Since exploding at midnight on Monday, Watch the Throne has been Hip-Hop’s sole topic of conversation and now Jay-Z and Kanye add more fuel to the fire with the visuals to “Otis,” directed by Spike Jonze. Read the rest of this entry »

There’s no shying away from the similarities between the Ferrari Boyz and Jay-Z and Kanye’s Watch The Throne projects. Both pit two pair of established superstar rappers and both were released this week. The elephant in the room is the massive iTunes plateau the Roc Boys achieved Monday morning, but Gucci Mane and Waka Flocka insist that there is no reason to feel discouraged. Read the rest of this entry »

Throne week continues as viewers can tune into MTV for the premiere of tandems “Otis” video. Read the rest of this entry »

Sidney Lauren

Celine Dion Destroys Ron Artest’s Fragile World [With Leather]

The Watch The Throne Samples [HHIR]

Justin Timberlake Says NSYNC Was A Non-Factor [Bark+Bite]

That Morning Smoke Is Probably Going to Kill You [Gawker] Read the rest of this entry »

Never one to see fire and not play with it a bit, Kanye West, performing at the U.K.’s Big Chill music festival, stirred up a healthy dose of controversy this past weekend. “I walk through the hotel and I walk down the street, and people look at me like I’m f*cking insane, like I’m Hitler,” he said. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s official: Kanye & Jay defeated the pre-release album leak. But it’s Monday morning, the wait’s over and by now the majority of fans and onlookers have Watch The Throne in their possession. Already, everyone’s forming their opinions on what’s set to be one of the biggest releases of 2011, rating it from good to damn near enchanting. For those that haven’t listened but have it in their hearts to do so, check the stream below while you kill time in your cubicle. Then, we shall all gather and throw our two pennies into the comments section.

Remember, the regular and Deluxe versions are now available for purchase. Personally, I’m holding out to purchase a physical copy and saving bread for the tour tickets.

Update: As the worldwide listening session continues, we decided to bring the post back up to the top to hear more of what everyone’s reactions are so far. The fact that it makes our Monday way easier is a great by-product as well. The easy route? Why, yes it is. But let’s face the fact, nobody gives a sh*t about much else happening musically so we may as well stay right here and chat.

Previously: Did Kanye & Jay-Z Defeat The Watch The Throne Album Leak?

Jay-Z and Kanye West’s announcement that Watch The Throne would be to be distributed digitally first then physical copies sold exclusively by Best Buy was met by an overwhelmingly negative response, and for good reason. Read the rest of this entry »

With just less than three days left, the Watch The Throne media blitz is now in full tizzy and they’re hitting us with a short promo clip to throw things over the top. Read the rest of this entry »

When Watch The Throne, the album, hits iTunes on August 8th, tickets will go on sale for one walloping tour featuring Jay and Kanye as they do 24 shows in support of the release. Read the rest of this entry »

If you thought the music to Jay-Z and Kanye West’s forthcoming Watch The Throne album was too rich for your blood, the independent retailers of the land feel the same way about the duo’s means to move the product all the same. Set for a release date of Aug. 8, the high-end rappers struck a deal with Best Buy and iTunes–two of the, if not the biggest names in music distribution today–for the exclusive rights to their move their record before everyone else. Read the rest of this entry »

Prepare to be whisked away to Sydney, Australia to join Jay and Kanye in the making of Watching The Throne, as seen in the ten minute mini-doc below. Read the rest of this entry »

The shot heard round the internet was fired late yesterday evening when the second leak from Jay-Z and Kanye West’s collaborative album, the highly-anticipated Watch the Throne, hit whatever passes for the “streets” these days. I was genuinely excited. All willpower in relation to my thoughts of waiting until the album’s release before listening to any of the songs were dashed when I saw that the leak was “Otis,” the track I was most interested in hearing after reading the various reports that came back from Jay’s impromptu listening session.

I put on my recently acquired Sennheiser (Thanks for the birthday gift, mom!) headphones, and settled in. When Otis Redding’s pained baritone wailed into my ears, immediately followed by an Easter Sunday organ stab and piano loop, a sense of relief washed over me. The Roc Boys were in the building and did not plan to disappoint.

