Jay-Z reached his peak 10+ years ago on The Blueprint...right?

[TheDarceKnight]

In hindsight Im glad he did that. It made AG an even stronger album and idk if ignorant shyt would fit in TBA. As far as Justify My Thug tho

For what it's worth the original Ignorant shyt had no Sigel, just 3 Jay verses.

 

[Finelli]

nah WTT, AG and Black album were fire

Were they really? Or are you an the 12 people that dapped you just Jay-Z stans?

 

[Osmar]

your not allowed to have your own opinions here?

 

[Dusty Bake Activate]

Jay Z hasn't been an "elite emcee" since 97? His music is "obsolete"? Some of you are so disconnected from reality it's funny. It's easy to spot those that live through the Internet.

No he hasn't. I'm glad I remember rap in the 80's and early 90's before the "swag era" when rappers became personalities to be package and commodified then sold so I know what emceeing is.

Jay is probably somewhere between my 5th to 7th favorite rapper of all time, but I'm objective, so often on this board I find myself playing the contrarian role against the tidal wave of Jay stannery here.

As I said, Jay's solo discography is probably top 3 all time, top 5 at worst. But so many of you can't seem to grasp that there is a difference between quality of album output and emceeing talent.

Many people would say Young Jeezy has one of the best bodies of work in recent memory. But you would have to be a moron to call Jeezy a great emcee. He just spits lazy trap/baller/shyt over hot beats with a infectious delivery and people feel it or relate to it whatever. He's makes albums people like, he isn't a great emcee.

Kanye has one of best recent bodies of work, but he isn't an elite emcee by any means. He is an elite producer. Rick Ross has been dropping heat. And while he can give you an occasional line of verse that's impressive, he's for the most part a burger and fries rapper. Burger and fries ain't fukking with filet mignon or lobster, but Five Guys hits the spot sometimes. Talib Kweli is obviously a better emcee than Rick Ross by far. But Ross' last few albums have gotten a lot more plays on my iPod then Kweli's last few. Take someone like Aceyalone, who I'm sure 99% of The Booth has never even heard of, but he is in all honesty one of the most talented and amazing emcees who ever lived. He just can't make an album people want to listen to to save his life. You get the point.

And by no means am I saying Jay is on Rick Ross/Jeezy or Kanye level. He's better than them BY FAR. But I still don't think he's performed at an ELITE level since since In My Lifetime, Vol. 1...that doesn't mean he hasn't been very, very, good. When you look at his content/subject matter, depth, complexity, poetic ability, wordplay, rhyme schemes, delivery/mic presence, voice, I don't see him as being elite unless you greatly over-value delivery and mic presence, which he's never lacked.

He was on Reasonable Doubt, which I see as one of the greatest emcee performances on an album ever. And he continued that into Vol. 1. Then after that while he still made good albums, his emceeing ability fell off a cliff. He "dumbed down for his audience to double his dollars," which he himself admitted, but his stans still defend him like he didn't. He scaled back his profound, introspective, thoughful rhymes and started spitting bubblegum pop rap bullshyt with greater frequency. Jay gets away with more bars and verses than any all-time great emcee, btw. You could fill up several pages of a book with bullshyt ass bars like "I got a Hublot I call it Tebow, I strap that bytch with a gator band, y'all nikkas ball halftime, y'all nikkas like the gator band."

Even on The Blueprint, which most would agree was a great album and you can argue it was the best album of that decade, he was still mostly just spitting shallow swag, flashy rap shyt like that previous poster said. It was buoyed by the great production and his sheer force of will and personality.

Other than RD and In My Life vol. 1, Jay is pretty much just a man sucking his own dikk for 45 min-1 hr on every album. He's at his best when he's speaking introspectively about his experiences or just on some braggodocious emcee shyt. But even introspective experience stuff overall kinda pales in comparison to being able to speak on larger issues of worldly matters in a way that's poetic and poignant, which is something someone like Nas or Andre 3000 does brilliantly, but Jay, not so much. And Jay's introspective "deep" rhymes are usually just self-praise in a back-handed fashion.

So you can easily argue Jay has a better body of work than Nas, Andre 3000, Posdnous, Common, Black Thought, Ghostface Killah, Ras Kass, Killah Priest, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, GZA, Pharoah Monch, or Lupe Fiasco, but is he a better emcee? Nope.

 

[FukyourFort]

nah jay z still nice.

 

[Gravity]

No he hasn't. I'm glad I remember rap in the 80's and early 90's before the "swag era" when rappers became personalities to be package and commodified then sold so I know what emceeing is.

Jay is probably somewhere between my 5th to 7th favorite rapper of all time, but I'm objective, so often on this board I find myself playing the contrarian role against the tidal wave of Jay stannery here.This is what I mean by when I say that people like you are disconnected with reality. You're not objective in the least. Everything you're saying about Jay Z is subjective, meaning it's just your personal opinion. Your problem is that you need to get over yourself and your opinion. Your opinion doesn't hold anymore weight than the people you refer to as stans. Jay Z has been considered an elite mc all throughout his career. You can personally disagree with that consensus opinion but you can't deny that reality.

