, that's on them.

Nas

#73. My weapon of choice is my voice.

Nas

#74. Through the lights cameras and action, glamour glitters and gold
I unfold the scroll, plant seeds to stampede the globe ...

Nas

#75. Marley is someone before his time, man. He's - he's almost - he's like a deity, like almost, you know what I mean? I just talk about what's going on, but of course, you know, Bob, before rappers, was already laying that kind of thing down.

Nas

#76. Some people say I'm conscious, some say I'm a gangsta rapper - it's just me doing me. I'm stomping in my own lane. I'm doing what I do.

Nas

#77. I fell in love with words and I think that made my mom smile. I think that was cool for her.

Nas

#78. I pledge allegiance to the fair and balanced truth.
Not the biased truth,
Not the liest truth,
But the highest truth.

Nas

#79. You know the block was ill as a youngster
Every night it was like a, cop would get killed body found in the dumpster

Nas

#80. You know, rap is sort of like a form of talking, right? So it's like you can hear, you know, the slaves doing it. You can hear, like, you know, Africans and Jamaicans doing it just kind of as, like, a rhythmic, poetic conversation, you know, to a rhythm.

Nas

#81. Realize, how many classics I gave you/Perhaps if you think back you'll realize that I made you

Nas

#82. Some people work hard to be something that they're not, and I don't work at all, I'm just me. And that can bother anybody I'm not working nearly as hard as the other guys, and they don't like it.

Nas

#83. I promise you, if you have a plan, you can accomplish everything you ever wanted

Nas

#84. Failure is not an option, and I always felt like I'm a man who doesn't have regrets, and I don't live with excuses. I can't take excuses.

Nas

#85. I talk about Africa and its meaning, being the birthplace of man and all that great history that's been erased and even hidden. I think it's my duty to be proud and to bring about the conversation that allows us to talk about the great history of my people.

Nas

#86. I set it off with my own rhyme / cause I'm as ill as a convict who kills for phone time

Nas

#87. Just do as much as you can.

Nas

#88. No Ideas original - there is nothing new under the sun ...

Nas

#89. In the past I had to deal with issues that hit me as a younger man. As a man who wasn't married who didn't really have the experience that I have now. Today I'm a different guy.

Nas

#90. What you base your happiness around?
Material, women, and large paper?
That means you inferior, not major.

Nas

#91. You ni**az get me sick, wannabe soundin like you know my arithmetic ... but we don't sound alike

Nas

#92. The further I get, the further I want to go

Nas

#93. I want to hear the artist. I want to hear them give me something that I can relate to, other than the fact that everything's about bragging.

Nas

#94. I got the opportunity to meet people all over the world. Brilliant women, tall women, short women, slim women, thick women, you name it. But, I don't meet them. I have the opportunities to and it's a little bit - I'm a little shy, so I don't meet them and I don't know who's right for me.

Nas

#95. I've met a lot of people and happened to inspire a lot of people who I'm in conversation with about business. It's just how things are going for me and it's great, but music is always going to be number one for me.

Nas

#96. America is a melting pot for all different groups of people, historically. And it's rare that the story of all of these people will be told in the history books. So I always felt I had to find out my history for myself and research my roots.

Nas

#97. To me, creatively challenging myself is my version of owning the Nets.

Nas

#98. I think marriage is a beautiful thing. I'm still a supporter of it.

Nas

#99. All I need is one mic
One beat, one stage
One ni%$a frontin' my face on the front page
Only if I had one gun, one girl and one crib
One god to show me how to do things his son did.

Nas

#100. When I write a story, I just wanna tell you what's in my head. It can come from real life and then turn into fantasy, stuff just rhyming. And write about what you know. I just like to tell stories that have not been told or told from my perspective.

Nas