#Jay z blueprint 2 original full
#Jay z blueprint 2 original plus
#Jay z blueprint 2 original mac

#Jay z blueprint 2 original plus

On your first album you have an entire lifetime’s worth of experiences to reflect on, plus you have the advantage of anonymity, the element of surprise. If hip-hop history has taught us anything, it’s that it is much harder to make a great follow-up than it is to make a hot debut. He came back to New York and tied up the loose ends, including several clutch tracks from Just Blaze, but “Izzo” was already in constant rotation on HOT 97 by mid June. In little more than a week he’d completed the lion’s share of the LP, drenched in soul and wrought with deep introspection. Over that long weekend Hova found the clarity to communicate his unique position, and the songs just started flowing. Jay was also awaiting two criminal trials, one for gun possession, and another for assault.īesieged in his hometown, Jay absconded to Miami during Memorial Day of 2001 with beat CDs from Kanye West and Bink. Rumors of a night club run-in with Fat Joe’s Terror Squad, and of a champagne-bottle clubbing of Jay, ran rampant in NYC. On random mixtapes, Prodigy rambled about, “Nah, we ain’t the Roc.we ain’t them faggots.” Nas quietly stewed over Jay’s clandestine relationship with Carmen, the Queens rapper’s baby’s mother, and fired not-so-subliminal shots back and forth with Memphis Bleek. It would be fair to say that as he recorded TBP Jigga was both the King of New York, and of rap in general.Īs his run started to enter unprecedented territory, Jay began to raise his competitors’ ire-particularly in New York.

Most of the dominant rappers from the RD era-2Pac, Snoop, Biggie, The Fugees, Wu-Tang, Mobb Deep, even Nas-had either lost it or were no longer alive. Over the preceding two years, he had dropped five Top 40 hits. Jay-Z was coming off The Dynasty-his fourth straight platinum album. The context surrounding TBP couldn’t have been more different. Hov was blatantly bogarting the scene, emulating Nas and Big, and using his own capital to make himself seem like their peer. In many ways RD was Jay-Z buying his way into the game, a fact that he would reference on “U Don’t Know” from TBP: “I came into this motherfucker a hundred grand strong.” It's not like he got all those beats and guest artists because everyone was checking for him at the time. Written by Insanul Ahmed ( by every record label, he and Dame started their own. So click through, read up, and find out why The Blueprint gets top honors in the Hov Hall of Fame. Yeah, we said it: The Blueprint is better. We already picked Jay's 100 Best Songs so we decided it was time to settle the big debate once and for all, so we broke each album down on the basis of twelve crucial categories, from beats and flows right down to cover art.īased on our scientific analysis of both, Complex can finally put an end to all the speculation-way beyond a reasonable doubt. Now that we’ve reached the 10-year anniversary of The Blueprint, this argument’s gotten to be as old as a 5th grader.

#Jay z blueprint 2 original mac

It’s a never-ending debate, the hip-hop version of Lebron vs Kobe, Pepsi vs Coke, Mac vs PC. 1 are dope too, and American Gangster is better than it usually gets credit for-but it always boils down to RD vs TBP.

#Jay z blueprint 2 original full

Which is better: Jigga’s 1996 debut? Or his sixth studio album-released a full decade ago, in the midst of his epic battle with Nasty Nas? That’s why the debate rages on in Internet comment sections, in barber shops, in the Complex offices, and any other place rap fans happen to congregate.

You love to have the argument, again and again: what’s the best Jay-Z album, Reasonable Doubt or The Blueprint? Both are absolute classics in every sense of the word-but only one can reign supreme.