rank Jay-Z albums itt

go for it

imo

American Gangster
The Blueprint
The Black Album

...

the other ones

well we're off to a good start

Let's get controversial:

1. Reasonable Doubt
2. American Gangster
3. The Blueprint
4. The Black Album
5. In My Lifetime

American Gangster = actual depth of feeling; The Blueprint = crocodile tears

Yes to JF

Reasonable Doubt
Blueprint
Vol 1
Dynasty: Roc
Vol 3
Black Album
Vol 2
Blueprint 2
Kingdom Come
American Gangster
Blueprint 3

Reasonable Doubt would likely be my #4, but it's really just at the top of the pile of Jay-Z albums I don't really spin on a regular basis.

The Blueprint
Reasonable Doubt
In My Lifetime
The Black Album
American Gangster
the rest

reasonable doubt
lifetime vol 2 (i like this way more than anyone else for some reason)
the blueprint
lifetime vol 1
lifetime vol 3
black album
dynasty
blueprint 2
american gangster
kingdom come
blueprint 3 -- or i'm assuming hated everything i heard and never wanted to hear it

Yeah, I'd be surprised if Blueprint 3 wasn't in dead last place on everyone's list.

Blueprint 3 at least has higher highs than Kingdom Come & Blueprint 2. But yeah.

Blueprint 2 has "Excuse Me Miss" though.

A meager bill of fare admittedly, but Blueprint 3 had no reason to exist.

Reasonable Doubt
Blueprint
Vol 3
Black Album
Vol 1
Dynasty: Roc
Vol 2

JAY-Z HAS NO OTHER ALBUMS BESIDES THESE 7

reasonable doubt
vol2
blueprint
vol3
the other ones i odnt really care i never listen to them as albums

Blueprint 3 at least has higher highs than.........Blueprint 2.

That's absolute bullshit.

reasonable doubt
blueprint
vol 3
vol 2
black album
vol 1
dynasty
blueprint 2

etc etc

Reasonable Doubt
The Blueprint
Vol. 1
Vol. 3
Dynasty
Black Album
Blueprint 2
Vol. 2
American Gangster
Blueprint 3
Kingdom Come

xpost

^May be truth, it's been a while. What are Blueprint 2's go-to tracks? I never found any that stuck.

American Gangster is way better than most of y'all are giving it credit for. How is that album so divisive? Is it just fumes from the Kingdom Come/Blueprint 3 era bad mojo?

idg the dislike for it either, but it's an unwinnable argument.

Not arguin, just curious.

I don't think I've ever really made it through any of his entire albums, dude is like a singles artist to me

nas is way better.

The Blueprint
Reasonable Doubt (tbh these first two depend on the day)
Vol. 2... Hard Knock Life (runs a close second as a nostalgic fave, used to listen to this ALL THE TIME)
The Black Album
Vol. 3... Life and Times of S. Carter
Roc La Familis
The Blueprint 2 (really, once you edit it down a little)
In My Lifetime, Vol. 1
American Gangster
The Blueprint 3
Kingdom Come

Blueprint
Blueprint
Reasonable Doubt
The Black Album
Vol 2
American Gangster
Vol 1
Dynasty
Vol 3
Blueprint 2
Blueprint 3

Just a guess I am only going from my memory. Never heard Kingdom Come.

American Gangster is way better than most of y'all are giving it credit for. How is that album so divisive? Is it just fumes from the Kingdom Come/Blueprint 3 era bad mojo?

― Parenthetical Grillz, Tuesday, February 1, 2011 7:14 PM (40 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this basically: http://www2.citypaper.com/arts/story.asp?id=14763

Vol 2
Black Album
Vol 3
Blueprint
Reasonable Doubt
Vol 1
Dynasty: Roc
American Gangster
Blueprint 2
Kingdom Come
Blueprint 3

black album number 2??? justify your thug whiney

Vol 2
----
Vol 3
Reasonable Doubt
Vol 1
----
Blueprint
Dynasty: Roc
Blueprint 2
----
American Gangster
Black Album
----
Kingdom Come
Blueprint 3

lines denote interchangeability

w/ whiny & helgeson on #2 although im biased cuz thats when i basically 'discovered' dude

id heard his stuff earlier, but it was the first time he felt like a big deal i guess

whiney is a huge black album stan cuz it has the rick rubin run-dmc track on it

Blueprint 3 at least has higher highs than.........Blueprint 2.

That's absolute bullshit.

― The Reverend, Tuesday, February 1, 2011 7:09 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

aside from the fact that blueprint 3 has literally 0 highs, blueprint 2 has WE POPPIN TAGS PIMPIN WE BE POPPIN TAGS

anyway

Blueprint
Reasonable Doubt
--
Vol 3
--
Dynasty: Roc
Vol 1
Vol 2
---
Black Album
---
Blueprint 2
---
American Gangster
Blueprint 3
Kingdom Come

On To the Next One is clearly a high

higher than Hovi Baby, All Around The World, Poppin' Tags, U Don't Know Remix, Some People Hate or Show You How, though?

