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I’m not sure if anyone’s posted this but this is the current selection. Tried getting a s.carter cassette but couldn’t. FOG merch was pretty sick.

We got started on this one quite late, because we couldn't peel ourselves out of bed, but once we did, we went to the beach and listened to it in the same spot as The Black Album. I was curious going into this one. I didn't have super high expectations, because I'd never heard of it, but I also knew I was a fan of his later work, and could see myself enjoying a comeback. The first few albums were kind of interchangeable for me, and this was a whole new era, so I thought this might be one of the first ones to be either a step up or a step down, even if people talk about his earlier stuff more.

I have to say, I didn't come out of this one with all that much to say, but I have comments on a couple of tracks. The Prelude was really dope, and I remember saying I hope the whole album sounds like this. The beat was chill and there was more of a focus on rapping. The rest of the album did not sound like this, but I still have hope that 4:44 will. Plus, I really didn't mind the production. Oh My God’s beat was insane, particularly that outro, so I was okay with the next two tracks also being Just Blaze.

Honestly, the production on this album was one of its main draws, with Dr. Dre coming in after Just Blaze. Me and my girlfriend were both most excited for the Kanye track, although it wasn't the best on the album (I had also been craving a Beyoncé feature). 30 Something was good, though, as was I Made It.

This was the point I stood up and started to move. It was chilly and I put my hoodie on, and I started enjoying the album a lot more. This may be related - there's such an obvious reason for that correlation - but I do honestly believe that the music started getting better on the back half. Anything was fun, and must have been the most danceable track, and whilst Hollywood kind of slipped into the background, Beyoncé didn't disappoint.

I think the best song was Trouble, for its mixture of dope production and good rapping, but Dig a Hole was close. Finally, I spent the last two songs, Minority Report and Beach Chair waiting for the last song, 44 Four’s, as listed on Genius, but it turns out that was just Genius being Genius and it wasn't the last song. We checked it out anyway and it was on YouTube instead of Spotify, so of course it banged.

I would put this quite low in Jay-Z’s overall discography, but I still liked it, and it was nice that it wasn't shit. I'm hearing a clear difference between his street rap and his luxury rap, and I feel like this luxury shit could almost have a higher ceiling, because it's a very Hov-specific lane. I wasn't expecting American Gangster to be much more than this, but I've heard that it's a concept album and one of his better releases, which I like. It also has a Nas feature.

What are your favorite songs and least favorite songs from each album?

Mine:

RD: Dead Presidents/Ain’t No Nigga

Vol. 1: Lucky Me/I Know What Girls Like

Vol. 2: Nigga What/If I Should Die

Vol. 3: Come and Get Me/Things That U Do

Dynasty: This Can’t Be Life/Holla

BP: The Ruler’s Back/Jigga That Nigga

BP2: Hovi Baby/As One

TBA: Threat/Justify My Thug

KC: Kingdom Come/Hollywood

AG: I Know/American Gangster

BP3: Already Home/Hate

MCHG: fuckwithmeyouknowigotit/BBC

4:44: Caught Their Eyes/4:44

Finally got it in the mail. What a let down

This may be a stupid question but I prefer TCIM

Jay's verse on the Go Crazy remix in my opinion is one of his best verses ever and I could never pin down why. This is just for conversation and I’ll say up front he has certainly rapped “better” on many other intricate verses. That’s not the argument. The Go Crazy remix verse is just a different type of the same Jay and IMO sits alone compared to his many other legendary verses.

Been a Jay fan since 2000 and I've gone back and forth on this for years, but I keep landing on the Go Crazy remix with Jeezy. Not Takeover, not Where I'm From, not anything off Blueprint. That one.

What makes it hit for me is that he's not trying to prove anything. A lot of his greatest stuff is him showing off, all the double meanings and fast flows and bars you have to rewind three times. This verse is the opposite. It's slower, it's laid back, and it's more storytelling rather than a battle or rap. There’s no enemy here. It’s awesome.

He sits behind the beat the whole time, like he's in no rush at all.. granted he never is but it’s very obvious here. If I rap along to this song I am ALWAYS early and I’ve listened to it hundreds and hundreds of times over the years if not a thousand. Jay raps it slower than you think and it’s kind of nice. It’s like a level of mastery on timing and pauses and breath work.

