Second update centering around something Nas says on his new album. For some reason I’m really fascinated by his rekindled love-interest with hip-hop, because on one hand it’s cool that he’s name checking all the artists I enjoyed growing up, on the other hand it kinda seems like it’s mostly done for the sake of having a topic to rhyme about.

Take “Where are the now” for one.

Apparently it’s a rhyme about “lost” MC’s that have fallen off the radar, and hiphopsite.com even gave him ‘hip-hop rhyme of the year’ for it or some shit. But he’s been sloppy with the research because for one, shouting out people that have been dead for years like Cowboy from Furious Five, it’s self explanatory why he’s “lost”. But the main reason is that a bunch of them are alive and rhyming, and a large percentage has even been in Denmark the past year. Here’s the the list of MC’s:

Redhead Kingpin, Tim Dog, Kwame, King Tee, King Sun, Super Lover Cee, Casanova Rud, Antoinette, Rob Base, Black Sheep, Group Home, Busy Bee, Ill and Al Skratch, Special Ed, Spice 1, Positive K, Father MC, The Skinny Boys, The original Spinderella, Lakim Shabazz, 9 MM, Fu-Schnickens, Buckshot, Finesse and Sequence, Rappin’ Duke, Body and soul (and Dee Barnes), Oaktown 357, J.J. Fad, Young MC, Tone Loc, Kris Kross, The BO$$, Divine Styler, Def Jef, Mic Geronimo, Pharcyde, Coolio, Craig Mack, Funky Four Plus One, Force M.D.’s, Miss Melody, Educated Rapper, Doctor ice, Kangol (the latter three are UTFO combined), Shante, EPMD, K-Solo, Moe Dee, Cowboy, Jam-Master Jay, MC Shan, Tragedy, Craig G…

To answer the question “have you seen these lost MC’s”, here’s a big-ass YES THEY’RE IN DENMARK answer to the following in order of appearence:

Tim Dog: Performed at Rust in Copenhagen. Kick-ass show and probably the best audience response I’ve ever witnessed to a song was when the entire crowd rapped along to “Fuck Compton” rapping EVERY SINGLE LINE.

Busy Bee: Was in Copenhagen and Århus twice during the past two years as the hype-man for KRS-One. Hasn’t really updated his act much, in fact he’s stepped his rhyming down a bit from when he came out for the second time with Rhyme Syndicate in the early 90’s, and he doesn’t know that many of KRS’s lyrics.

Buckshot: The BDI Thug rocked Århus Took It 2005 with the rest of Boot Camp and Vega in Copenhagen about a year later.

Coolio: Didn’t perform in Denmark but was in Sicknature’s video for “Slip Away” and apparently flew in from Germany via helicopter.

Pharcyde: Booty Brown and Imani as Pharcyde as well as Fat Lip and Slim Kid Tre performed at Rust within the last couple years.

EPMD: Do I need to go back into that?

Craig G: Has performed in Denmark at least 6 times recently.

It’s a nice courtesy of Nas to mention rappers he feel doesn’t get enough exposure, but it’s a double-edge sword, because it can make rappers that really are on the grind seem as if they’re sitting at home on their ass. And hey, ain’t it been a while since we’ve seen Nas out here???

Read the lyrics to “Where are they now” here.