Honestly I've already been into hip hop cause i grew up in the heart of Queens and my older brother (r.i.p) and my older cousins who was kinda big on the block showed me some good music, I think the first big musical influence on me was the Fugges-The Score, that was the first album i heard i thought was incredible, so one day im listening to it in my brothers stereo when he comes home and sees me, he grabs my headphones listens to a little bit of it and smiles, a few days later he gave me illmatic and thats when i started rapping, i think just last week i actually understood that whole album, so i gotta thank my brother for giving me illmatic, but Nas was always my biggest musical influence, The Fugees were for a few months when The Score dropped but its always been the one and only Nasty Nas, but now i also have to give Rakim HUGE props cause like someone else said Microphone Fiend was crazy (first song of his i heard) 1luv.