Nas‘ 2001 single “Gor Ur Self A Gun” has earned another Hollywood connection, serving as the backdrop to the trailer for the latest film in the the John Wick franchise.
The preview for JW4, which arrived on Thursday (February 16), opens with a DJ dedicating the song to Wick while introducing it as a “hit” — a play on his career as a hired assassin. The sampled portion of the chorus — which incorporates the song’s title — comes as an acapella in the first instance. As Nas joins in, viewers are treated to an alternate beat rather than the keyboard-driven original production from Megahertz.
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Throughout the trailer, Keanu Reeves fights his way through Paris and other international settings as the titular character, while Nas’ lyrics and ad-libs, as well as the “got yourself a gun” part of the chorus, are interspersed into the action over a percussion-driven track mimicking the sound of gunshots.
The portions of the song used in the trailer seem quite deliberately selected to match the plot of the film, with Nas heard rapping: “Many try, many die, come at Nas if you want a war, get it bloody, uh.”
Picking up where John Wick 3 – Parabellum left off, the fourth installment in the series finds Wick still fighting for his life and freedom after his feud with the High Table turned almost the entire underworld against him. As shown in the trailer, pretty early into the action John Wick discovers a way to earn his freedom and possibly walk away from his life of crime once again.
JW4 was originally scheduled for release in 2021, but was delayed first due to COVID-19 restrictions impacting production, then due to Keanu Reeves’ commitment to The Matrix Resurrections.
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The movie’s trailer isn’t the only connection Nas’ single has to big budget Hollywood productions. The sample driving the song’s chorus is taken from British band Alabama 3’s “Woke Up This Morning.” The 1997 single’s “Chosen One Mix” served as the theme song to HBO’s hit series The Sopranos for its entire eight-year run.
In addition to having his music included in countless film and television projects — most recently Big George Forman and the final season of Ozark — Nas has racked up a few production credits in that space as well.
Last summer, the Queensbridge legend hopped behind the camera to co-direct Showtime’s Supreme Team documentary, providing viewers with a behind-the-scenes look at the notorious ’80s Queens hustlers. The Supreme Team story is told through the eyes of its two feared leaders Kenneth “Supreme” McGriff and his nephew Gerald “Prince” Miller.
The three-part doc began streaming on Showtime on July 8, 2022, and included contributions from LL COOL J, Ashanti, Irv Gotti, newscaster Joy Reid and NYC Mayor Eric Adams.
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Later in the year, Nas and Yo Gotti teamed up for a new documentary titled The Invaders, which examines the plethora of radical civil rights leaders that emerged from Memphis in 1967. The documentary also looks at how these young, overlooked leaders worked closely with Martin Luther King Jr. in the hours leading up to his assassination.
Nas also pulled double duty by narrating the project, which arrived on a Apple TV+, Prime Video and a number of other digital platforms on November 1.
