Jay-Z is in an empire state of mind right now. The reigning king of New York seems rather comfortable in the lavish, royalty themed confines of Central Park South’s most famous short stay, The Plaza. Here to promote and explain his exclusive role as co-host (he shares the spotlight with rap superstar Eminem) in the new DJ Hero Renegade Edition video game, Jigga sinks into the throne like chair placed before him and tucks his hands into his jeans. Decked out in an nearly all black outfit, topped with a Yankee fitted cap, today’s living legend eagerly awaits his last set of roundtable questions from a group of reporters wanting to know everything from his touring secrets to his favorite all-time video game to how his beloved team will win the World Series. With the setting relaxed and intimate, you can bet he doesn’t disappoint with his quick wit and comedic timing, stand up should have been his first calling.
This interview is the first of four parts that we will be posting everyday this week. Just for kicks, the questions with the * symbol were asked by yours truly. DJ Hero, the video game drops today, pick it up and get your Grand Master Flash on.
*How did you get involved in the whole [DJ Hero] situation?
Jay-Z: They brought me a demo early on. The game play was great. Of course there may have been a couple of things like, the cross fader snapped back…little minor things. It didn’t look as good as it does now, but it was a demo so…but it was pretty much what it is now. The game play was cool, but what really drew me to the game was how they had the DJ’s mixes in there. There were these mash ups of different blends of music. You know I’m into that, I only believe in good music and bad music. I saw that as a vehicle and an opportunity to introduce hip-hop to so many different genres of music. You know, Guitar Hero is for rock, it’s fun, it’s great, but it’s one genre of music. This has blending of all kinds of music and I think that’s how people listen to music today. It’s a game of course but the over arching thing for me is it was bigger than that.
*Did it remind you of your Linkin Park [Collision Course] project?
Jay-Z: Yeah, of course, it was that.
You have a pretty young record label, moving forward how do you see stuff like this working into how you work with artists that aren’t as established as yourself and [taking things] to the next stage in the music industry?
Jay-Z: The consumption of music is at an all-time high, so anytime that you can integrate music in different vehicles to get it out to an audience you want to do that. So Roc Nation that was pretty much the reason to start Roc Nation. I didn’t have to; I had a big comfy job at Def Jam. I think that the freedom to do these sorts of things going forward was most exciting to me. It’s like a very exciting time in the music business. It’s almost like cowboys and Indians. We are pioneers at this time, discovering new ways to get music out there. It’s exciting to me. We’ve always been entrepreneurs; we’re going to embrace any type of vehicle that makes sense. We aren’t just going to do anything…showing up in a Wendy’s commercial.
Going way back here, did you play video games when you
