He was supposed to be the next big thing and then nothing

He released some brilliant albums. "Doe Or Die", "Pieces Of A Man", "9 Lives", many collabs with Nas, like "Mo Money Mo Murder Mo Homicide", "How Ya Livin", "Gimme Yours", and of course, the entire "The Firm" album.

He had some minor hits with "Sugarhill" and "Hey AZ".

In the last few years he's released a lot of independent albums. But supposedly at the moment he is working on "Doe or Die 2" with production from L.E.S, Buckwild and Pete Rock including a sequel to the classic "Rather Unique". It's gonna be sick! Pretty much guaranteed that Nas will make an appearance somewhere.

I hardly count that as "nothing" - he has been very active and made a lot of great songs

AZ is living good releasing independent albums. He said "fuck the mainstream".

I think "The Firm" album flopping hurt everybody involved. I honestly don't know why - I've always liked it a lot. But maybe as a whole it just wasn't greater than the sum of it's parts. Hell - it hurt Nas. It took him a few years to recover.

It even hurt Dr. Dre enough for him to rap about it on "Forgot About Dre".

All you niggas that said that I turned pop
Or the Firm flopped
ya'll are the reason Dre ain't been getting no sleep
So fuck ya'll! All of ya'll!

If ya'll don't like me, blow me!

Foxy's career never had as much traction post-Firm as it did beforehand, neither did AZ, and as for Nature..... well, he disappeared of the map, but he was only ever a last minute replacement for Cormega (who was kicked out) anyway.

So maybe that's what happened to AZ, in the mainstream sense, and pushed him into going independent.

The Firm was a bad idea to begin with though I did like one of their tracks (I forget the name).

Doe Or Die was a good album imo

It honestly seemed like he was going to be the next NAS for awhile

Gunsnhalen said:

Doe Or Die was a good album imo

It honestly seemed like he was going to be the next NAS for awhile

Maybe that was the problem. They were expecting him to be NAS.

Timmy84 said:

Gunsnhalen said:

Doe Or Die was a good album imo

It honestly seemed like he was going to be the next NAS for awhile

Maybe that was the problem. They were expecting him to be NAS.

Doe Or Die from what i heard had ALOT of comparisons to Illmatic. So i can see that being true

I don't get the Nas comparisons, they have totally different styles. If anything comparisons may have been made because they are both from NY (Nas is from Queensbridge, AZ is from Brooklyn) and they worked with a lot of the same producers like Pete Rock and LES.

Militant said:

He released some brilliant albums. "Doe Or Die", "Pieces Of A Man", "9 Lives", many collabs with Nas, like "Mo Money Mo Murder Mo Homicide", "How Ya Livin", "Gimme Yours", and of course, the entire "The Firm" album.

He had some minor hits with "Sugarhill" and "Hey AZ".

In the last few years he's released a lot of independent albums. But supposedly at the moment he is working on "Doe or Die 2" with production from L.E.S, Buckwild and Pete Rock including a sequel to the classic "Rather Unique". It's gonna be sick! Pretty much guaranteed that Nas will make an appearance somewhere.

I hardly count that as "nothing" - he has been very active and made a lot of great songs

That's all I needed to hear...that album is going to be hott shit!!!!! I need a release date for this ASAP!!!!

The Firm? did I miss something? When did they come out?

scriptgirl said:

The Firm? did I miss something? When did they come out?

1997. It was a supergroup of Nas, AZ, Foxy Brown and Nature, produced by Dr. Dre and Trackmasters and released on Dre's label Aftermath. Cormega was originally in the group but was kicked out and replaced with Nature, which sucks as Cormega is wayyyyy better. This was their album:

The singles were "Firm Biz" (based on Square Biz by Teena Marie) and "Phone Tap".

Someone stole my copy of this album I guess I was one of the few that actually bought it lol.

[Edited 4/14/12 9:16am]

That cover looks like a rip off of The Fugees album cover

scriptgirl said:

That cover looks like a rip off of The Fugees album cover

It was actually a rip off of the movie poster for "Casino" (1995):

[Edited 4/14/12 15:21pm]

[Edited 4/14/12 15:21pm]

Militant said:

scriptgirl said:

The Firm? did I miss something? When did they come out?

1997. It was a supergroup of Nas, AZ, Foxy Brown and Nature, produced by Dr. Dre and Trackmasters and released on Dre's label Aftermath. Cormega was originally in the group but was kicked out and replaced with Nature, which sucks as Cormega is wayyyyy better. This was their album:

The singles were "Firm Biz" (based on Square Biz by Teena Marie) and "Phone Tap".

Someone stole my copy of this album I guess I was one of the few that actually bought it lol.

[Edited 4/14/12 9:16am]

If they dropped Cormega then they shouldn't had replaced him and just left the remaining three.

"Phone Tap" was the song I couldn't quite name but said was my favorite from them...

AZ was good, one of tthe few (if any) that ripped Nas on one of his own tracks.

His flow was real nice.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

AZ was good, one of tthe few (if any) that ripped Nas on one of his own tracks.

His flow was real nice.

Yeah I dug AZ on this track.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

AZ was good, one of tthe few (if any) that ripped Nas on one of his own tracks.

His flow was real nice.

Just listened to "Rather Unique" on youtube. Lawd, takes me straight back to '95 in 7th grade. Ahh the memories.

Thanks, Miss Fee