Nas’ iconic debut album, Illmatic, has just reached 1 billion streams on Spotify. Released on April 19, 1994, Illmatic remains one of the most celebrated and influential albums in hip hop.
It’s his first studio album to reach the milestone.
Illmatic debuted at number 12 on the Billboard 200, selling 59,000 copies in its first week.
The album features production by hip-hop heavyweights like DJ Premier, Pete Rock, Q-Tip, and Large Professor, alongside Nas himself. It spawned five singles: “Halftime” released on October 13, 1992, followed by “It Ain’t Hard to Tell” on January 18, and “Life’s a Bitch” on April 19, the same day the album dropped. “The World Is Yours” was released on May 31, 1994, and the final single, “One Love,” came out on October 25.
Songs such as “N.Y. State of Mind,” from the album also became instant classics, solidifying Nas as one of the genre’s leading storytellers.
In 2014, for the album’s 20th anniversary, Nas and his company Mass Appeal remixed Illmatic with the help of the National Symphony Orchestra at The Kennedy Center concert hall.
In 2021, it was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.” Its influence is seen in generations of rappers who followed in Nas’ footsteps, from Jay-Z to Kendrick Lamar.
The album was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association Of America in 2001 and has so far sold over 2 million copies in the U.S. alone.
