Nas' 'Untitled' enlists Keri Hilson, Chris Brown

By Glenn Gamboa | glenn.gamboa@newsday.com

July 15, 2008

Cover of Nas album "Untitled." (Handout)

Of all the things that separate Nas from pretty much every other rapper around, the most important one isn't his great flow or even his legendary rhymes. It's his sense of purpose.

Nas isn't a firestarter, despite the recent dust-up over the title of his new album - now called "Untitled" (Def Jam) instead of the unprintable racial epithet he wanted - or the way he tackles the weighty topics of race and class. He doesn't say outrageous things because he feels like it, the way 50 Cent and so many others do. He says them because he's outraged. ("Only Foxx that I love was the Redd one/Only black man that Fox loves is in jail or a dead one," he raps in "Sly Fox," his seething attack on the Fox Network.)

When Nas boasts, as he does in the new single "Hero," it's mainly to give more weight to his opinions. "Try telling Bob Dylan, Bruce, or Billy Joel, they can't sing what's in their soul," he argues, claiming rappers don't get the same artistic freedoms as their rock counterparts.

As he was on the underappreciated "Hip-Hop Is Dead," Nas is just as meticulous in lining up collaborators and beats for "Untitled" as he is with his rhymes. The Last Poets provide gravitas. Chris Brown and Keri Hilson provide hitmaking potential.

Throw in Nas' considerable firepower and it all adds up to a classic album that will be dissected for years, with or without a title.

NAS

"Untitled"

THE GRADE A

BOTTOM LINE Fiery, sly, brilliant and probably album of the year

THE HOLD STEADY

"Stay Positive"

THE GRADE B

BOTTOM LINE Brooklyn band builds bigger, better indie-rock composites

The Hold Steady's new album, "Stay Positive" (Vagrant), is filled with the kind of boozy optimism that strikes around last call, when the ideas are always a bit grander than the execution.

Craig Finn and the guys aim for the near-impossible welding of indie-rock attitude and concerns - as well as alternative-leaning lyrics and phrasing - to broad, arena-rock anthems, and they come very close to the mark - especially in the gritty-grand "Sequestered in Memphis." The "sing-along songs" they idolize in the dynamic new single, "Constructive Summer," and in the earnest, epic title track succeed as new-millennium Springsteen. And what The Hold Steady lack in precision, they more than make up for in enthusiasm.