Nas Decides To Change Controversial Hip Hop Album Title

After plenty media controversy and speculation, dumb-ass self-promotion (like the above picture of Nas and his wife) and months past the original Black History Month release date, rapper Nas has finally agreed to change the name of his long-delayed ninth album.

The above photo was believe to be the original cover for the album. I held back on commenting on this because I kept hoping that Nas would change his mind or his record company would change it for him. Who knows what caused this most recent change. I don't really care. I am not an "N" word crusader, I don't believe that censoring words changes the original beliefs and feelings behind the creation of such derogatory terms such as nigger. Considering how many rap songs have the word nigger in the title or the lyrics, I am not surprised that eventually a rapper would name their album with this term. Nas is an extremely talented and intelligent rapper and I would never want to put any limits on his creativity, but I strongly believe this album is a poorly conceived and potentially dangerous idea.

In my view, in order to successfully pull off what would have easily been considered one of the most controversial album releases in hip hop history, Nas' album would have simply needed to be one of the great rap albums of all-time. Nas and his album would have had to been strong enough to carry the baggage, heat, and weight that was going to come raining down heavily on him, hip hop and the black community. I truly hope that Nas fully understands that this proposed album title would have come with a huge responsibility, it would have been completely unacceptable to hide behind excuses such as "I'm a artist" or "people don't understand."

With that said, considering the two album tracks that Nas has already confirmed to be on the album, the chances of this album (with it's new title or not) being classic hip hop material seems highly unlikely. The two confirmed tracks, "The Fear Of The Black Man's Dick" and "You A Nigger Too" don't sound like the makings of ground-breaking hip hop music. In fact, it sounds like more of the same old junk that has been churned out over the last ten years. If there is any truth to the title of Nas' previous album, Hip Hop is Dead, then his next album, Nigger or whatever the new title will be, is going to prove it!