best Jay-Z/producer combo

Ski:
"Politics As Usual"
"Dead Presidents"/"Dead Presidents II"
"Feelin' It"
"22 Two's"
"Who You Wit"/"Who You Wit II"
"Streets Is Watching"

DJ Premier:
"D'Evils"
"Friend Or Foe"
"Bring It On" f/ Big Jaz and Sauce Money
"A Million And One Questions/Rhyme No More"
"Friend Or Foe '98"
"Hand It Down" f/ Memphis Bleek
"So Ghetto"

Irv Gotti:
"Can I Live"
"Can't Knock The Hustle (Fool's Paradise Remix)"
Jay-Z f/ LL Cool J "Only A Customer"
"Can I Get A..." f/ Ja Rule and Amil
Ja Rule f/ Jay-Z "Kill Em All"
Ja Rule f/ DMX and Jay-Z "It's Murda"
"Watch Me" f/ Dr. Dre

I was just thinking about this today! I recently rediscovered "Just Wanna Luv U" on some old Adam Sandler-heavy mix cd. It might be my favorite Jay-Z single.

But I'm not sure if I'm voting for the Neptunes.

Trackmasters/Poke And Tone:
Foxy Brown f/ Jay-Z "I'll Be"
Shaquille O'Neal f/ Jay-Z and Lord Tariq "No Love Lost"
"Face Off" f/ Sauce Money
"Wishing On A Star (Trackmasters Remix)
Mya f/ Jay-Z "Best Of Me Pt. 2"
R. Kelly f/ Jay-Z and Boo & Gotti "Fiesta (Remix)"
"Jigga That Nigga"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Take You Home With Me a.k.a. Body"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Break Up To Me"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "It Ain't Personal"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z f/ Lil Kim "Shake Ya Body"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Somebody's Girl"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Shorty"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Honey"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "Big Chips"
R. Kelly & Jay-Z "She's Coming Home With Me"

yeah I think "I Just Wanna Love" is practically the only really good song he did w/ Neptunes, definitely wouldn't vote for them.

Swizz Beatz:
DMX f/ The LOX, Jay-Z "Blackout"
"If I Should Die" f/ Da Ranjahz
"Money, Cash, Hoes" f/ DMX/"More Money, More Cash, More Hoes" f/ Beanie Sigel and Memphis Bleek
"Coming Of Age (Da Sequel)" f/ Memphis Bleek
"Jigga That Nigga"
"Girl's Best Friend"
"Things That U Do" f/ Mariah Carey
"Stop"
Beyonce f/ Jay-Z "Upgrade U"
"Dig A Hole" f/ Sterling Simms

Timbaland:
"Nigga What, Nigga Who (Originator '99)" f/ Amil and Jaz-O
"Paper Chase" f/ Foxy Brown
Timbaland "Lobster & Scrimp"
"It's Hot (Some Like It Hot)"
"Snoopy Track" f/ Juvenile
"Big Pimpin'" f/ UGK
"Come And Get Me"
"Is That Yo Bitch" f/ Missy Elliott, Memphis Bleek and Twista
"Hey Papi" f/ Amil and Memphis Bleek
"Hola Hovito"
Missy Elliott f/ Jay-Z "One Minute Man (Remix)"
Timbaland and Magoo f/ Jay-Z and Twista "Party People"
Ms. Jade f/ Jay-Z "Count It Off"
Missy Elliott f/ Jay-Z "Back In The Day"
"What They Gonna Do" f/ Sean Paul
"The Bounce" f/ Kanye West
"2 Many Hoes"
"Dirt Off Your Shoulder"
Missy Elliott f/ Jay-Z "Wake Up"
Timbaland f/ Justin Timberlake and Jay-Z "Give It To Me (Laff At Em)" (Remix)

Write-in for Mark The 45 King.

"Hard Knock Life" alone being better than people he's done dozens of songs with? wow.

Just Blaze:
Amil f/ Jay-Z "That's Right"
"Intro" (Dynasty)
"Streets Is Talking"
"Stick 2 The Script"
"The R.O.C." f/ Beanie Sigel and Memphis Bleek
"Soon You'll Understand"
"Girls, Girls, Girls"
"U Don't Know"/"U Don't Know (Remix)" f/ M.O.P.
"Song Cry"
"Breathe Easy (Lyrical Exercise)"
Cam'ron feat. Jay-Z, Juelz Santana "Welcome To New York City"
"Hovi Baby"
"Meet The Parents"
"Somehow, Some Way" f/ Scarface and Beanie Sigel"
"As One" f/ Memphis Bleek, Beanie Sigel, Freeway, Young Gunz, Peedi Crakk, Omillio Sparks & Rell
"Bitches & Sisters"
"Show You How"
Beanie Sigel f/ Jay-Z and Rell "Still Got Love For You"
"Don't You Know"
Freeway f/ Mariah Carey and Jay-Z "You Got Me"
Freeway f/ Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel "What We Do"
"Interlude (Intro)" (The Black Album)
"December 4th"
"Public Service Announcement"
Memphis Bleek f/ Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel - "Hypnotic"
Memphis Bleek f/ Jay-Z "Everything's A Go"
"Dear Summer"
Snoop Dogg f/ Jay-Z, Soopafly and Nate Dogg "Lollipop"
"Oh My God"
"Kingdom Come"
"Show Me What You Got"

