![]() ![]() ![]() Jay weaves his way through every imaginable style and flavor with unyielding expertise- from the natural repetition of "A Dream" to the extreme assonance of "The Bounce" to the classic cocky confidence of "2 Many Hoes"- driving home clear evidence that his top-tier emcee ranking is deserved, and that few could be as entitled. There's no deep concept or surrounding purpose behind this record: it's just pure confidence. On his mid-to-late 90s Volume trilogy, Jay had steadily lost track of his confident street corner philosophy, but a series of battles led him to re-evaluate his career, resulting in the landmark album of his career: the prequel to this two-disc blowout was an inarguable masterwork of beautiful soul-struck production and serrated bling 'n' sting street rhymes sharp enough to eclipse even the heralded, barbs on 1996's world-memorized classic Reasonable Doubt. Jay-Z has chosen his own route: The Blueprint 2: The Gift & The Curse lobbies for a position on top of the commercial hip-hop market. For Biggie and Tupac, it led to grisly deaths. For the Wu-Tang Clan and Michael Jackson, it led to exponential career declines. Uneven albums like Hard Knock Life were the crossover attempts, and now that Jay-Z is "runnin' this rap sh*t," a fully realized masterpiece like The Blueprint is the glorious result.The double album can mean a number of things for an artist. Besides, when you're already the top MC in the game, there's no need for crossover attempts. ![]() For once, listeners get exactly what they want: Jay-Z and nothing but Jay-Z, over beats so loaded with marvelously flipped samples the songs don't even need big vocal hooks. Moreover, if the rhymes and beats alone don't make The Blueprint a career highlight for Jay-Z, the minimal guest appearances surely do. Besides rhymes that challenge those on Reasonable Doubt as the most crafted of Jay-Z's career to date in terms of not only lyrics but also flow and delivery, The Blueprint also boasts some of his most extravagant beats, courtesy of impressive newcomers Kanye West and Just Blaze. There are 12 other songs on The Blueprint - and they're all stunning, to the point where the album seems almost flawless. And by the time he brutally dismisses two of his most formidable opponents, Mobb Deep and Nas, less than ten minutes into the album, there's little doubt that Jay-Z's status as the top MC in the game is justified. So when Jay-Z opens The Blueprint dropping rhymes about "runnin' this rap sh*t," it's not so much arrogance as it is a matter of fact. Yes, Jay-Z had risen to the top of the rap game in the late '90s and solidified his position with gigantic hits like "Big Pimpin" and "I Just Wanna Love You (Give It 2 Me)." Furthermore, The Blueprint's leadoff single, "Izzo (H.O.V.A.)," dominated urban radio numerous weeks before the album hit the streets, generating so much demand that Def Jam had to push up the album's street date because it was being so heavily bootlegged. At this point in time, nobody in New York could match Jay-Z rhyme for rhyme and nobody in New York had fresher beats - and many would argue that Jigga's reign was not just confined to New York but was, in fact, national. Four years later in 2001, when he released The Blueprint, no one was smirking and no one dared snicker. When Jay-Z dropped "The City Is Mine" in 1997 and claimed New York's hip-hop throne upon the Notorious B.I.G.'s demise, many smirked and some even snickered. ![]()
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