(AllHipHop News) One of the lesser known facts about Hip Hop is that Illmatic‘s 10 track list was a result of the album being rushed to release due to it leaking. In a recent interview with REVOLT LIVE, Nas admits to leaking his own debut album.
Nas says he did not intend to leak the album, but simply wanted to give his friends sample tapes. However, once the young MC saw the leaked songs reach across the country, he knew he made a mistake:
I heard a lot of stories, but I feel guilty too because I was making tapes for my friends. I didn’t think about it like, ‘My album’s gonna come out,’ but I made a few copies for my boys. Everybody wanted a copy so I just gave them a copy. It was playing in the neighborhood, so I thought it was cool that the neighborhood had the copies first until I heard [that] it was in [Los Angeles], Chicago, and all these different places. I was messed up for a minute. It was dope, too, at the same time because I knew people liked it. It was cool.
Nas’ documentary Time Is Illmatic will debut at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 16th and will chronicle his Illmatic years.