[Intro] Yo, what up? This is Nas with the official (-), J. Period "If I Ruled the World" was originally a Kurtis Blow record You know? Somebody who I love and saw him in crèche school And his song wit' "These are the breaks"... I used to breakdance to his music, you hear what I'm sayin'? So "If I Ruled the World" was a tribute to him And also speakin' out to the world And, um, I used to work wit' the Fugees on tour And, you know, they would open up for me wit' our first albums And our second albums, it flipped And he sold, like, you know, thirty million albums
And I'm — now I'm openin' up for them So, um, we was — we was cool like that And, you know, Lauryn came and got on the record Who I felt was — would make the record even more incredible Me and her, I really appreciate her work And, um, and talked to her well You know, not just my projects, but every projects in December Everywhere in the world So I thought that would be the perfect record [Outro] If I ruled the world Still living for today in these last days and times