Jay-Z’s “American Gangster” is pure soul disguised as hip-hop
Jay-Z has gotten a lot of mileage out of his hustler/CEO persona, and at some point you would expect him to start to chaff under the title of worlds most successful everything. Last year’s “Kingdom Come” certainly didn’t feel like the Hov of old. When he admitted on the title track, “Got to admit a lil’ bit I was sick of rap,” it was abundantly evident. As a plus-thirty MC who currently sits in the corner office of a multi-million dollar recording company, it can’t be easy to find things to rap about. Maybe, he really hates that guy who takes his parking spot all the time? Or maybe he comes up with a withering critique of the mediocrity of Bic pens compared to his exquisite, diamond-encrusted Mont Blanc? Perhaps he’ll just go to his old standby; talking about all the many units of drugs he used to move in his formative years.
Jay-Z has always rapped about how rich and powerful he is, and has always claimed to be the best rapper alive, but after 2003’s “The Black Album” he actually seemed to become the character he so much wanted to embody. Yes, he has more money than most people can even understand, and yes, his flow is to put it mildly, unstoppable. What now?
What he has lacked recently is inspiration (after all, there are only so many stanzas waiting to be written about how to brush dirt off one’s shoulder), but in “American Gangster” he has reignited his voice and outsized persona and wrapped it in sensuous, soul-inspired production that grooves along with his biting imagery. Imagine the “Shaft” theme song, backing some of the most pointed rhymes the Jigga Man has laid down. Even though the production is mostly 70’s throwback, Jay-Z casually invokes the ’80s much like the film that inspired the album. In “Blue Magic” he gives a history lesson all while getting his swagger on: “Whatever, hundred for the diamond chain/Can’t you tell that I came from the dope game/Blame Reagan for making me into a monster/Blame Oliver north and Iran-Contra/I ran contraband that they sponsored/Before this rhyming stuff we was in concert.” If you hadn’t noticed before now, the dude can turn a phrase.
Despite the rough narrative, the most salient aspect of the record as it turns out, is the production. The smooth horns that kick off “Roc Boys” invoke funky, soul records that lend “American Gangster” an instant sense of timelessness. This isn’t all backward looking groove samples, however, despite the laid back, hep-cat, aesthetic the emotions always boil close the surface. In “Sweet,” groovy break-beats punctuate the laid back delivery as Jay-Z takes us back to his own upbringing in the Marcy Projects and then his rise to the top. Say what you will about the movie that provides the title, “American Gangster” has all the trappings of a new hip-hop classic.
Grade: A
-chase.thompson@aggiemail.usu.edu