The duo weaved between and around Redding’s voice, manipulated into a series of grunts and howls, in a display of back and forth rhyming that I’m sure put a smile on the faces of Jadakiss and Styles P as they began attempts to leap over the recently raised bar. Jay was at his charismatic best with lines like “photoshoot fresh/looking like wealth/I might call the paparazzi on my self.” He calmly rattled off boasts about private jets, multiple passports and Hublot watches, like you or I might talk about finding a route to work that saves ten minutes. Kanye was incorrigible. Couture level flow? His other-other Benz? The whole scene-stealing play on customer/accustomed? Murder. The pair of kings did not seem to be playing around, and the Hip-Hop world stood to benefit.

As I ran Jay-Z and Kanye’s foot-stomping soul swagger showcase back for the tenth time, I scrolled through my Twitter feed to capture the reactions of the people I follow. As expected, the responses orbiting around the Twitterverse ranged from blatant fanboyisms (to which I may have contributed), to arguments about who outshined who, to reasonable criticism and, of course, unbridled hate. Nothing in particular stood out until I saw this tweet from dream hampton, a writer for whom I have immense respect, and who I’ve read since I was a teen

Damn. Why’d you have to go and do that?

For the three minute running time of “Otis” I almost believed I was a multi-millionaire jet-setter. I could feel the coolness and weight of that Rolex on my wrist. I could smell the smoke from Cuban cigars as it wafted throughout my beachside cabana. Now I have to think about real life. I think about being an underemployed, wannabe writer, and how my ends are about as far away from meeting as The NBA owners and players. I remember that even with my own problems, I’m still doing a hell of a lot better than the nearly 10 percent of Americans that don’t have a job at all. Hampton’s tweet made me wonder: Is it irresponsible for rappers to flaunt wealth to such a degree during such harsh economic times?

Make no mistake; Jay-Z and Kanye were not the first rappers to flaunt their material wealth. Many of us remember The Sugar Hill Gang’s rhymes about Lincoln Continentals and sunroof Cadillacs. However, over the past decade, it seems as if the ante keeps being raised to a level where very few, if any, of us will ever be able to have a seat at the table. Watch the Throne’s golden cover art looks like something Indiana Jones would kill 50 natives to have, not like something that belongs in Best Buy. The aforementioned cover art was designed by Givenchy’s Creative Director Riccardo Tisci for god’s sake. I’m still not 100% sure how to pronounce Givenchy or Tisci. Bentley became the new Benz and Bugatti the new Bentley. Private jets are the new limos. Islands are the new mansions. How can we stand to listen to this when so many of us don’t have two nickels to rub together? Why do we let so many rappers get away with these braggadocios lyrics?

The recession is far from over, but it’s been three years since Young Jeezy became the first major label emcee to talk about the recession without mentioning being too rich for it to affect him. I looked for more to follow his lead, but most didn’t. Are Hip-Hop listeners like the poor tea party voters who vote for legislation that helps the richest people in the country, despite their own humble circumstances? Have we succumbed to some delusion that we can ascend to the rarefied air occupied by our favorite rap stars, and like to listen to them as they keep our seats warm in anticipation of our arrival? Is it just an escape, like Bond films and HBO’s Entourage? Are we tuning out the content, and concentrating solely on well put together verses and/or ear-pleasing production?

The truth is I don’t know why boasts like the ones in “Otis” and countless other Hip-Hop songs don’t bother me, but I do wish that more mainstream artists spoke for the people who are its biggest consumers. In the meantime, I’ll keep listening to Jay, Kanye and others ball out better than everyone else in the business, but hope to hear a rounder version of the country’s economic story more frequently.

“I made ‘Jesus Walks,’ I’m never going to Hell, Couture level flow, it’s never going on sale.”

Flex gives us the first Watch The Throne leak since “H.A.M.” Read the rest of this entry »

The royal rappers are sure becoming great at promoting their highly anticipated album, Watch The Throne, with nary a leak, snippet or soundbyte for the general public. Ever since the release of the album cover/tracklisting, the Internet has been burgeoning with excitement, mainly because the details surrounding the project have shrouded in Da Vinci coding. Read the rest of this entry »

Even though SXSW took place in March, the release of Watch The Throne’s official tracklist has offered this footage new life and Vevo is poised to fully take advantage. Read the rest of this entry »