Jay-Z Doesn't Have Much To Give You

Welcome to Listening Habits, a column where I share the music and musical topics I’ve been fixated on recently.

For the longest time I complained that rap music wasn't getting the Hollywood documentary treatment it deserved. While I've enjoyed experimental, in-depth docs for The Velvet Underground, David Bowie, Kurt Cobain, and of course, Bob Dylan, I felt that this kind of serious, prestigious treatment should've been given to our best rappers. And for the most part, over the last couple years, we've started getting that: an astounding docuseries on 2pac and Afeni Shakur, a documentary on the Notorious B.I.G. using home video footage never seen before, an extensive, long-gestating documentary of Kanye throughout his descent into madness, and now an 8-part series about Jay-Z on HBO, shot by Bradford fuckin' Young. And you know what, I'm still complaining.

Many of these projects are flawed or exercises in mythology forming, but Jay-Z in 8 in particular follows an absurd conceit, which is that it is interesting to watch Jay-Z and Rick Rubin—the Peter Thiel of the music industry—use therapy words to each other about rap for like six hours. But its in black-and-white, so you know it must be important. Jay-Z in 8 sees Jay talking through his lyrics for a selected playlist put together by professional playlist maker Rick Rubin, and from these lyrics we are going to expand into the larger history of Jay-Z the artist. Not to be confused with Jay-Z: Decoded, the book in which he essentially does the same thing, or Rick Rubin's podcast where he asks the same kinds of questions. This docuseries—which could've been a documentary movie, but really should've just been a podcast—caps off this year of Jay-Z, where he's celebrated the anniversaries of Reasonable Doubt and The Blueprint with a Roots Picnic performance and sold out shows in London, Los Angeles, and Yankee Stadium in New York. Whether he is gearing up for a new album or a Super Bowl performance or both, he has used this year to effectively market the continued surplus value of Jay-Z as an industry.

Maybe that's a cynical take, but its hard to get anything else out of this show. No one has been better at saying as little as possible while keeping people on the hook than Jay. Even here, where he's supposed to explain the inspiration for his lyrics, everything is carefully curated, every detail or description is worded in a way to still be vague while maintaining the illusion of revelation. You get some personal stories about how he ended up shooting his own brother and the one time he met his father before his father passed. But the show is notable just as much for what he hasn't and maybe won't talk about as what he does. As of six episodes, he has not mentioned Dame Dash, his estranged partner in Roc-A-Fella who seems to only be able to make money by complaining about Jay on YouTube interview shows, or Dehaven, his former drug dealing partner who similarly to Dame makes his money these days complaining about Jay. Jay also doesn't mention, well really anyone that was alongside him, not DJ Clark Kent, not Irv Gotti, not Kareem 'Biggs' Burke, not Memphis Bleek, not even Tyran 'Ty-Ty' Smith.

It's just the Jay show, and everything is on a need to know basis even 30 years later. Even when he gets personal in discussing 4:44, his pseudo-response record to Beyoncé's Lemonade, he can't actually talk with any vulnerability. It is an insular focus. Which is fine I guess, it's his series and he can tell it how it how he wants to, but what exactly are we doing here if its not about real revelation or the actual history as it happened from Jay's perspective? Jay-Z is never going on a podcast like Drink Champs or any of these rapper story podcasts or shows. He is not interested in ever being in a position where he doesn't have complete control over the story.

In essence, this is a lot more Jay-Z brand management. And knowing that, it is funny how much time Jay spends trying to distance himself from the version of himself that once sold drugs in the ’80s. Jay routinely talks about that time in his life like it happened to a totally different person: A "lost youth" responding to the destitution of growing up in poverty. He talks of the "mask" he had to wear back then in order to survive, and how it was different from the person he was raised to be. On one level, its clear that he has to do this now that he is a card-carrying wealthy businessman. It is imperative he constantly shows corporate America that not only is he a trustworthy, sophisticated, mature man that can be responsible with any major partnership, but that he also still has the juice to reach the hip-hop and youth audience. That's seemingly what this whole year has been about. But on another level, Jay-Z accomplished what he did because he brought that same cutthroat business acumen that allows one to sell drugs to their neighbors and family members and applied it to the bigger legitimate business world. It's all the same mentality of money over everything, money over morals or honor. There is no duality at play here and Jay is still every much the same guy he was on the block in the late ’80s.

Jay has long been an advocate of freedom through capitalism. It is why he had no qualms about selling his stake in Roc-A-Fella when he did. It is why he had no issue swiping the rug out of Colin Kaepernick and his protest. And it is why he has never turned down any opportunity to make money for himself regardless of where it comes from, and any sort of criticism that's been thrown his way has been tossed aside as if its de facto illegitimate. If the point of the game is to make the most money and extract the most resources, how can anyone tell Jay he's wrong?

Bu at what point is the joke on us? Like a lot of people over the age of 30, Jay-Z was once among my favorite rappers in the world. As a result, not only have we put up with a lot of his bullshit, we keep waiting for some kind of... closure? Absolution? We have always wanted Jay-Z to be more profound, and maybe more interesting than he actually is. There's an entire eco-system built out of treating his every word like the gospel. Before it became a meme, the $500,000 or dinner with Jay-Z was posed as a serious question. When former GQ editor-in-chief Will Welch stepped down he wrote about learning his most valuable lesson from Jay, which was this statement: "I walk into every room as myself." The kind of meaningless phrase that makes you seem profound to others around you. No wonder this guy hangs out with Rick Rubin. This is the curse, I suppose, of being the coolest guy, along with being the richest guy. People see you, they admire you, they stare at you, they envy your lifestyle and covet it, and it gives you an unearned sense of wisdom. People read into your every word and action as though it is the key to success. They lose all common sense for you because they want to believe you can bring them to their promised land. But behind the curtain, there's no wizard. It's just a man, maintaining a fantasy.

I don't know that this particular fantasy has much run anymore. Jay-Z will always mean what he means to men of my age and older but there are obviously dwindling returns. And he's not the only one. Listening to Pharrell's production work on the new Quavo album, he seems to be another one that keeps spinning into staleness. More worried about maintaining the image of what he was to still try anything new (just look at his Louis Vuitton collections). When I watch Drake hang out with streamers and continue trying to make club music for 20 year olds, or Timbaland try to make AI music, and 50 Cent and Rick Ross get into trolling wars on Instagram, it is like watching your uncles try to dress cool and dye their hair. Its less that they're not allowed to be around and make art or whatever, it's just this reaching to maintain relevance and status as if life doesn't or shouldn't move on. The kids don't care as much but we—the older ones out here—do and honestly that can still be just as nice.