The Best Rappers of All Time: A Basic History JAY-Z vs. NAS 

Once upon a time, it was inconceivable that JAY-Z would pay tribute to his archenemy Nas. Today, however, precisely that is occurring. Hov casually put to rest a long-standing rap dispute by revealing his most recent TIDAL-exclusive playlist, which is a twenty-four-track ode to Nas.

Although it may appear contradictory at the moment, the two New York rappers were embroiled in a bitter dispute for years during the late 1990s and early 2000s; as recently as 2018, they continued to criticize one another. Pusha-T and Drake’s feud was nothing short of acrimonious; JAY’s mother, Gloria Carter, was even cоmpelled to intervene at one juncture.

For those lacking knowledge, the rivalry between JAY-Z and Nas quickly establishes itself as the quintessential rap beef—a subject that captivated the hip-hop community globally, including New York City, and even generated a verb denoting one rapper destroying another with a diss track.

It Was Written, the follow-up album by Nas, was released one month later. “Lex with TV sets the minimum” appears on the first of numerous perceived jabs at JAY-Z on the album’s introductory track, “The Message.” What is a Lexus that contains a television connected to? Indeed, JAY-Z’s Reasonable Doubt was replete with allusions to the opulent automobile. On “Can I Live,” he compared his mind to a Lexus (“My mind is infested, with sick thoughts that revolve like a Lexus”), and a Lexus GS appears in the music video for ” Presidents II.”