99 Problems

So the new Jay-Z album came out today, destined to be one of the three rap albums I hear per year. Which got me to thinking--is Jay-Z still relevant? Does this record matter if it isn't any better than Reasonable Doubt or the original Blueprint? My first thought was that yes, it matters, because he dates this young lady. This thought was echoed by a friend, meaning that it wasn't only me that first thought of Ms. Knowles. But would Jay-Z take comfort in that? What a sad state of affairs it must be for him if his credentials are provided not by himself, but by 1/3 of Destiny's Child. And who knows what the relationship is like now that the power/fame/talent equilibrium is shifting quickly, but that's a question for someone else. Instead, I'm going to "live-blog" my first listen to the album. In quotes because really I'm typing into a Word Doc and then pasting this later. But, you get the point. Anyhow, The Blueprint 3 is no lightweight, with 15 songs coming in at under an hour. This better be good, because I'm delaying watching the first episode of Season 3 of The Wire for this. So, eh, here goes:

10:11 PM--Fuck, this is going to take an hour, and I have to be at work early to go to Baltimore. Oh well. First track is "What we Talkin' About" feat. Luke Steele. Nothing that impressive in the lyrics, mostly a repeat of talkin about ____ or about ____. Now fill in 2 opposite things. Like truth and fiction. I can't remember if he said white or black but it would have been fitting. 1:36 in a bridge, now he's got a kind of sing-songy voice but not saying anything more interesting. Not one to judge early but this could be a long fucking hour. I mean who likes this track? Not really something for headphones, and I can't see people dancing to this. Even the weird dancing chicks at K Street Lounge and their apparent sugar daddies probalby wouldn't get into this, and they were dancing to fucking Nickelback. I'm bored. 30 second outtro.

10:17--track 2, finally (had to pause for a bit). Called Thank You, no feat. Ok...so on this one he starts by thanking his fans...and then he starts bragging about all he's done. What the fuck? If this is our song, as he says, why brag? What kind of person has to validate themselves while issuing a thank you? Even after millions of albums? And just missed it but a reference to an "8-ball." When was the last time Jay-Z dealt drugs? Did drugs (marijuana doesn't count)? Blah. Maybe he doesn't have anything to rap about anymore.

10:21--bored and checking my email. Fuck.
10:22--Third track is DOA, Death of Autotune. And I actually like the instrumentation here, a little guitar, a little sax, a little rap. This track could hold up to some other things he's done. I mean a lot of less than clever braggadocio, but he gets away with it here because of the overall sound. That said, Autotune ain't always bad, as Kanye proved last year and I explained in my year end piece. As the track closes, I will say that his words just aren't pulling me in the way they need to on this album. Not sure if it's because I'm tired, or this album is tired.

10:25--getting some ice cream. Need to buy some good shit because my roomate eats the store brand. Some things are worth paying for. Good ice cream is one of them.

10:26--Track 4 Run This Town with Rihanna and Kanye. Ok, I like this song. I think it was on a commercial. First one where I feel like I want to go back to the beginning and hear it again. Another guitar in the background, pretty bare other than that and some drums. He's singing a bit here, and holding hard to the rhyme scheme and the guitar line. Melodies sound good, who knew? Solid opening couplet about the color black. Seriously.

10:31--Eyelids getting heavy. Fuck I'm old. Is it sad that I want to stop listening to this and go read my book before I go to bed? I may be my father's son, but I've adopted way too many of my mom's habits.

10:32--Track 5, Empire State of Mind, pushing on. Featuring Alicia Keys, apple of Bob Dylan's eye. More upbeat and a heavier bass than we've heard thusfar. "I'm black (not the word he used) Sinatra." Nice. The high notes on the piano are good, balance out the low lines. Guarantee I'm going to watch some drunk girls dance to this song this fall. You will too, especially if you live in New York City. Name-drops Lebron and D-Wade. Alicia Keys only sings the chorus, guess she didn't want to rap on this one. Pretty good chorus though. WAIT, she does fucking rap, unreal. Hold on I gotta listen to that again. Ok, kind of, it's a rap/sing, but she does do that "uh, yeah, uh, yeah" stuff on the beat, which is...disturbing/definitely means it was a rap? Ok, what started off as a total failure has picked up from tracks 3-5.