"on to the next one" is a good beat

it's an aight song but like...every other Jay-Z album has at least a couple songs way better than it.

hmmmmm

1. blueprint
2. american gangster
3. black album
4. reasonable doubt
5. vol 1/vol 3/vol 2 (all kinda interchangeable imo)
|
|
|
|<------ big quality gap
|
|
|
6. blueprint 3
7. dynasty
8. kingdom come

haven't heard the other ones yet sorry (blueprint 2.1? pffffftt)

vol 1, 2 and 3 are vastly different albums with different strengths and weaknesses

yeah i know they're different, just saying personally i like them all about equally, or the rank could change day to day-- dont have a strong preference for any single one of them

That's a great article by Al Shipley on American Gangster, and he makes nothing but cogent points. But I don't value the same things he does in Jay-Z's music. American Gangster is so exciting to me *because* Jay's not quite on point. He sounds like he working something out. You can almost hear his process. And that's enforced by non-pop song structures for the only time in his career, and the Frank Lucas shit--which begins corny, but spins into this echo-chamber of proto-Rick Ross-ian persona bullshit, but with some real emotional weight to it, as opposed to the play-acting he did on The Blueprint. It's Jay's rawest album next to Reasonable Doubt.

Plus, Ignorant Shit.

y u hate dynasty? xp

American Gangster is so exciting to me *because* Jay's not quite on point. He sounds like he working something out. You can almost hear his process.

this is a really nice & sugar coated way of saying "jay sounds old & out of breath & unable to stay on beat"

Gotta go back and hear those Blueprint 2 tracks, honestly. Excited to now, though.

wow yeah ilxor thats way underrating dynasty ... any album w/ '1900 hustler' doesnt belong in the same batch as one w/ 'beach chair'

i overrated american gangster bcuz 'ignorant shit' is so dope

american gangster has three good songs "roc boys" (his last great single), "success" (altho nas has the best verse) & "ignorant shit" -- everything else is TERRIBLE tho, just awful

yeah i kinda shortchanged dynasty..... never really clicked w/ me, there were 4 great albums before it & i just didnt spend that much time w/ it b/c it didnt seem as great as the others. and then a year later was blueprint, etc. etc., so then i REALLY had no reason to look back. i should play it again

From what I remember about Blueprint 2, every song was a pale impression of another, better song. And Jay was maxing out his Biggie biting.

BP2's length and hit-to-miss ratio makes it very easy for your eyes to glaze over and to miss the great songs, but they are there and are worth finding and honing in on

great Jay-Z songs with non-pop structures that are better than anything on American Gangster: Friend Or Foe, A Million And One Questions/Rhyme No More, 1-900-Gangster...

American Gangster is way better than most of y'all are giving it credit for. How is that album so divisive? Is it just fumes from the Kingdom Come/Blueprint 3 era bad mojo?

― Parenthetical Grillz, Tuesday, February 1, 2011 5:14 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

American Gangster is a two-bit Reasonable Doubt knock-off. It fucking sucks.

finally you have a good opinion on rap

The first time I heard "Friend or Foe" was o_O because his flow is so conversational that I didn't even realize he was rapping til halfway through the song. I just thought he was talking shit before he started rhyming.

would it be overkill to do a jay-z POX? i think that would be super interesting

i overrated american gangster bcuz 'ignorant shit' is so dope

― *kl0p* (deej), Tuesday, February 1, 2011 8:08 PM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark

Yeah, but he should've just released the full three-verse original. Way better than the American Gangster one.

I'd still kill for a no-DJ original version of that track.

finally you have a good opinion on rap

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, February 1, 2011 8:31 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

I have bad opinions on rap?

i was just joking -- it's cuz you like drake

Yeah, but he should've just released the full three-verse original. Way better than the American Gangster one.

I'd still kill for a no-DJ original version of that track.

― rihanna rennavated my dick (rennavate), Tuesday, February 1, 2011 9:32 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

agreed

i think i basically like anything that flips that part of 'between the sheets' tho

i was just joking -- it's cuz you like drake

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, February 1, 2011 8:34 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

Drizzy killing my cred.

This is my favorite joint on BP2 Shiplo didn't mention:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YO-R69IU75E&feature=related

I was on the Peter Pan bus
You was puttin Peter Pan up in your room
Y'all fuckin with whom?

