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Since relocating to Los Angeles, Nas has been working on his new album, DN3, slated to come out Feb. 4. “I’m not going to lie, DN3 is definitely derivative of those two Donda songs,” he says. “Like, just that smoothness, that feeling, that vibe that I that I was able to give to him for Donda, I’m definitely going all in on it for my project.”

It’s also the vibe he’s been tapping into for the tracks he’s been writing for Donda 2 — Ye’s first sequel album, due out Feb. 22. Ye has given him two notes so far: to sound “more monk-like” and to “simplify” the tracks.

Ye also gave Nas some specific requests for how Donda 2 should feel. Nas pulls out his phone to make sure he captures the instructions he got correctly. “These are the directives for the album: ‘If it cannot be played at a funeral, childbirth, graduation, a wedding, it will not be on our record,'” he says. “We learned a lot from Donda 1. We learned what hit. We learned what was sticking. So we took from there. It has to be able to be played at four major moments in people’s lives. That’s crazy, right?”

Without offering song titles, Nas says he’s particularly excited about one track Ye recorded with the album’s executive producer, Future. “That’s just phenomenal,” he says. He also says Ye has been collaborating with some of the producers who worked on his 2013 Yeezus album, a few familiar names from the original Donda, and one special guest that blew Nas away: “Travis Scott pulled up and played beats for Ye,” he says, beaming.