10:38--Track 6, Real as it Gets feat. Young Jeezy. Ok, fuck this, I dont' give a shit about Young Jeezy, I'm out for this track. Why must there be guest spots? I really don't get it. Your fans bought your album, impress them. If that means it's gotta be 12 tracks instead of 15, fine. Or, join the Wu-Tang Clan and you can all rap. But this is a Jay-Z album, I only want to hear Jay-Z rap, and whoever the fuck he wants to sing the choruses. Next track.

10:40--On to the Next one feat. Swizz Beatz This sounds like a Nelly song. Is Nelly featured (checks computer)? Nope. Wouldn't be surprised. References the Jonas Brothers (does Jay-Z have kids? is this because they played with Stevie Wonder? what the fuck?). This track sucks. "On to the next one."

10:42--This goes quicker when i skip the second half of the track, noted. Track 8 Off That feat. Drake. I think we could cut 30 second off of every track if we didn't have to listen to Jay-Z and his guest start talk (and, now that I think about it, 30 seconds off the end if we took out the outtros). Ok this sound is a bit different, but I'm not sure if I like it. Is that a xylophone? Uh, ok. Shout out to Barack, and then "tell rush limbaugh to get off my balls." Which I guess is kind of funny, and sounds good, but can't he do better than that?

10:46-- Track 9 A star is born. Still referencing P-Diddy. Then illmatic. Others. This is like Rivers Cuomo singing Heart Songs. Also reminds me of people reminiscing about how great high school was. Either way, I'm not interested.

10:49--I'm reading The Historian, by the way. It's pretty good, at least early on. At this point it has more pull than the past 3 songs.

10:50--Ok, I couldn't make it through the whole thing. To be continued...

A couple of days later...

Ok, got 6 more tracks to get through. Let's do this shit.

9:25--Track 10 Venus vs. Mars. Just finished an episode of the Wire so not jonesing for that as much as last time. Is this like men are from mars, women are from Venus? Let's hope not. Rhymes: She's a mac, I'm a PC. Sighs. Done with this one. Really? Jay-Z, you're looking to self-help books for inspiration? Fuck. "shorty like pepsi, me I'm a coke man." Did you get the double entendre? Good job.

9:27--Track 11, Already Home feat Kid Cudi. Ready for this to be over. Not much going on in this song until about 0:52 in. Wasted time. The rest of the song isn't objectionable. But I think Jay-Z needs me to edit his songs. Or he needs to stop giving out these guest spots to singers and guarantee them a useless 1:30 sandwiching what people actually bought the CD to hear. At this point, I'm just frustrated, this song isn't bad but I'm skipping it and what is probably a 45 second outtro.

9:30--Track 12 Hate feat Kanye. I like Kanye, how's this gonna go? Forgettable. I started checking my email and got distracted.

9:32--ok, halfway through the next track when I finally get back to it. Called Reminder. This isn't awful but the chorus kind of sucks. Sounds like a guy singing after inhaling helium. Big fucking claim: "only the Beatles, nobody else ahead of me." Umm...no. I mean...just, no. Later, I'm going to figure out how many are ahead, I'm sure it's at least 5, maybe 10. 3 or 4 great albums...that's it. hmmm. This is a future blog post if I can remember it.

9:35--So Ambitious feat Pharrell. Penultimate track!!! So excited to be done. And again, it's 38 seconds before the song actually starts. Me and Jay are going to have to talk about time management. Another song about his father. Am I just in a bad mood? Or is it really this old/tired/boring? I'll invite comments on that.

9:38--Is Jay-Z the Brett Favre of rappers? Good enough to pump out a few good games/tracks, but the rest of it is tired and below par? Used to have a drug issue? I think it works.

9:39--FINAL TRACK. Jay-Z rapping over forever young calls the track Young Forever. Ok, this might be the best track I've heard tonight (the last 6 tracks of the record). Jay-Z sounds fresh, and he flows well over the 80s synths.

9:42: Done, finally. Overall, 4 good tracks? Eh. I'm underwhelmed. Is Jay-Z relevant? Yeah. But mostly because of Beyonce.