Neptunes/Pharrell:
"I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)"
"Excuse Me Miss"
"Fuck All Nite"
"Nigga Please" f/ Young Chris
"A Ballad Of The Fallen Soldier"
"La La La (Excuse Me Again)"
Pharrell f/ Jay-Z "Frontin'"
"Change Clothes"
"Allure"
Slim Thugg f/ Jay-Z, Bun B and Pharrell "I Ain't Heard Of That (Remix)"
Snoop Dogg f/ Jay-Z and Pharrell "Drop It Like It's Hot (Remix)"
"Anything" f/ Usher and Pharrell
Pharrell f/ Jay-Z "Young Girl"
"Blue Magic"

Kanye West:
"This Can't Be Life" f/ Beanie Sigel and Scarface
"The Takeover"
"Izzo (H.O.V.A.)"
"Heart Of The City (Ain't No Love)"
"Never Change"
"Girls, Girls, Girls (Remix)"
Scarface f/ Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel "Guess Who's Back"
"A Dream" f/ Faith Evans and Notorious B.I.G.
"'03 Bonnie & Clyde" f/ Beyonce
"Poppin' Tags" f/ Big Boi, Killer Mike and Twista
"Some People Hate"
Talib Kweli f/ Mos Def, Kanye West, Jay-Z and Busta Rhymes "Get By (Remix)"
"Encore"
"Lucifer"
Kanye West f/ Jay-Z and J-Ivy "Never Let Me Down"
Kanye West f/ Jay-Z "Diamonds From Sierra Leone (Remix)"
"Do U Wanna Ride" f/ John Legend

Bink!:
"You, Me, Him & Her" f/ Beanie Sigel, Memphis Bleek and Amil
"1-900-Hustler" f/ Memphis Bleek, Beanie Sigel and Freeway
"The Ruler's Back"
"All I Need"
"Blueprint (Momma Loves Me)"

Dr. Dre:
"The Watcher 2"
"Lost One" f/ Chrisette Michele
"30 Something"
"Trouble"
"Minority Report" f/ Ne-Yo
"Beach Chair" f/ Chris Martin

Just Blaze and Timbaland seem like the most obvious ones due to sheer bulk and a handful of classics, although I might vote for Ski or Bink! since they're kinda underrated and every song they did w/ Jay is great. Dre and Neptunes don't deserve any votes.

this is an awesome poll

but yeah you're right, kanye & JB are the "easy" answers and ski is the "sort of slept on but sort of not"... i think his stuff w/ premo is pretty great too tho. irv gotti is not bad either.

Yeah Irv is a tempting non-conventional answer because I fucking love "Can I Live" and the "Can't Knock The Hustle" remix. I probably would've leaned toward Kanye 4-5 years ago, but some of their better songs together haven't aged well for me.

The Ski collabos are all amazing.

Ski is my favorite producer from all these guys on the basis of his work with Camp Lo, but that wasn't the question, which I'll have to think more about.

I'd trade Camp Lo's two and a half albums for all of Jay-Z's career in about a half a second, though.

Ah shit, that's not really true. But I don't think of Primo as being in the same universe as most producers.

Just Blaze:
Amil f/ Jay-Z "That's Right"
"Intro" (Dynasty)
"Streets Is Talking"
"Stick 2 The Script"
"The R.O.C." f/ Beanie Sigel and Memphis Bleek
"Soon You'll Understand"
"Girls, Girls, Girls"
"U Don't Know"/"U Don't Know (Remix)" f/ M.O.P.
"Song Cry"
"Breathe Easy (Lyrical Exercise)"
Cam'ron feat. Jay-Z, Juelz Santana "Welcome To New York City"
"Hovi Baby"
"Meet The Parents"
"Somehow, Some Way" f/ Scarface and Beanie Sigel"
"As One" f/ Memphis Bleek, Beanie Sigel, Freeway, Young Gunz, Peedi Crakk, Omillio Sparks & Rell
"Bitches & Sisters"
"Show You How"
Beanie Sigel f/ Jay-Z and Rell "Still Got Love For You"
"Don't You Know"
Freeway f/ Mariah Carey and Jay-Z "You Got Me"
Freeway f/ Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel "What We Do"
"Interlude (Intro)" (The Black Album)
"December 4th"
"Public Service Announcement"
Memphis Bleek f/ Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel - "Hypnotic"
Memphis Bleek f/ Jay-Z "Everything's A Go"
"Dear Summer"
Snoop Dogg f/ Jay-Z, Soopafly and Nate Dogg "Lollipop"
"Oh My God"
"Kingdom Come"
"Show Me What You Got"

what of it

+ all those memphis bleek tracks.

probably my favorite track involving jay-z is all.

boring maybe, but 90% of those tracks are really fucking good. "oh my god" makes up for the rest of the shit on kingdom come.

