Original art by Julia Schur, (aging this photo).

For some time now, Jay Z has been rap’s most involved elder statesman. He’s been a made man since the late ’90s, and for our genre, that’s an eternity ago. Jay keeps putting out music, but once he passed the torch and completed the trilogy that began with his most highly acclaimed record (and got married), he became an old timer. Jay has certainly come to carry himself in such a way too, always giving off a stately, polished, much-too-rich-to-be-here type of presence that surpasses even the most cocksure moments of his career’s earlier eras. With this status of hip-hop tenure, it’s easy to begin to slip, which Jay undoubtedly has. But every so often, a more passionate, inspired Hova comes back and reminds everyone just why it is he’s one of hip-hop’s the world’s most powerful men, and one of music’s most respected artists. Here are Jay Z’s best verses since gaining Old Man Hov status. (Roughly, we’re drawing from everything 2010 and onward.)

10. “Heaven,” Verse 2, Magna Carta Holy Grail

Jay sounds particularly reinvigorated here. From the exasperated way he opens and delivers that clever little line about “baggage” at heaven’s gates, to the quick adoption of Chief Keef‘s flow, to that inspired image of the angel wings on his Lambourghini, Hov’s dancing all over the place in the best way possible. Also, relating religion’s dividing powers to his Maybach’s partition is just quintessential Jay Z as a philosopher / millionaire.

9. “The Devil Is A Lie,” Mastermind

After what most felt was an overall sluggish performance on Magna Carta, “The Devil Is A Lie” was what convinced many that Hov still had the fire in him, whether or not it was doused in a little D’usse (which gets a pretty terrible reference here). Jay’s nimble flow at the verse’s opening and his cocky energy throughout are what make his spot on Ross’s record special. Well, that and when he puts White Jesus in his crock pot, calling the accepted image out as bullshit, and adds soda to make Jesus (who is of course, Jay here) into his truer, blacker self.

8. “Mr. Nice Watch,” Cole World: The Sideline Story

This verse was widely overlooked, and even called “phoned in,” likely because of the seemingly repetitive nature of the first few lines. Jay does rhyme “band” with “band” and “wound up” with “wind up,” but the way he puts a new meaning on each repetition, and builds the complex punches around the theme of watches and time is pretty damn masterful. He goes on to, with quicker pacing, pull the same trick again, saying he’ll “Put the front on the back of the ‘Bach like a boss / So I’m fronting on niggas when I’m backing off.” Stunting at its finest.

7. “New Day,” Watch The Throne

The entirety of this verse’s strength comes from its second half. When Jay moves past the relatively uninteresting “Paparazzi sucks” warning to his future child, he begins to speak with true substance. Setting himself up with a great line about finding his path at 26 (which is the age he got his first record credit) and wanting to start his son out at 13, Jay gives commanding advice about speaking with conviction before showing some true vulnerability as his mind wanders to a possible split between him and the child’s mother. The last line really lets the doubt soak through, as Jay promises to never repeat his deadbeat dad’s ways. “Never repeat ’em…never repeat ’em,” he echoes, showing just how close Jay is worried he might be to his father.

6. “No Church In The Wild,” Verse 1, Watch The Throne

To properly open Watch The Throne in epic fashion, Jay bombards with vivid, dramatic images. “Lies on the lips of a priest” might have more distinct detail and tangibility than the entirety of Jay’s raps on the rest of the album. It’s moments like that that show the man still has a love for language somewhere inside him. Next, Hov quotes one of Plato’s most interesting questions: “Is Pious pious cause God loves pious?” The question is ultimately asking what humans truly bow to: the opinion of themselves or of gods, and further, who should interpret the word of god? Considering the album’s goliath nature, fewer questions could be more relevant.

