Didn't realize you were a Jay fan jwb. Who do you think won the beef between him and Nas?

Nas.

Blueprint 2 was fire but the perception is still that Nas won cause that **** came out later and missed the hype.

Blueprint 2 was kinda bloated - that said, it was better than Nas's double album (Street's Disciple).

The common wisdom is that Nas won with Ether, but I've always felt otherwise. I mean, it's not a terrible track or anything, but the beat is kinda goofy and a lot of the disses in the song are variations of "Oh yeah? Well you're gay!". Kinda weak tbh.

Jay desconstructed Nas's whole career to that point in his song, and he did it pretty mercilessly. In a weird kinda way, I think Jay helped rejuvenate Nas's career. Takeover's beat is definitely better, that Doors sample is mint.

They had other diss tracks - Jay's "Supa Ugly" was pretty gross though tbh. Certainly one of better beefs in hip hop history though.

On the down low, one of the best diss tracks from the '90s.

No I meant blueprint 2 the diss track not the album

I think like you said Ether is overrated and has a lot of really immature and stupid lyrics tbh but really it still won the beef for him because it was a time when it was questionable if Nas had completely fell off and he came in with a strong response.. I believe that took jay and everyone else by a bit of surprise and that's what won it for him.


But if we were just going lyrically I mean neither takeover or ether are as good as the 2nd verse in blueprint 2 but nobody remembers that song for a reason.

Oh ****, I forgot about that song too apparently. That is a great one. I guess it got lost in muddle of all the other tracks on the album. Blueprint 2 being sandwiched between two of the greatest albums of Jay's career probably don't help retrospective appreciation of the album.

I feel like you could've possibly made a single disc album out of the good tracks and it would've been up there at least with the Black Album.

Possibly. At least as good as Vol. 1 or American Gangster. But Black Album had a lot more inventiveness and creativity than Blueprint 2 - I mean, it's been a while since I've listened to them back to back, but that's how it always felt to me. In college, I used to listen to the Black Album before big exams or presentations to pump myself up. Always worked too.

I've always thought Vol. 3 was Jay's most underrated.





I'm kind of a stan tho, Jay's my favorite rapper. I don't think he really had a complete flop until Magna Carta Holy Grail.