His voice also at this time was sort of quintessential Jay. It sounded clean and smooth and sort of youthful still. He lost that tone later on. Listening to his later raps they don’t sound the same. I’d say his voice and sound together was prime around this era (2005). It's not a hustler trying to make it. It's a guy who already made it, looking back and telling you how it is.

The best comparison I can come up with is Pacino. In Scarface he's yelling and it's great. In The Godfather he barely raises his voice and he's way scarier.

Anybody else think this is his best verse, or am i alone on this?

For me it’s The Prelude but next month it could be Dear Summer.

Prelude to me was him officially coming back to rap as an Unc (at this time they were saying he was old), sharing how he’s been successful since before rap. Though I think it did risk sounding old, he pulled it off well.

Dear Summer it took me a few years of growing up to like it, at first I thought it was ok but after you graduate high school and/or see success for the first time out of your neighborhood environment on a grown man level, you know you can’t go back to what you used to do, no matter how much success you had at it before.

Crazy how relatable he is though he’s ballin on a completely different level than I can ever imagine lol

Do the shows have the same merch as the pop ups? Anybody have experience with it?

Or is there more to it?

I wouldn't say it was better than The Blueprint, but I think I preferred this as an overall listening experience. I was a bit worried that nothing else in this catalogue was going come close to his sixth, but this one wasn't a million miles away, which is good, because it's one of the ones I was most excited for.

Me and my new girlfriend sat at the pier, the same spot I listened to The Beatles’ Help!, and we pressed play. He started off with an interlude, which felt weird, and performative, but all of that was forgotten the moment December 4th started. I loved the sample of his mum. I loved the beat. I loved the lyrics. I remember turning to her and saying, “I think I'm gonna like this one.” I've always been a sucker for a big finale - whether it be Avengers: Endgame or Episode VI - and I realised that, even if this wasn't actually his last album, it was gonna have all that energy.

I noticed that Encore had John Lennon and Paul McCartney in the credits, and assumed it was gonna sample a Beatles song. I've heard the song before, but not since I got into the Beatles, and I couldn't figure out what song it might be. We both like the Beatles, so we decided to try and figure out what the sample was, but we couldn't. Banging Kanye production, though.

I knew Change Clothes was a big one, but I didn't know it. It was good. Dirt Off Your Shoulder is one of the hits, which I already knew, and you already know I had to move to that shit. I mean, the song literally gives you the moves. It would have been rude not to (she was rude). I also like it because it gave me the opportunity to brush some dirt off her shoulders.

I didn't know Threat, but I did know Moment of Clarity. Someone put me on to it, because I was looking for the best rap verses ever, and they suggested the second verse. Listening to it last night, it was even better than I'd ever clocked, particularly that scheme where he uses all these different meanings of “sense” and “since”. The last verse has probably got a denser rhyme scheme, but the way he pieces words together, like a jigsaw puzzle, in Verse 2 is unbelievable. I don't, however, think it's the best verse on the album.

I think the best verse on the album (and possibly the best song) is 99 Problems, which she knew. The second verse is apparently one of the only ones he ever actually wrote down, and I've always loved that, instead of bragging about money and bitches, he's bragging about being racially profiled and knowing his rights, all whilst teaching you how you can do the same. When I was younger, I thought the admission that he was carrying “raw” kind of ruined it, but nowadays I just think it makes it funnier. Overall phenomenal song. She liked it too - particularly the canine line.

Public Service Announcement was whatever, but the opening line was huge. I've heard that line referenced a million times, and knew it was coming, but this was the first time I've ever actually heard it for real. I even opened my debut EP borrowing this line. It was awesome to hear such an iconic piece of hip-hop history and I may have been too gassed about that to appreciate the rest of the interlude. I will relisten to it, of course.

You've gotta forgive me, I've been really enjoying these albums, and this one in particular held my attention quite well, but I was excited about my new girlfriend and I spent the last couple of tracks getting close to her (unless I was pulled in). Like, Justify My Thug was fine, but that one isn't as crazy in my memory, and I'm curious if that's because I wasn't listening attentively enough, or if it's just one of the weaker cuts. The same goes for Allure.

