“I used to think rapping at 38 was ill, But last year I grossed 38 mill, flow is special, got a 38 feel, the real is back…” – Jay Z – “The Prelude”.

Oh really? Jay-Z is back? OK. Didn’t he retire? Yep. Well why is he back? Cause he’s a rapper…Is Benz0 the only one who knew that Jay-Z retiring was just a publicity stunt? I mean you would think that Jay Hova would have been more original than this. Too Short retired long time ago just to come back. It’s all a publicity stunt in rap. Which is why I admire Barry Sanders who was one of the greatest running backs in the NFL of all time but retired YOUNG and kept his word and never came back.

Michael Jordan played the same retirement game too but dude won 3 championships when he came back!! I guess Jay-Z figures he can do the same thing. Retire then come back and put out 3 back to back to back multi-platinum selling albums? Well I don’t know about that. See in rap, YOUTH WILL BE SERVED! Rap changes styles about every 12 to 15 months. In Hiphop you simply CANNOT take more than 15 months off and still be in the mix of what’s hot (Though Outkast defied this logic for 5 straight albums before falling totally off the edge as they only come out every 2+ years). One of the smartest rap business men in hiphop history, Master-P, knew this so he came out like every 3 months and made millions as he gave the nation drunk on a steady dose of his lethal country verbal elixir in the late 90s.

Heck Jay-Z knew this too. Rarely a year went by where we couldn’t grab a new Jay-Z record over the summers. So knowing this why would Jay-Z try to take three years off and try to make a comeback? Well if you ask me dude was probably bored and jealous sitting at home by himself while his prized Beyonce possession (who is way more famous than him) continued to do her thing. I mean I can just imagine lonely Jay-Z sitting in one of his mansions like a sucka for love R&B thug about to cry as he’s watching Beyonce perform on TV at yet another hot awards show surrounded by young hot dudes that look better than him. He probably figured he better get his name back out there before Beyonce forgets how hot he used to be. That’s my honest to god truthful assessment on the situation. Cause dude has said just about EVERYTHING there is to be said. We’ve heard about his hard upbringing. We’ve heard how proficient he was at selling drugs and how he had loot before he made it big in rapping. We’ve heard about his pops not being there and his lost child. We’ve heard his tributes to his mom already. We’ve heard about how many bottles of bub he pops at the club and how many girls he’s had.

I mean I think we all feel like we could write an autobiography on this cat. But yet here he comes again. At almost 38 Hov just can’t put down the mic. To his credit thus far it seems like he’ll probably be the best 38 yr old rapper ever. But then again only Reverend Run of RUN DMC fame tried to come back at that advanced rapping age. So Hov is trying to comeback like Michael Jordan after Jordan’s first retirement but unfortunately folks after giving an honest listen to his newest offering called KINGDOME COME, his comeback resembles more like Jordan’s SECOND comeback where Mike Jordan came back fat, slower than ever, OLD and injury prone. In that SECOND comeback, Jordan couldn’t even get his team into the playoffs in the WEAK Eastern Conference. The same team that a YOUNG Gilbert Arenas would get into the playoffs soon after. So as Jay-Z makes his comeback it’ll be about the same results as this aging Jordan. You’ll see some 50 point scoring highlights here and there but mostly you’ll see someone beginning to be past his prime and on the verge of embarrassing himself at times. As you go through this album you can literally see the wrinkles forming as you get further into each track.

When the album first starts we are reminded of the YOUNG Jay-Z! The intro starts out nice enough and goes right into “Oh My God” which is classic Jay-Z! I couldn’t get enough of this song when I heard it. I mean dude is ripping it like the Hov of old!!. Peep his lyrics: “Got all these rival dealers trying to do me in and all these little rappers don’t know how prepared for them I am, I feel like the world is against me Lord, Call me crazy but I love them odds!!..”. Not only that though the chorus, track and hook are all classic Jay-Z. Then the next song, “Kingdome Come”, is a “can’t miss” as producer Just Blaze samples Rick James “Super Freak” in a surprisingly unique way to give the song just the right touch. Jay easily skates through the song with ease.