As I said, Jay's solo discography is probably top 3 all time, top 5 at worst. But so many of you can't seem to grasp that there is a difference between quality of album output and emceeing talent. I don't think that people have trouble understanding that concept. Again, I think that your having trouble understanding that your personal opinion is just that, a personal opinion. You want to act as if your personal opinion outweighs everybody else's. Just because you don't think that Jay Z is an elite emcee doesn't mean that all the people who feel that he is are wrong.

Many people would say Young Jeezy has one of the best bodies of work in recent memory. But you would have to be a moron to call Jeezy a great emcee. He just spits lazy trap/baller/shyt over hot beats with a infectious delivery and people feel it or relate to it whatever. He's makes albums people like, he isn't a great emcee.

Kanye has one of best recent bodies of work, but he isn't an elite emcee by any means. He is an elite producer. Rick Ross has been dropping heat. And while he can give you an occasional line of verse that's impressive, he's for the most part a burger and fries rapper. Burger and fries ain't fukking with filet mignon or lobster, but Five Guys hits the spot sometimes. Talib Kweli is obviously a better emcee than Rick Ross by far. But Ross' last few albums have gotten a lot more plays on my album then Kweli's last few. Take someone like Aceyalone, who I'm sure 99% of The Booth has never even heard of, but he is in all honesty one of the most talented and amazing emcees who ever lived. He just can't make an album people want to listen to to save his life. You get the point.Yes, I get the point. Your point seems to be that your personal opinion holds more weight than the average person's opinion. My response once again is to get over yourself. You seem to think that theres a right or wrong answer to how good an emcee is based on your personal opinions as preferences. Just because you think that Kweli is a better emcee than Ross doesn't mean that he is. Ross and Kweli run in 2 different lanes, they're competing in different races. Who's to say that Ross isn't capable of doing what Kweli does? You? Who's to say that Kweli is capable of doing what Ross does? Its the samething sith Jay Z. Jay is running in a didferent lane than he was in the 90's. He's a completely different rapper catering to a different audience. You take none ofthat into consideration. You not only need to get over yourself you need to open your mind. The ability to write hits is a skill, what Ross does requires skill. What Jeezy does requires skill. You personally may appreciate technical emcee skills over the ability to write songs that appeals to the masses, but so what that's you. Other people obviously have different tastes.

I'll end it right here because I'll just end up repeating the same thing over and over. The bottom line is my man, get over yourself. Everybody has an opinion, and yours doesn't hold any extra weight.

 

[Ridickulous]

Black Album and American gangster are both straight crack...what are you smokin? BP3 kingdom come, and watch the throne were ehhh

 

[Griffith]

everytime i log on theres an anti jay-z thread popping

 

[msa13]

No Church in the Wild? N***** in Paris? Gotta Have It?!?! New Day? Who Gon Stop Me? Murder to Excellence?!?!?! Why I Love You?!?! How the hell is that anything but fire. And aside from a few fun songs there was a lot more serious subject matter than most successful hiphop albums these days. Time will favor WTT as Kanye also added his touch giving the beats variation verse to verse.

 

[labelplant]

Were they really? Or are you an the 12 people that dapped you just Jay-Z stans?

Actually 18 people dapped me But ya obviously I have a point if so many people agree, all of them can't be Jay Z stans. Just because I like Nas more and many other artists for that matter, doesn't mean Jay hasn't put out great music. I mean have you listened to the albums I listed? If you have and think they suck, either you just have a predetermined hate for Hov or your music taste is

BTW, I think this is the most dapped comment I've had on the board so far, so thanks guys and keep dapping. I'm glad to see that there is so many knowledgeble hip hop heads on this site and for the most part people like my posts. Makes me and just feel good about being a life time hip hop fan (read: nerd).

 

[heisenburrr]

these kind of threads are why the spot fell off so bad it's almost not even worth checking out anymore

 

[mvp_status]

The verses are fire, but the hook is ehh, and the beat is average as hell by DJ Quik standards.

9th Wonder's version is fantastic

Jay-Z - Justify My Thug (9th Wonder Remix) - YouTube

damn this shyt went from to

 

[BIGDENNIS10UK]

Jays been selling out for years, he's good but coulda been great.

 

[labelplant]

damn this shyt went from to

That justify my thug kind of grew on me after a while but the 9th version is way better, most def.

 

[MegaTronBomb!]

these kind of threads are why the spot fell off so bad it's almost not even worth checking out anymore

did you ever have a plat thread on that piece of shyt site?

my jay hate threads was weekly, and did numbers since 08.

this is where you brag about your real life, and how you dont really care about the internet like that.