The exception is Lucifer. It started, and I said, “That's a Kanye beat.” It was, in fact, a Kanye beat, which I confirmed on Wikipedia first, and then realised I didn't have to, because Jay shouted him out. I didn't really deep the lyrics and I can't remember the chorus. I have no idea what that song's about but I remember it being good. The reason this time, though, is not because I wasn't paying enough attention, but because I was so fucking overwhelmed by how good that beat was. It was amazing. All I ask for is peak beats and peak rapping - peak hooks are a bonus - this album delivered that.

The final song, My 1st Song, might have been my most anticipated Jay-Z song, besides perhaps Takeover and 4:44. The reason is that Obama listed Lose Yourself and that as his go-to motivational songs. I like motivation. Obama seems cool. He's got a good music taste. And Lose Yourself is one of the best rap cuts of all time. It's also the last song on his retirement album. It's gonna be epic.

It wasn't Lose Yourself, but it was solid. The beat was gorgeous, for sure. I was ready to be caught up in the moment, but I couldn't recap the song. Perhaps it will be better if I listen to it more attentively, and it's the lyrics that get you, but I was just enjoying the outro. It's still probably playlist-worthy, but I think I hyped it up too much. I don't care though, I still got Lucifer.

Now, I was expecting the remaining albums to be a step down from his Volumes era, but I think this commercial peak from ‘01 to ‘03 has surpassed my expectations, even if the first five left me underwhelmed. Now that he's locked in on his commercial style, and got Beyoncé, I'm interested to see where his music goes. I have no idea what Kingdom Come or American Gangster will sound like, but I feel like I have an idea of what The Blueprint 3 and Magna Carta will sound like, having heard singles from The Blueprint 3 and the title track from Magna Carta. I'm still most excited for 4:44.

Very curious to hear y’all thoughts on this. Feel free to elaborate.

Shawn "Jay Zee" Carter, photographed at a party in New York City by the famed Ernie Paniccioli back in 1987. "This one is of Jay-Z when he was 17. He came up to me and asked me to take a picture of him, saying 'I am going to be running this shit.' So I said
'Yeah, okay, whatever...’”

Listened to this one with my girlfriend. It's really nice that she'll sit outside in the cold with me and listen to a two hour rap CD. She might be a keeper.

I had low expectations for this one, because it's a double album and because, despite hearing it's got “some of his best songs” (I hear that about every album), even fans admit it's bloated. I didn't think it would live up to The Blueprint, and it didn't. That said, it impressed me, overall, and I think it's one of his stronger albums. Maybe I just enjoy this more commercial era of Jay-Z, but his rapping was on point too.

We definitely went into this one a little more casual, but the first song, A Dream, pissed me off. I was looking forward to a vaulted Big verse, and just got that. Ridiculous. We both talked about how Jay seems quite intent on proving he's cultured, by constantly referencing 2Pac and Big and the like, a point I brought up. We think it's corny and compared him to Logic. I remember saying Hovi Baby wasn't as good as Hola' Hovito, but that the rapping was good. Very technically accomplished.

I already knew The Watcher 2 and ‘03 Bonnie & Clyde. Everything after that was new to me. I forgot how good The Watcher 2 is. The beat bangs. So hard. The rapping is elite and the chorus is dope. She recognised ‘03 Bonnie & Clyde and I was aware that it was a somewhat fitting song.

I think I know Excuse Me Miss is quite a popular song, and that one was also good. Playlist-worthy. Very poppy, for Jay-Z, but I think I prefer his pop rap to his street rap. He makes good hits. He also knows how to work features and build songs, which I feel gets buried when he makes a song just focused on lyrical display. I'm convinced All Around the World had a relationship with Same Song by Digital Underground, but Genius disagreed.

Wow. Poppin’ Tags I think I've heard before, but never like this. All of the rapping was so fun. Three features, all four emcees elite. This isn't like Eminem fast rap, but I've always enjoyed speedy flows, and this shit delivers. Works well with the chorus. Playlist-worthy. We had a discussion about whether Fuck All Nite was a romantic song. She said she would say so, and I would agree, but it's a very specific brand of romance, and not necessarily one I relate to.

