"Classic (Better Than I've Ever Been)" is a song by American rappers

Kanye West Ye ( ; born Kanye Omari West ; June 8, 1977) is an American rapper, singer and record producer. One of the most prominent figures in hip-hop, he is known for his varying musical style and polarizing cultural and political commentary. After ...

Nas Nas (born 1973) is the stage name of American rapper Nasir Jones. Nas, NaS, or NAS may also refer to: Aviation * Nasair, a low-cost airline carrier and subsidiary based in Eritrea * National Air Services, an airline in Saudi Arabia ** Nas Air (S ...

, and

KRS-One Lawrence "Kris" Parker (born August 20, 1965), better known by his stage names KRS-One (; an abbreviation of "Knowledge Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone") and Teacha, is an American rapper from the Bronx. He rose to prominence as part of the ...

. Produced by

Rick Rubin Frederick Jay Rubin (, ; born March 10, 1963) is an American record producer. He is a co-founder of Def Jam Recordings, founder of American Recordings, and former co-president of Columbia Records. Rubin helped popularize hip hop by produci ...

and DJ Premier, it was released as a single on February 20, 2007 by Nike Records. It was performed live at the Nike Air Force Ones 25th anniversary party shown on

MTV2 MTV2 (formerly M2) is an American pay television Cable television, channel owned by the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global, through PMN’s MTV Entertainment Group Subdivision. The channel launched initially as an all-music ...

. Its

remix A remix, also sometimes called reorchestration or rework, is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, poem, or photograph ca ...

, "Better Than I've Ever Been DJ Premier Remix", is produced by DJ Premier, and it features Rakim along with the aforementioned rappers. It features DJ Premier's signature scratches from prior songs such as Nas' " One Love" and " It Ain't Hard to Tell". The song was nominated for Best Rap Collaboration at the

50th Grammy Awards The 50th Annual Grammy Awards took place at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, on February 10, 2008. It honored musical achievement of 2007 in which albums were released between October 1, 2006, through September 30, 2007. The primary ceremonie ...

in 2008. Proceeds from the song's sales go towards youth leadership programs through the Force4Change Fund. The song is often misinterpreted as a DJ Premier track featuring Rakim, Nas and KRS-ONE and excluding Kanye West. This is due to a popular upload of the

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

where DJ Premier is credited as the artist and Kanye West's opening verse is removed from the video. The music video itself was released for the DJ Premier Remix of the song.

Track listing

Side A produced by

and Side B produced by DJ Premier.

Music video

The

for the DJ Premier Remix of "Classic (Better Than I've Ever Been)" was released on March 29, 2007 and directed by Thibaut de Longeville.

Samples

The original beat by

samples the song " Give Me the Night", performed by

George Benson George Washington Benson (born March 22, 1943) is an American jazz fusion guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He began his professional career at the age of 19 as a jazz guitarist. A former child prodigy, Benson first came to prominence in the ...

, off his '' Give Me the Night'' album. DJ Premier's remix contains samples from "Dance the Kung-Fu" by Carl Douglas.

References

{{authority control 2007 singles Rakim songs Nas songs Kanye West songs KRS-One songs Song recordings produced by DJ Premier Songs written by Nas 2007 songs Song recordings produced by Rick Rubin Songs written by Biddu Songs written by KRS-One Songs written by Kanye West Posse cuts