5. “Glory,” Verse 2

There have been so few occasions throughout Jay Z’s career where he really wore his heart on his sleeve, but this song, and this verse in particular, might be the best and most bare example. Opening up with a line about his own subpar father, Jay pulls in that same doubt that we saw on “New Day,” but moves on to the more immediate concerns of being a (famous) father that that hypothetical on WTT could never reach, like spoiling Blue. The verse grows even more personal as Jay reveals that Bey miscarried on their first try for a child. It’s not a particularly innovative or slick line, but the joy in his voice when he says “nah baby, you magic!” is undeniably powerful and, most of all, human. Additionally, Hov closes out with those sweet lines about Blue being the child of Destiny, and while it’s a good punchline, it’s even better knowing that he really earned them by taking us through the troubling road to this glory.

You’re a child of destiny
You’re the child of my destiny
You’re my child with the child from Destiny’s Child

4. “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe” (Remix)

While it was largely overshadowed by Kendrick‘s show-stopping third verse, Jay let off a pretty dope verse to cement his cosign of K.Dot as, already, one of the greats of his time. Jay’s a little slow getting started, but he does exude a solid distillation of that above-it-all Jay Z cool, as he feigns frustration with gossip and wind pockets: “Up in the clouds, me and my spouse…Turbulence, shit, I almost spilled my drink.” When he speeds up to a more rapid-fire flow, his writing gets denser. The “million dollar baby” punchline is great, but it leads to possibly the best one-off line of this entire era for Jay: “Sittin’ next to Hillary smelling like dank.” Jay Z tells truths (or at least plausible lies) that not only could no other rapper pull off, but few could even dream something that good.

3. “Shiny Suit Theory,” Pre-Act II

Much like that destiny’s child line from “Glory,” one of the best moments on Jay’s “Shiny Suit Theory” feature is a play with homophones and homonyms. Kicking off the theme of the “insanity” of how far Jay’s come from his humble beginning, he contrasts his time “warrin’ with undercovers” to landing on “covers with Warren Buffet.” It’s “warrin’ to Warren.” Jay Z’s genius has always been delivering wisdom and wit with slogan-like slickness. Jay only makes you work a little bit to understand him, and is always sure to make that work well worth it. By the time we reach the verse’s end and Jay Z is wedging the picture of his inexplicable success into a larger, societal frame, we truly understand the “insanity” theme. “Since when did black men become kings,” he asks. Well, those who see the truth and future are often pegged as crazy.

2. “Oceans,” Verse 1, Magna Carta Holy Grail

Right off the bat, Jay is making distinct use of a powerful pallet: white and (vs) black. He still smells like the dope he left behind, and, because of the white echoed in his robe and boat, he still looks like it too. Hov then jumps from one past that can’t be forgotten (his) to the grander past that’s also hard to ignore as we stand with him on his yacht: “the oil spill that BP ain’t clean up.” Few lines in Jay’s career have been darker or sneered harder than that one. Another great example of Jay’s gift for slogans comes soon after: “The only Christopher we acknowledge is Wallace.” Wrapped up in that one small moment is an entire movement of reclaiming America as black culture and black culture as American, complete with the recasting of heroes and villains. Next, Jay continues to wield his palette wisely, contrasting his black card with the white cotton of Hermés. Both black and white are found in wealth here; we see how similar opposites can be, and how close the distance between “old” and “new” money (touched on later in the album) can feel.

It’s hard to believe that the same rapper who spits that terrible Ocean’s 11 line (twice!) is capable of producing such thought provoking material for the same verse, but we’ve known Jay’s complex for some time now.

1. “We Made It” (Remix)

There is  something about pressure of diss records that often bring out the lyrical best in them. “We Made It” is certainly a lot more complex than just being a warning to Drake, though. Even when Jay fires his real “shots” at Aubrey, he is light to medium teasing at best, calling him “Mrs. Drizzy,” before turning Drake’s (and many others’) complaints about Magna Carta on their head the way only a business–man could. Jay confronts the storied issue of what do street rappers write about once they’re rich and safe? by facing it head-on. He’s just rapping about his life in that moment, he argues. Further, in fact, he taunts, “Silly me rappin’ bout shit that I really bought,” as if going by any other model would be ridiculous. That’s the way a good Jay verse makes you feel–as if any other pick for the GOAT would be ridiculous. To paraphrase: you could have been anywhere else in the world right now, but you’re there with him.

