jay-z 101

On September 8, 2009 American hip-hop rapper Jay-Z released his eleventh studio album title “The Blueprint 3”.

The album was produced by Jay-Z (exec.), Kanye West (exec.), No I.D, Al Shux, The Inkredibles, Timbaland Swizz Beatz, The Neptunes, Jermone “Jroc” Harmon and Jeff Bhasker.

It also feature artist such as Rihanna, Kanye West, Alicia Keys, Young Jeezy, Swizz Beatz, Drake, J.Cole, Beyonce, Kid Cudi, Kanye West, Pharrell and Mr Hudson.

The album falls under the genre mainly hip-hop.

The first single to kick off the album is “D.O.A (Death of Auto-Tune)”.

It was written by him and produce by No I.D. The song starts of with a sound from a trumpet with accompaniment from drum patterns. In the chorus part of the track slow bass is being added in the mix.

The bridge of tracks is inspired by “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye” from Stem’s. This track somehow gave a little jazz feel with a combination of modern hip hop.

A music video has been made for the song. It starts when Jay-Z walk out from a car and walking in a basement. Inside the basement he started to rap with a band at the background. Jay-Z was also spotted in a room with 3 more other guys playing poker and drinking red wine.

In another scene Jay-Z was playing basketball with professional basketball LeBron James. The video ended up with multiple shots of explosion such as boxes of Auto-tune, wine bottles and a television.

The second single from the album is “Run This Town”. It features R&B singer Rihanna and rapper Kanye West.

It was written Jay-Z, Kanye West, E.Wilson, R.Fenty, A.Alata and produced by Kanye West, The Four Levels Of Existence. A sample was also taken from No I.D.

The song contains a mid tempo speed with stong bass beats as background music and a drum pattern. The starts by chorus being sang by Rihanna. After that, Jay-z rapping the lyrics of the song and later Kanye West rap his verse in the song.

In chorus part of the song, somehow a similar bird sound effect is being heard.
A music video has been released to promote the single. It started with a riot scene where people are holding sticks and fire torch. Later, Rihanna and Jay-Z are being spotted in the riot.

Jay-z started to rap his verse in a tunnel. Everyone in the video is seen wearing black clothes and attire. During Kanye West verse in the song, he is shown rapping in a broken, glass shattered BMW car.

Overall the album is good having good rap patterns and rhymes and well constructs song structure.

The album does carry some issues and message to the public such as in the single “D.O.A( Death of Auto-Tune)” that shows negative side of Auto-Tune effects.

While in other songs such as “Empire State of Mind” it shows the glory of New York City and the birth place of hip hop music, tracks, for example, “So Ambitious” shows everyone can achieve anything if they put their heart soul in it.

It will definitely be a good choice of rap album for this fall.