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Isaiah Rashad spoke with Life + Times to decode “Tranquility,” a song off of his EP, Cilvia Demo. While most lyrics merely harp on how hard it is growing up in an impoverished street life, Isaiah cleverly speaks on “co-existing within the peace and bullshit, the good and the bad.” “All my purposes in my verses, be  in the first line,” he begins as he breaks down the song that helped him find peace with knowing that sometimes you just aren’t able to change what happens within the world. He also speaks on being consciously aware that he wasn’t just another person that was oblivious to the effect his lyrics have on people in his personal life. Watch Isaiah decode “Tranquility” below.

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The Pusha T theme continues at RESPECT. Check out this video of a very candid Pusha Ton breaking down the inspiration and meaning behind his bars from “Doesn’t Matter,” which also features French Montana. The song is a breakout track from January’s Wrath of Caine which you can cop here. Pusha’s My Name is My Name is due later this year, and it is going to be a banger. Yuchk!

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As we steadily approach A$AP Rocky‘s debut album’s in-store release (Jan. 15), Life+Times asked the pretty flaco to decode the first song off of his album, “Long Live ASAP.” He details how the beat reminded him of the last decade’s New Orleans scene and he uses third-person in the track to emphasize that. “I’m putting myself in the existence of a 22-year-old New Orleans/Magnolia trapper.”

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If anyone was going to bring advertising and street art together in real hip-hop style, it’d be none other than Jay-Z, of course. Droga5, the advertising company that marketed Jay-Z’s book Decoded won an Outdoor Grand Prix Award on Tuesday. The advertising campaign literally hit the streets and posted the pages of Jay-Z’s book where it all happened.

Watch the video for full details about how the whole thing came together. This project was epic.

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Oprah recently launched her OWN (literally) network.  One of the flagship series on the network will be the “Master Class” series.  A mini-series about the backgrounds and driving forces of some of the most influential individuals in various fields.  The series debut with a look into Jay-Z’s life, career and motivations.  The documentary is like the Cliff Notes for Jay-Z’s book “Decoded”.

Watch more clips HERE.

via Da Best Of

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Continuing on with this weeks theme of books, I now present you Jay-Z‘s memoir Decoded. Starting this past Monday, to up the hype factor for this book (as if Jay needed any hype),  passages from the book are on display in various locations throughout New York City, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Miami and London until the books November 16 release date. The locations of the passages will correlate to Jay-Z’s musings in that excerpt:

“If in certain pages Jay-Z is talking about something related to Times Square, then those pages might be on billboards in Times Square,” said David Droga, creative chairman Droga5, the New York agency heading the campaign.”

About half of the passages will be traditional outdoor advertising, like billboards, but according to Droga there will also be some more unique placements, because Jay-Z is anything but regular. Look out for Jay-Z’s writing printed on the bottom of hotel swimming pools, on the lining of jackets in store displays and on the felt table of pool tables (pictured above).

For more information read the New York Times article.

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