At this point I pick up my phone and call my manz Jamil Austin in Chicago to tell him about how elated I am thus far with the album. But then Jamil is like “Yeah, well wait till you hear the songs towards the end..You won’t be impressed”. OK. So then the ubiquitous “Show Me What You Got” comes on and it’s still easy on the ears as I was a big Public Enemy fan when they first sampled the same horns in their TAKES A NATION OF MILLIONS TO HOLD US BACK album. Track 5 infiltrates my senses and I’m loving it! “Lost One” is a nice rendition of the quote Lauryn Hill made famous and Jay talks some real stuff as he explains guilt over buying his nephew a car that would eventually cost his nephew his life. But he explains how his faith was restored as his nephew’s girlfriend became pregnant right before the tragic accident. And I guess he’s referencing Beyonce in this song in another verse as well as he realizes he has to “not hate” and let his girl do her thing as it’s her time to shine. So at this point Young Hov aka Jay-Z still seems like the Jay-Z of old or is that the Jay-Z of Young?

Then the new Jay-Z starts showing his gray hairs as soon as Track 6 starts rotating. But you know I still kind of like “Do U Wanna Ride”. It’s soulful. Then “30 Something” comes on and at first I notice how lame the track is but yet he’s still spitting some decent lyrics as he honestly explains how now he’s “Young enough to still know what right car to buy, but old enough to not put rims on it..”. But still man. Track just lays there. Track 8 we get another “dear mama” type song which is just simply an average tribute to his mom that highlights some back in the day tender moments. YAWN!! Then the wrinkles really start to show with the star-studded, yet VERY AVERAGE, R&B (Rappin BULL&&&&) song “Anything” that sours the face of your stereo and your face.

I mean how can you have Usher AND Pharell and have such a lame outcome? Yeah Benz0 hates most R&B but that’s mostly the slow sappy “Baby I’ll pay all your bills” love songs. I dig a lot of fast R&B cause it’s basically a hiphop beat these days thanks to Teddy Riley’s visionary efforts. But this one just sucks and not even Beyonce can save the below average “Hollywood” song that comes on next. I’m sure he’ll make a fancy video for either “Anything” or “Hollywood” and all the girls and R&B thugs will force themselves to like it but the songs suck. Then you have “Trouble” which the album credits say Dr. Dre produced but I can’t tell. It can’t be Dr. Dre of Compton but must be Dre from NY that used to host Yo MTV Raps with Ed Lover cause the track is one of the wackest tracks in the history of hiphop. Now “Dig a Hole” starts out with a bang the first 5 seconds until some crooning a$$ R&B dude starts singing a wack chorus that is the hook for what is supposed be Jay’s attempt at hardcore.

Well I guess too much time with his face in between Beyonce’s thighs has made Jay’s head soft cause no way you try to make a hardcore song with a wack singing hook like this one. This is not the “Takeover” Jay-Z I knew that single-handedly crushed Nas and Mobb Deep on a whim over a hardcore track with no wack singing on it!! Man I want my money back at this point cause this dude has lost his edge!! Yes he has a tight subtle line in which he says “[dudes] throwing Roc signs outside of your coup” in reference to Cam’Ron’s shooting incident in D.C. but the wack chorus just turns the song into a joke. Even worse some kind of New Orleans tribute song shows up on the next track out of no where. Mr. Jay-Z you’re only a gazillion months too late on this one. What were you thinking??…

Interestingly enough the last track on the album (Track 14) is INCREDIBLE!!! Peep the tight lyrics on “Beach Chair”: “See I got demons in my past so I got daughters on the way, [cause] if the prophecy’s correct then the child will have to pay for the sins of a father, so I barter my tomorrows against my yesterdays, in hopes she’ll be OK, and when I’m no longer here, they shade her face from the glare…”. Wow. Now that’s the Jay-Z who became my favorite soloist ever talking right there.

The inspirational, clever, new-school but with old-school character, type of rapper that spoke so vividly that I shared his pain like it was mine!! Where has that Jay-Z gone? Is it age robbing him or his fascination with Beyonce? I don’t know. I think dude just took too much time off personally. You can’t do that in the American rap industry and think you can come right back ruling things. Rap in America is a dog eat dog world in which your star will maybe shine for about 30 seconds if you’re lucky until the next tidal wave of innovation drowns you into obsoleteness. So does the impressive last song on the album represent an aging, dying man’s last gasp? Or does it represent signs of a man on cardiac arrest starting to show real signs of serious life? As a former Jay-Z Loyalist I hope it’s the latter. But this effort IS NOT ENOUGH!!! Download tracks 1-5 and track 14 and go about your business!! I can’t in good faith recommend folks buy this album as it’s not consistent enough.

Benz0
Contact Benz0: BenzWritings@Hotmail.com

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