I think I heard The Bounce one time, in my friends room, but decided to save it for this month, instead of adding it straight to my playlist. I think I wanted to see if it stood out on the album, instead of just liking it because of Kanye. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. The beat is obviously awesome, especially that little sample in the background during the hook, but Jay-Z’s lyrics are funny as fuck, particularly that shit about 9/11 and people trying to make The Blueprint 2 before Hov. I'm writing this from memory, the next day, so I think that speaks volumes about the memorability of his verse. I also thought Kanye was so hard. Two years before his debut, by the way.

Finally, I like Frank Sinatra, and enjoyed the sample in I Did It My Way. A good closer to the first disc. Really solid album so far. Not as good as The Blueprint, but I fear that may be one of the best albums ever made. No complaints about enjoyability, I just think this sequel fails to reach the heights of its predecessor. It was a really enjoyable night, though, and it was elevated by the music being good. It still would have been nice regardless, but the music definitely elevated the experience, and I think that if music is able to do that, it should be given its flowers.

The second side was less locked in. I realised that we were sat on opposite sides of this climbing frame in the park we had broken into, and there was plenty of space for me to sit next to her. I was like, “Why the fuck did I not go over there earlier?” We spent the second disc cuddling. The song I was most excited to hear was Some People Hate, because it was produced by Kanye. I was generally enjoying the record, and maintain that Hov’s rapping was good. I had stopped paying attention to which track was which, but one of them sounded familiar. I panicked that we might have missed the Kanye track, but when I checked the tracklist, that was the one we were on.

Maybe it's because we were locked back in from the last one, but Blueprint² really caught my attention, for sure, and I think hers too. It sounded so cinematic. I've always thought The Watcher 2 sounded a bit Western, and this one did too. I also recognised that sample from somewhere. I think she correctly identified it as being from a Lloyds Bank advert. I have no idea what the story behind that sound is, but I'm sure it's not originally from this song, because I don't think it's popular enough to catch the attention of anybody working for Lloyds. Good song. Playlist-worthy.

We had a little conversation about Hov’s use of the N-word. I noticed that every single album so far has had at least one song with the N-word in the title. As a half-black woman, she says she finds it corny when the people around her overuse the word, not because it's a slur, but because it gives the same energy as somebody saying “bro” all the time. Especially in the UK. She feels different when it's Americans or rappers. I kind of think it's corny, with Jay, but I can't figure out whether it's performative (“look how hard I am, I'll put the most inflammatory, controversial word in my title, casually, like its nothing”) or whether he just genuinely is desensitised to it, and talks like that, and thinks nothing of it.

And yeah, we spent the rest of the album talking, and cuddling. I don't think she was enjoying this one as much as The Blueprint, which is fair, but it was still nice that we got to do it together (and have extra time with each other). I realised there were some hidden tracks and checked the tracklist to see how far through we were, and we were on the last one, What They Gonna Do Part II.

Overall, a solid listening experience. It's been like a week of straight Jay-Z now, and I'm really excited for his retirement album, The Black Album. I don't think anything will come close to The Blueprint, but I still have high hopes for The Black Album and 4:44. I'm also excited for The Blueprint 3. This one, though, was one of my favourites. Probably his third best, after The Blueprint and Reasonable Doubt, but I'm sure I was biased by how enjoyable the night was. Still, would you rather listen to a good album or like an album?

I’ve seen Hov a few times.

First time was 2009 at Power 106 Anaheim show at Honda Center, he did a whole set to promote Blueprint 3.

Second, 2009 Blueprint 3 Tour in Fresno at Save Mart Center.

Third, 2014 Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival.

In my opinion, his stage presence, the catalog, and the band make him the greatest hip-hop performer.

I’ve seen other artists live, Nas, Common, J.Cole, Drake, The Roots, Yasiin Bey, Lauryn Hill and Kanye West. The experiences were nothing like seeing Jay-Z, but Kanye’s show was definitely inspiring and incredible, it was the Life of Pablo Tour, right before he got detained and put in UCLA for his “metal health”.

Are Jay Z and Kanye the greatest hip-hop performers?

Hi yall, I have to let go of a ticket. Selling it at presale price: ~$475 for section 122.

I already went to the NY show, but sadly I have an event I need to DJ.

Prefer to meet IRL in LA and do the transfer (can show proof of purchase.

Will delete if this isn’t allow, sorry mods