Anyways:

Reasonable Doubt
The Blueprint
Volume 3
Black Album
Volume 1
Dynasty: Roc la Famiglia
Volume 2
Blueprint 2
----- But BP2 is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than BP3.
Blueprint 3
Kingdom Come
American Gangster

fuck it

JAY-Z POX

man fuck y'all American Gangster is quality

American Gangster is so exciting to me *because* Jay's not quite on point. He sounds like he working something out. You can almost hear his process.

this is a really nice & sugar coated way of saying "jay sounds old & out of breath & unable to stay on beat"

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, February 1, 2011 10:07 PM (53 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Not what I'm saying, but even if it's true, I don't really care about any of that. It seems pretty reductive to be grading rappers solely by how well they stay on beat. Like, I don't give a fuck how well rock guys can play guitar.

Oh and what is POX?

really the only one I 'hate' is Blueprint 3 (haven'th eard Kingdom Come as I mentioned).

also Dynasty is solid.

POX stands for "painted ox"

Oh and what is POX?

― Parenthetical Grillz, Tuesday, February 1, 2011 11:21 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

"pick only ten" (songs)

Theoretical future Jay-Z song Painted Ox definitely one of my ten choices

lol sorry if that came off as snarky was just making a dumb joke

Not snarky at all

jeez what was with the sudden jay-z surge while i was sleeping

the blueprint
volume 3
reasonable doubt
volume 2
in my lifetime
the black album

i have not heard any of the others in full

yeah i know why you all put reasonable doubt top but honestly in terms of how much i actually feel like listening to it it might even be below my fav cuts on vol 2.

Dynasty
Vol. 3
Blueprint 1
Reasonable Doubt
Black Album
Vol. 2
Vol. 1
Blueprint 2
Unplugged
American Gangster
The one with Chris Martin I genuinely can't remember the name of, the comeback one.
Blueprint 3

Fake album with Big Hat Club in top 5

Vol 2
Vol 3
Reasonable Doubt
Vol 1
Blueprint
Black Album
Dynasty
Blueprint 2

Vol 3 / Blueprint
Vol 2 / Reasonable Doubt
Vol 1 / Dynasty
BP 2 / Black

Have avoided the last three.

I feel like BP2 is very underrated, people's comparative love of The Black Album feels kinda arbitrary to me, isn't it just a third disc of BP2 essentially?

jeez what was with the sudden jay-z surge while i was sleeping

i tried to talk about how underrated Vol 1 and inevitably we ended up w/ 2 other threads about all his albums which kinda proved my point

1. the blueprint
2. american gangster
3. vol 2
4. reasonable doubt
5/6. vol 3/vol 1 (no strong preference for one over the other)
7. the black album
|
|
|
|<------ big quality gap
|
|
|
8. kingdom come
9. the blueprint 3

(changes made: vol 2 ranked much higher; black album fell a few places, wasn't feelin it; kingdom come moved ahead of blueprint 3 b/c "show me what you got" is actually kinda good and i couldnt find anything good on blueprint 3; removed the dynasty b/c i need to hear it again, i actually haven't played it that much compared to the top 7 here)

that's redone after a couple hrs of jay-z listening last night btw

I still like American Gangster but, boy, do I regret sticking it in my top ten that year.

People really like AG - worth reassessing or do y'all just have sucky tastes?

no post-retirement album is better than any pre-retirement album imo.

jay's "retirement" was a 3 year break btwn albums! that's like, normal time btwn albums for most artists. ppl should stop thinking of it as "pre" and "post" and just disregard the retirement bs altogether

american gangster is awes

jay's "retirement" was a 3 year break btwn albums! that's like, normal time btwn albums for most artists. ppl should stop thinking of it as "pre" and "post" and just disregard the retirement bs altogether

yeah but he actually ANNOUNCED his retirement

i'd rather he hadn't come out of retirement at all tbh - what little good there's been since is far far outweighed by the bad.

yeah but he actually ANNOUNCED his retirement

this is like "strategies for keeping yr name on the front page of mtvnews.com 101" ish

lol @ ppl who took his retirement srsly

i can't believe people have albums ahead of Reasonable Doubt.

I love Reasonable Doubt but Blueprint is better imo.

I think lyrically he never topped that point.

He was never hungrier and angrier than on RD, but as great as it is I start to skip around – get restless – after the first third. The Blueprint's production meanwhile is a perfect complement to the swagger.

i hate the jock jay-z. imo he began to craft that version on BP, it's a great album but that's when I stop identifying with him.