"Oh My God" was my least favorite of JB's beats on that album, though. "Show Me What You Got" was just fine, especially compared to "Blue Magic."

this might not make sense, but the horns on 'show me what you got' straddled the line for me between really catchy and really annoying, and after like the 897th budweiser commercial (which isn't blaze's fault, i know) i was really sick of that beat.

i guess i would rank this:
1. blaze
2. ski
3. kanye (i really like all his work on blueprint/black album and on his own albums, + it's probably cheating to include the 'get by' remix, but i love that shit.)

the combo of "What We Do" and "Girls, Girls, Girls" seals JB as winner for me.

seeing all those swizz songs he'd def. the most underrated.

can't decide

Ski
Just
Tim
Preemo

I'd throw Kanye and maybe Swizzy in there, but that looks about right. Ski gets my vote, anyway.

dangermouse

Premier for me, with Kanye second.

ban am0n

^^^^

it was the only write-in i could think of

voted timba, then briefly regretted it, then read the list and felt vindicated

swizz beats. otherwise, write in for eminem LOL, ROFL etc. ("renegade" is actually a sick beat though.)

I'm going with Irv Gotti, but he suffers by comparison with others in terms of the number of tracks produced. So it's not a straightforward thing. I considered Timbaland but the problem is that while the highs are very high ("Nigga What, Nigga Who", "Big Pimpin'"), the lows are lower than I'd like ("Snoopy Track" "It's Hot"). It's nice to see all the tracks laid out like this.

snoopy track is fire

i went w/ boring and obvious TIMBALAND but sorry if vol. 3 is my favorite jay album it just makes sense

also people who voted blueprint best Jay album better be voting for bink

xp Snoopy Track and Its Hot are not fucking 'lows'

those are olympius-style peaks

Yeah I don't feel Juvenile on "Snoopy Track" but damn maybe I gotta go try those two again.

Can't decide between the big names, but I like all of those Bink tracks (never noticed his name until now).

xpost

deej OTM.

Yeah, even if you don't think "It's Hot" and "Snoopy Track" are among the best, they're definitely better than "Paper Chase" and "The Bounce" and "Back In The Day" and "Dirt Off Your Shoulder" and "2 Many Hoes."

Yeah, those are better examples. I'm on a Jay binge so I'll revisit all these soon.

i meant mt olympus

"boring and obvious timbaland"

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I voted for Bink Dog.

real quick before the poll closes, I'll make some predictions about the results, just to see how wrong/right I turn out to be: 1. Timbaland 2. Just Blaze 3. Ski 4. Premier 5. Kanye

"Hard Knock Life" alone being better than people he's done dozens of songs with? wow.

-- Alex in Baltimore, Sunday, 7 October 2007 01:43 (5 days ago)

"Hard Knock Life" is that good.

o_Okay, dude, whatever you say

every other single off vol. 2> "hard knock life"

pretty much, yeah.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

kinda disappointing turnout! barely more than half the votes the jigga album poll got, anyway. surprised by only 1 vote for Ski, too, I think at least 3 people implied they thought he was the best or that they'd be voting for him. and I underestimated the Swizz appeal.

I voted for Ski, but it's possible that I didn't get counted for one reason or another.

this was such a dope poll

i keep deciding ultimately on timbaland but man that just blaze list

i could take the five best songs from the timbaland list and the just list + the bink songs and quit music forever tbh

who did You Me Him & Her? Love that break so much.

That plus 1-900-Hustler = I think I would have voted Bink. The Dynasty = the most underrated album of the decade.

write in for rick rubin!

well, not really, but it's worth a mention as a heavy hitting one-off collab

That plus 1-900-Hustler = I think I would have voted Bink. The Dynasty = the most underrated album of the decade.

― I donated and I expect some sort of reward measured in virgins. (a hoy hoy), Wednesday, June 10, 2009 5:39 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

WORD

Big Pimpin' Trial report contains some solid excerpts, this one in particular:

Later, Timbaland’s attorneys brought out a keyboard for the producer to compose a beat in the courtroom, so that he could demonstrate for the jury the "relative unimportance of 'Khosara Khosara' in 'Big Pimpin,’” but technical problems prevented that. As a result, Timbaland reportedly beatboxed the song instead, "to demonstrate the importance in his productions of the beat, not the samples".

http://pitchfork.com/news/61650-jay-z-testifies-in-big-pimpin-trial-i-didnt-think-there-was-a-sample-in-it/

can't wait for American Crime Story: Big Pimpin'