Can't Knock the Hustle?

that jay-z felt a revelation of sorts after his viewing of the upcoming American Gangster and has decided to make an album based on it shouldn't be news to anybody who pays attention to music. but this shit gets a lot weirder the more i think i about it, and trust me i think about it quite a bit. but here goes: the album is loosely based on memories and past experiences that jay hadn't been able to really rap about for years that were culled from his viewing session of said film. its not the official soundtrack, and suprisingly enough there doesnt seem to be any huge tie-in with the film either, actually jay claims he is going to make his own 40 minute film tittled american gangster (?) that from what i hear has relatively nothing to do (scratch that, nothing at all) with the original movie and seemingly won't even detail jays drug slinging days, but that of his fathers or uncles or something. so we've got a nearly forty year old legend using a movie as an excuse to lay out a non commercial (for jay-z anyway) concept album detailing the rise and fall of a drug dealer, this is a major jump from the dude who premiered the lead single from his last album in just about the most extravagant way possible.

as fucked up as all of this sounds its actually the coolest sounding thing this side of "in rainbows", the lead single was given its own teaser trailer and was gifted with one of pharrell's "hell hath no fury" sounding beats(crooner Bilal closed off that album, seems the same is happening on AG, jay's taking the right ideas from the right people here), and jay demolishes it with a seemingly hidden for the past ten years rakimish flow. apperantly those steely synths didn't fit into the flow with the rest of the album, so the single, with it's hype williams directed video that helps to remind us jay is talking about drugs again gets kicked on to the end of the cd as a bonus track. not that jay really needs to worry about not highlighting a single and video that probably cost too much to think about, dude most likely literally wipes his ass with thousands. he's ecstatic about this new shit, claiming in interviews hes in a "zone" he hasn't been in for years. jay is also deciding to follow his part of the deal and allowing nas to be on a song on this one, after their too good to be true matchup on hip-hop is dead, plus beans (!) is on the revamped ignorant shit, a track leftover from the black album. speaking of beans, hes got a new disc coming out, as does freeway (finally). plus unless jay was just bullshitin i'm pretty sure the roc is gonna come very very hard in the next year. better even, the other greatest rapper alive drops in for hello brooklyn 2.0, a track meant for tha carter III, jay heard it and needed, wayne obliged. i don't quite understand how a song about weezy hollering at a girl from brooklyn fits in with jays supposed story arc here, but fuck it. a lot of people have been waiting a long time for this, and it sounds great.