fter the recent controversy surrounding Nas title choice for his new album, many were asking if Nas would be able to have his album out in stores.

In a recent interview by RollingStone, Nas adressed the resistance put up by New York assemblyman Hakeem Jefferies to stop Universal to release an album with this title as he requested that Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli withdraw the $84 million that New York's state pension fund has invested in Universal and its parent company, Vivendi.

Here is what Nas answered : "It's the new act of hate," he said, "and probably because of Barack Obama, people's ignorance and fear and jealousy is creating an outrage throughout the country, and people are reacting by putting nooses up. It's been a really serious year."

"It's probably going to make people uncomfortable," Nas said of his upcoming album entitled N*gger. "I don't expect a lot of people to sell a record called N*gger. Hopefully, people can open their minds up and lose some of their fear and deal with it. It's just an album. It's one piece of the many things I do, and this will be one of my favorite pieces."

"It will be certain record stores that will be scared to deal with it. The record label is gung ho, and it's ready to go."

As we first reported, Antonio L.A. Reid, Chairman of the Def Jam Music Group has been backing Nas artistic choices : "We support everything our artists do, everything ! We stand firmly behind and beside our artists with pride and with pleasure. Anything Nas wants to do, I completely stand beside him. Nas is prolific, he's prophetic, he's a genius, an amazing artist of respect. So, while I'm not sure exactly all that [the title] entails, I know it's smart, so I stand behind him. That's real."