The historical lineage of hip hop can sometimes be unkind to individuals who are unfairly overlooked, their legacy often looms in the shadows. Few individuals are treated as unreasonably as Kool G Rap, who, among other achievements, is the man to thank for launching the career of Nas.
While on the surface, it seems like talents such as Nas would always be destined for the top, the music industry isn’t a meritocracy, and the stars don’t always align for talent alone. If it wasn’t for Kool G’s assistance, then perhaps the world wouldn’t have been lit up by Illmatic and the rapper’s greatness.
However, Kool G is a celebrated figure in his own right, and somebody Nas has cited as an inspiration, as has Eminem, Biggie Smalls, Jay Z, among many others. He grew out of the underground Harlem scene in the late ’80s and helped set a precedent which the next generation took to dizzy new heights. Jay-Z summed up the regard that the hip-hop community hold Kool G in on ‘Encore’ when he boasted about his own ability and said, “Hearing me rap is like hearing G Rap in his prime”.
The first moment that G Rap heard Nas stuck with him, and during an appearance on Ebro In The Morning, the rapper delved into how he even attempted to get his mentee signed by Def Jam straight after being gripped by his talent.
“When I was working on my second album with Large Professor, he was telling me about a young kid from Queensbridge that’s like bananas,” said G about Nas. “He was like ‘Yo, G. This young kid, yo. He go crazy hard. He remind me of you and all that.
“Eventually, I ended up meeting Nas. Everything was like what Large Professor said. Nas, he showed a lot of promise. Young kid that showed a lot of promise, and I wanted to work with him. I wanted to make sure he got himself out there and known to the world.”
He added, “I ain’t try to set up meetings. I set up meetings with them. I actually brought a demo tape I had on Nas. I had him recording some songs at my house and all that. I had brought some songs. I played it for them, and they was like ‘Yeah, G. He’s good, but, you know, he sounds a little too much like a G Rap.'”
Eventually, Nas would sign with Def Jam and become one of rap’s most prominent names. To the average man on the street, chances are there’ll be much more likely to be familiar with the work of Nas than Kool G, but this isn’t something that drags him down. In fact, he sees it as the opposite.
“If my whole purpose was to put the battery in the backs of others, maybe this was bigger than me,” he elaborated. “Maybe it wasn’t about G Rap’s life propelling to 100 levels up, maybe it was about spreading it, and giving this person a chance and an opportunity to change they life, givin’ them an opportunity to get off the block. It might have been a purpose bigger than me.”
The way that G Rap holds no bitterness to his position in the wider landscape outside of die-hard hip-hop heads is admirable and exactly why his peers respect him so much. He knows that during his pomp, he could go toe-to-toe on the mic with anyone, and without him, perhaps, there’s no Nas or Jay-Z.
An underappreciated icon of the genre.