Jay exhibits another great moment of condensing in the verse’s opening, as he wipes aside all previous shackles-to-jewelery punchlines with ease, painting the transition with refreshing crispness. The brevity of his motion–from slave ship to jeweler’s–somehow makes it all the more triumphant. From the very start, it’s a victory lap. Jay puts himself “onstage after 12 Years A Slave” with an Oscar-like bottle of champagne before going one step further, inserting himself in biblical times with an amazing stretch of lines. “Showed up to the last supper in some brand new J’s” might be the only line in Jay’s recent catalogue that can touch the Hillary line mentioned earlier.”You’re blind baby, blind to the fact of who you are, maybe,” stings with unbelievable precision considering how vague the actual wording and target are. Regardless of bearing in the real world, of which he often has tons, it remains that Jay Z is just on another level when it comes to saying the most piercing thing with the fewest words.

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Releasing lyrics to a song before releasing the actual song is a growing phenomenon in the hip-hop world. The artist formerly known as Jay-Z recently used this strange technique to promote his latest LP, but the results were pretty lame. Frank Ocean has done a much better job, probably because he’s not trying to cram an album down our throats.

Discussing Versace and much more, the Odd Future singer flexes his superb writing skills just as gracefully as you’d expect.  Headlines will try to frame the song as a Chris Brown diss, but there’s so much more going on. If you read the lyrics to the cadence of “Versace,” it’s even more rewarding. When the vocals are released, the fun will really begin, but for now, read along below.

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Elliott Wilson, editor-in-chief of RESPECT., meets with Jigga to discuss myriad topics from the rapper’s lengthy and loaded career. With Magna Carta Holy Grail as a starting point, Jay Z addresses everything from collaborating with Justin Timberlake and collecting art, to shooting the Samsung commercial without a script, counting digital sales, and having bigger things to worry about than paparazzi. A man who wears many hats, Hov contends that this spectrum of roles reflects his individuality, asking “What’s the sense of being successful if you can’t still be yourself?”

Watch the first part of the interview below, and stay tuned for part two, scheduled to be released later today.

Update: Part two is now available as well. Continue on. 

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With the release of his newest album, Magna Carta Holy Grail, Jay Z managed to yet again please listeners and earn himself his 13th No. 1 hit on the Billboard charts. Somewhere along the way he decided that he no longer needs the hyphen in his name. The rapper has wasted no time making the change and is officially referred to as JAY Z  on his website and iTunes page.

Billboard editor, Joe Levy leaked the grammatical change to the Twitter masses yesterday night.

Breaking: Jay Z has dropped the hyphen from his name, according to his label. I am not kidding. (Wish I was.) Copy editors: take note.

— Joe Levy (@RealJoeLevy) July 18, 2013

The change has been taking quick roots across the world wide web since Levy’s announcement. Throughout the progression of his career, Jay Z has embodied numerous aliases for himself. Whether it’s been Hov or Hova or S.Dot, Jay has frequently toyed with his name.

This isn’t big news, but it will be interesting to see if Jay‘s name change will be taken more or less seriously than Mos Def‘s. Yasiin Bey still hasn’t quite caught on yet.

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BBC’s Radio 1 has been releasing their Jay-Z interview in segments over the last few days, and now the whole thing is out there for our viewing pleasure. Over the course of an hour, Zane Lowe talks with Hov about the recording process of Magna Carta Holy Grail, arguments with Kanye, the downside to fame, sports management and life as a family man. Watch all four parts down below. If you don’t have time to watch the full interview, we’ve already compiled the best quotes.

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Jay-Z is continuing to build Magna Carta Holy Grail momentum, crossing the pond for an exclusive one-on-one with BBC Radio 1 DJ, Zane Lowe. Mr. Carter made the 3,687 mile trip to the historic Abbey Road Studios for an hour-long interview, where he spoke in-depth about the making of Magna Carta Holy Grail, his heated disagreement with Kanye West whilst making Watch The Throne, why he had to originally stop working with Timbaland, and how the birth of his daughter Blue Ivy impacted his focus. He also revealed why he strongly believes President Obama stands for a generation of youngsters who grew up like him, and whether we’ll ever see him on tour with Beyoncé at his side. For those of you who missed the in-depth interview, we compiled the 7 best things Jigga said.

