Jay Electronica Ghostwrote on Nas’ Untitled Album…

Place all the Nas stans on suicide watch. According to Dream Hampton, Jay Electronica and Stic Man of Dead Prez served as a ghostwriter for Nas on his album Untitled. FWMJ’s Rappers I Know recently wrote a piece hilariously titled, Nas Lost (Ghostwriters), in which he revisits his days working at Hot 97 back in ’07 and receiving a phone call from Jay Electronica telling him that he was ghostwriting for Nas.

I don’t recall specific dates, because I actively avoided listening to any of it, but we were either at the tail end of or in the middle of the ringtone era when I got this call from Jay. Rapping was in bad shape on a mainstream level, and that’s why the New York DJs as I would witness for the months surrounding any new Nas release would be giddy as hell hoping that the Soulja Boy and Tity Boy songs they are handcuffed to play day in and day out, would come to some sort of balance with a new Nas single that would hit…..
You check because despite his inability to put together an album that’s pound for pound the quality you (perhaps irrationally) expect from him, at the end of the day he can still out rap the majority of other rappers with major label deals out there doing it.
But then I got a call from Jay telling me that he was ghost writing for Nas. What does that mean? What does that do to your legacy? What does that mean for any of your future recordings?
This is why, I say I am unmoved when I listen to a song where Nas is rapping positively about raising his daughter. After all, this is the same guy that has the absolute worst and most disturbing, while trying not to be, sex raps out; may I never hear another rhyme talking about pentagrams in a woman’s vagina or ass play with a beer bottle (“a real joker!”). No really, I’m good.

It’s 2012. Does it matter if a rapper has a ghostwriter? It matters to me since to me the whole premise of Nas’ career has been predicated on the fact that he is one of the greatest lyricists in Hip Hop history. It’s easy to get past the Jay-z lyrical assaults, the horrible beat selection, the Queens bridge album, the tech on the dresser and Carmen because you realize he’s one of the greatest. Can we take this as fact? I’m inclined to believe it.

I think Jay writes what he believes. Nas’ “Nigger” album was largely written by Stic of dead prez and Jay Electronica @jusaire

— dream hampton (@dreamhampton) August 13, 2012