Killer Mike: Watch Him Talk About Nas’ ‘Illmatic’ In ‘Ozark’ Scene
On Friday, Netflix dropped the final episodes of the popular series Ozark. We won’t spoil anything for you here, but by now it’s fairly well known that Killer Mike of Run The Jewels made a cameo playing himself. In the first of the new episodes, Ruth (Julia Garner) travels from the Ozarks to Chicago to get revenge (this relates to the end of the first half of the season). The episode is soundtracked by songs from Nas’ classic 1994 debut, Illmatic.
While in a Chicago diner, Ruth is listening to the song “N.Y. State Of Mind” on her earbuds and she realizes that Killer Mike is having a meal there. She stops by his table and says, “I just wanted to say, I really love your s—.” He responds “I appreciate you, thank you,” and asked what she was listening to. She hands him her earbuds and says “It always feels to me like he hates it and misses it, all at once… and he’s only f—in’ twenty!”
Mike responds, “You know, when I listen to that record… his projects are in Queens, and you can kind of see Manhattan [from there]. And I’ve always thought that it was hopeful and f—in’ cruel, at the same time.”
She asks, “You ever wonder if he’d trade that record if it meant not having to go through all that s—?” He says, “I mean, if you have to ask the question…” The full scene is a bit longer than what Netflix provided on YouTube (which, by the way, is NSFW): Mike says, “You should take it easy on the coffee.” She laughs nervously and says, “Me? I never sleep.” He asks, “Why not?” She says, “You know.” He nods, knowingly; they both know that in the song, Nas raps, “I never sleep, ’cause sleep is the cousin of death.” The episode’s title was “The Cousin Of Death.”
The entire Ozark series is available now for streaming on Netflix.