On his four-day long dispute with Kanye West about the Watch The Throne album:

“We had this whole plan when me and Kanye did the Watch The Throne album that we would go right into our solos after that. Soon as I thought we had wrapped up Watch The Throne, I made two records. I had “Holy Grail” and “Oceans”, no lyrics on “Holy Grail”, and I recorded “Oceans”. And I played those records for Kanye, and he was like, ‘No those have to go on Watch The Throne’ so we spent four days arguing about those records and I was explaining to him why it wasn’t right for this project and I had a whole idea for making this album called Magna Carta… Holy Grail. The name came after. Four days, four days, literally arguing four days–not like fighting…well, there was some pushing at one point but not between us. Just everyone else got a little excited.”

On why, after the release of The Blueprint 3, he stopped working with Timbaland:

“The fall out happened at the end of that album [The Blueprint 3], it really happened, the way the album happened, a couple of songs were getting leaked that were his songs, and that whole thing just ruined the whole process and I wanted him and Kanye to produce. And Kanye, who was the Executive Producer of The Blueprint 3 was like ‘Yo, let’s get Tim, lets bring Tim in’ and we were all inviting to him and he just wasn’t accepting of the process, and it seemed like it was more about him than the actual album. When you’re going and making an album you have to put all egos aside. I’m putting egos aside, everyone has to put egos aside for the sake of the project, and he wasn’t accepting of that thing and that was almost like the last straw type of thing. So we just went our separate ways, and after those concerts, when he came back, I’d seen a new Timbaland. He has this maturity and this growth, and I was like ‘Oh okay, this is going to work out.’”

On the unexpected origins of Magna Carta‘s “BBC”:

“It was Pharrell’s 10th anniversary of BBC (Billionaire Boys Club). We went to the dinner, we hung out at the dinner. Nigo was there to honor Pharrell. We left from the dinner and we went to the studio. We got Nigo, Pharell, me, Bey. Justin was next door doing his thing, and Justin walks in. Tim was meeting Nas, so Nas walks in and I was like ‘Yo, what you doing here?’ He comes in the room, so now we got seven people and we’re around this console right here and I say, ‘If we don’t make a record tonight, shame on us’. You just hear the fun and the session was just party, you know.”

On the “hope” President Obama provides to the nation:

 “My thing is about hope, the hope that a person like Obama inspires in an entire nation, and even outside of the nation. Everyone outside of America was like ‘Wow’. It was a time when people were getting this aversion to America, you preach these ideals, but you don’t really practice theml and that was a major turn for us. Everyone’s getting a shot at it: any color, creed and we dealt with racism in America in that way, that there is a black president. It still exists…  of course it exists, but we dealt with that in some way. We have to deal with sexism of course, that’s the next thing. But what I support, other than that Obama is a great guy, a more than a capable president, is the hope that he represents to a generation of kids who grew up like me. They can achieve this American dream, I’m pretty much into that idea.”

On a potential tour with wife, Beyoncé:

“Its always floating out there, it’s floating out there. We just don’t want to make it a schnick (gimmick). It has to be the real thing, and its slowly making sense, more sense every day, every day it’s making more sense–as far as a tour, but not an album.”f

On what he believes his purpose is as a father and a person:

“I’ve always been pretty self correcting and wanting to grow, wanting to evolve as a person, so I was always thinking about ways, and thinking about the things that I was doing, and thinking about karma, and thinking about how can I further myself, learning from my mistakes and trying to be a better person and then something happens. When you get older, you’re ready to have a child and your world opens up and its just like all the things that you’ve been trying to learn, it just happens, it just happens for you if you’re ready.”

On his daughter Blue Ivy’s persona and impact on him:

“Very thoughtful and very inside of her own mind, pretty much like her Pop. She will answer in her own time. The birth of my child gave me this new energy and focus.”

Zane Lowe’s four-part interview with Jay-Z will be aired today through to Thursday on his Radio 1 show.

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