Are you excited for the new Jay-Z/Samsung collab?

[Incandenza]

http://youtu.be/B--ZARCwSIE

I think his previous collaboration albums with R Kelly and Linkin Park are some of his best work, so I'm definitely excited for this.

 

[Incandenza]

How long until I get some hot thinkpieces on What This Means for Contemporary Hip-Hop. Slate's letting me down so far.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

smh

 

[Byron The Bulb]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCAGUlWfCRM

 

[Byron The Bulb]

Jay-Z, like The Simpsons, has now been lousy for longer than he was great.

 

[Sesquipedaliantique]

Nah. 1996 - 2003/2006 - 2013. Give him another year.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

I dunno, looking back most of those pre-Kingdom Come guest verses from 04 and 05 were, if not as bad as what came after, actually pretty mediocre and were clearly pointing forward to the garbage that was on the horizon.

 

[Incandenza]

I don't mind that Jay-Z keeps releasing shitty records, but I really wish other artists would stop letting him fart all over otherwise perfectly good songs. (Justin Timberlake's "Suit & Tie" and The-Dream's "High Art" being recent examples.)

 

[Byron The Bulb]

http://pitchfork.com/news/51413-listen-jay-z-holy-grail-ft-justin-timberlake/

ahahaha this is so bad

 

[Byron The Bulb]

This sounds more like Coldplay than that song on Kingdom Come that Chris Martin produced.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

The Nirvana interpolation is maybe the most embarrassing moment of Jay-Z's career, and that covers a lot of ground.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

This is such a train wreck I can't stop listening to it

 

[Brooklyn Zoo]

did you get through the album?

 

[Byron The Bulb]

I haven't even tried. Maybe once it's on Spotify I'll liveblog it.

 

[Brooklyn Zoo]

Do it

 

[Byron The Bulb]

OK HERE WE GO

 

[Byron The Bulb]

01. "Holy Grail" - I covered this above. Skip.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

02. "Picasso Baby" - "It ain't hard to tell/I'm the new Jean-Michel/Surrounded by Warhols/My team ball" UGH. This is just embarrassing. Rapping about an art collection could be novel in the right hands but this song just takes standard brand name-dropping luxury rap tropes and replaces "Ralph Lauren" with "Basquiat." Lazy as all get out. Could be read as an unintentional commentary on the status of art in late capitalist society, tho

 

[Byron The Bulb]

03. "Tom Ford" - As if it wasn't already clear, the name of this song alone makes it clear that this album is the audio equivalent of an ad in Vanity Fair. "Fuck hashtags and retweets" seems like a pretty disingenuous thing to say on an album that was built for corporatized social media distribution.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

04. "Fuckwithmeyouknowigotit" (ft. Rick Ross) - This beat sounds kinda cool I guess. Neat buzzsaw guitar line thing. Though like every other song so far, there's absolutely no sense of urgency or forward momentum at all, which leads to feelings of "where the fuck is this going?" and "when will this end?" More than half-way through and at least 80% of the song so far is just Rick Ross repeating the title. Oh now Jay-Z is doing the same thing. Holy shit this is bad. What a waste of a beat.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

These Advanced Auto Parts ads are a breath of fresh air. At least these blatant commercial creations don't have the dour pretensions of art attached.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

05. "Oceans" - "Dope boy still smelling like cocaina." "I'm on an ocean/I'm in heaven/YACHT.....Ocean 11" jesus christ I can't listen to anymore. It sounds like he's trying to bring back his late 90s flow here and it's just making me want to go listen to The Dynasty instead, and I never want to listen to The Dynasty.

 

[Brooklyn Zoo]

You should wash this down with a review of Yeezus

 

[Byron The Bulb]

06. "FUTW" - I wonder what that acronym stands for. There are so many points on this album where he just starts ignoring the beat and says random phrases like it's supposed to be a hook or something, but it's never catchy or hooky. Oh, "fuck up this world." god this shit is so boring. this song has only been on for three minutes and it feels more like seven. IT JUST GOES NOWHERE. NONE OF THESE SONGS GO ANYWHERE.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

07. "Somewhereinamerica" - What is this new song naming convention, dude? Why are you running these words together? This beat has some cool noises on it, especially the piano figure, but once again the insufferable jackass rapping on it ruins everything. Last minute (of a 2.5 minute long song) is literally just him going "uh" and "yeah" and "hah" over orchestration. Calling this "self-parody" would be too kind.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

08. "Crown" - oh cool now he's rapping about signing athletes away from Scott Boras. I'm sure there are people out there who might find this sort of thing enjoyable, and I'm glad I don't personally know any of them. It sounds like he's running out of breath on some of these verses. If Jay-Z wasn't a member in good standing of the wealthy global elite this sorry display of rapping would be sad and pathetic, but as is it's just gag-inducing.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

Imagine if Jamie Dimon commissioned Damien Hirst to make a giant diamond encrusted shark as a monument to his own greatness. This is like that, but in audio form, and shittier.

 

[Byron The Bulb]

09. "Heaven" - Title of this makes me want to listen to the Talking Heads song of the same name. Think I'll just do that instead of listening to any more of this trash.

 

[Brooklyn Zoo]

lol

 

[Mickey Massuco]

09. "Heaven" - Title of this makes me want to listen to the Bryan Adams song of the same name. Think I'll just do that instead of listening to any more of this trash.

nah bro you gotta finish, this is a good review.