Let's take a moment to appreciate the rhyming, mic skills, narrative abilities, cohesiveness and journey like rapping in this song. No words wasted, no time wasted, no pauses.
Just pure MC skills.
Poetry in rap motion.

Nas is unrivalled.

Last real n alive was the burial for Jay in this beef

Everything Nas said is facts.. Nas made Nastradamus in 1999, his next album wasn't until the end of 2001, during that 2yr span Nas was basically chilling with his sick mother, eventhough Nas did respond to Memphis Bleek in late 2000 on the QB Finest album on a song called the bridge 2001.. But up until Jay Z released the Takeover it was mostly just jabs back and forth between the two groups, Jay went for the knockout with Takeover..

When Nas talks about his baby mother with another rapper he is talking about Jay Z, Jay Z slept with Nas's baby mother..

Lake is Lakey the kid, he is a rapper from Queens bridge, he say I was 18 when Lake seen the island meaning Nas was 18 when Lakey got sent to Rikers Island prison, Lake was supposed to be on some of Nas's earlier albums but he was locked up and wasn't released until 1999.. He is featured on a song with Nas called Revolutionary Warfare which is a good song to react to in the future if you have time.

The Fever is a night club in Bronx that alot of rappers used to try to perform at in the early 90s to help them get noticed, it was like The Appolo for rap artists

Raekwon and Ghostface felt like biggie was fake and was putting on like a fake Don Juan bravado personality,the purple tape is Raekwon first album called Only Built 4 Cuban Linx, there is a skit on there where Ghostface basically calls out Biggie and says that he bit Nas with his album cover, on Nas illmatic album he used his baby picture as the cover and then Biggie did the same thing for his album cover on Ready to die

Yes Nas was talking about Foxy Brown when he says he had Fox, Foxy Brown was in a Group with Nas, Dr Dre, AZ, Cormega, and Nature called the Firm, while Biggie had Lil Kim and Junior Mafia..

Jungle is Nas's brother

Side note edit: If you've never heard Takeover by Jay Z or Nas's response to takeover called Ether then you absolutely must do those reactions on your channel..

"I was Scarface, Jay was Manolo, it hurt me when i had to kill him, and his whole squad for dolo"
That was the nail in the coffin of that beef.

He's the greatest Dex‼️Nobody can tell a story like Nas. You just scratching the surface.

Nas can do a movie out of this song

His ability to paint vivid pictures with words is 2nd to none. Nobody better!

There’s so much history with nas . You wanna know about nas and all the situations just listen to his catalogue A to Z . You don’t need a documentary with Nas . He spits his life in his bars. Much love

Nas called Rakim to ask him if he should go at Jay when they were beefing. R told him to pull the trigger ONLY if he wanted to. Not cuz his crew was gassing him up. We got Ether after that.

That's why he's the greatest of all time, and this is after he defeated Jay-Z with Ether.

The pause after the last verse is 🔥 for some reason

This song always used to give me goosebumps.

There is a skit on Raekwons Cuban Linx album called “Shark Biters” where Raekwon and Ghost mention people biting Nas’ album cover they were talking about BIG

Do Nas "we will survive," and you will understand a little bit of Nas and Biggie competition.

The first verse of The Message up until the point when he says, "There's one life, one love, so there can only be one King." it was about BIG.

Kick in the Door was going at Nas, Jeru the Damager, and Wu Tang

And Jay hit with "Ain't no N*gga" ....One of Jay's first tracks that went crazy on the radio feat Foxy Brown

This is the GOAT laying everything on the table

“Rip the freeway shoot through Memphis with money bags stop at Philly order cheese steaks and eat beans fast” Nas killed that whole crew on wax and in life 😂 and that’s a fact… they all knew it after   Ether

Puff was working for Andre Harrell at Uptown Records….

The Purple Tape refers to Raekwon’s first release under Loud RCA “Only Built for Cuban Links”.  The cassette tape was actually the color purple.