"Cashmere Thoughts" is basically the epitome of of what I love about the first half of his discography. it's the coolest rap ever made.

vol 3
reasonable doubt
/vol 2 - blueprint - dynasty/
vol 1
/blueprint 2 - black album/
/
/
/
american gangster
kingdom come
the blueprint 3

jay's "retirement" was a 3 year break btwn albums! that's like, normal time btwn albums for most artists. ppl should stop thinking of it as "pre" and "post" and just disregard the retirement bs altogether

american gangster is awes

― Damn this thread seems so....different without ilxor (ilxor), Wednesday, February 2, 2011 10:10 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

it's not that the 'retirement' itself is important or worth taking seriously, it's that nothing after it measures up to anything before it imo.

like, I can see thinking American Gangster is awesome if you're a stan and love all his first 8 albums, but I don't know why it would rank far ahead of most of them. anything it has going for it, at least a couple albums did better: sustained mood (Reasonable Doubt), sense of narrative (Black Album), soul beats (Blueprint), introspection (Dynasty, RD again), dense wordplay (BP2), etc.

well timed http://www.emusic.com/features/hub/icon_jayz/index.html

I'll be reading that all day.

this mixtape would make my list i think if mixtapes counted

http://www.j-loveonline.com/jayzgame2tracks.html

the m.o.p. remix of u don't know is soooo hot

heads up, important poll

Worst Jay-Z Album

important question: does your copy of reasonable doubt have umlaut above the 'Y' in 'JAY-Z'????

underrated BP2 track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ5A2aKmZhI

is it as good as the movie?

otm symsymsym that was one of my fav tracks on that album

tho according to e-music, it is "a complex story song that many Jay-neaologists call his best ever". but nothing will ever be as good as the movie, ilxor

reasonable doubt
--
vol 3
vol 1
vol 2
--
the blueprint
--
dynasty: roc la familia
the black album
--
--
the rest

Still bewildered by people thinking The Black Album is way better (or even any better) than BP2.

^

tbf i've only heard BP2 once or twice and i like some of the singles

i'm more bewildered by ppl thinking the black album is any better than any of the albums i listed above it

the better half of BP2 murders Black Album but you can't just ignore double album bloat

yeah, but still

I can't really ignore single album bloat either tho some dude.

Black Album is very patchy but it's also his shortest album so 'bloat' isn't really the right word

Hm. I can't think of The Black Album as bloated.

xpost no maybe not - I just mean that when I'm listening to TBA it doesn't seem any less patchy than either disc of BP2, so it comes across as one disc of a second bloated double album.

oh wait no reasonable doubt is 4 seconds shorter than the black album, but still

if BP2 maintained the level of quality it starts with throughout, it'd be up there with LAD or AEOM.

yeah that's the thing, it has lots of good songs but the moment you hold it up to any classic rap double album measuring stick you realize how much filler it has

ha!

http://www.missinfo.tv/index.php/jayz-ranks-his-solo-album-collection/

that's actually not terrible, i like how he realizes his newer work is mostly shit

were those captions from the man himself or from whoever wrote that post?

he's gassed off magna carta tho

no yeah those are from jay

Ranking American Gangsta and Magna Carta ahead of both Vols 1 and 3 is some crazy shit.

even in their most honest moments you probably can't get them to say anything bad about their last album after less than 6 months. overall pretty respectable.

it's pretty silly how "Sunshine" is this huge strike against Vol. 1 in his (and most people's) eyes but nobody puts an asterisk next to The Black Album for "Change Clothes"

I like to read the thread title with 'rank' working as an adjective

http://www.whudat.com/news/images/jay-z-not-the-prez-big.jpg

"Sorry critics, it's good"

don't agree with the list 100% (I'm a Vol 3 stan) but those are some pretty perceptive notes.

1. watch the throne
2. dynasty (intro alone...)
3. blueprint 2
4. blueprint
5. reasonable doubt
6. vol 2
7. vol 1
8. vol 3
9. black album

12. Kingdom Come (First game back, don’t shoot me)

#factsonly

do we all get to insert Magna Carta in our old lists now?

trying to imagine LL getting away with "First game back, don't shoot me" on "Mama Said Knock You Out."

lol at Jigga's list.

Tim F otm

the way the Jay-Z poll came out was interesting, in both the albums subpoll and how the track totals shaked out by album: JAY-Z ILM TRACKS POLL RESULTS - WORD TO THE HYPHEN IN MY NAME

that poll was the best

word to the hyphen no longer in my name

that was after hyphengate, the thread title was an act of defiance

nahhhhh jay-z gets no points from me for shading vol 3 like that

all-time album

reasonable doubt

stone-cold classics

volume 1
blueprint

great but flawed

volume 2
volume 3

hit and miss but with great highs

dynasty
black album
blueprint 2

grandpa, stop

everything else

vol 2
vol3
bp2
vol1
dinasty
rd
bp1
ba
.
.
.

in the main I agree with k3vin

american gangster in the hit-and-miss with great highs cat for me

American Gangster is easily his worst, imo. On Kingdom Come at least he's trying. I'll take an honest failure over its half-assed apology any day.

otm

or at least AG was his worst when he made it, BP3 kinda dug a trough underneath it

Vol 3 is #1