Part III of GG’s 4 part series questions Jay’s intent on killing Autotune Rappers.
Jay-Z is in an empire state of mind right now. The regaining 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 third part of four that we will be posting this week. Just for kicks, the questions with the * symbol were asked by yours truly, the ones without the * were asked by other reporters in the room. DJ Hero dropped October 27th, pick it up and get your Grand Master Flash on.
Part 3
Do you feel like “D.O.A.” accomplished what you wanted it…
[Jay interrupts] More. More than what I wanted to accomplish. [Sits up, with back off the chair] I really just wanted to send a message to rap; I didn’t know it would be a cultural dispute. I really wanted to have the conversation like, “Are we really gonna keep sounding like each other? Like everyone is gonna sound the same? That’s what we’re gonna do? Don’t y’all know this is dangerous?” This is just how Rock and Roll got pushed from the forefront. We did this to Rock and Roll. When everyone was doing the hair band thing on MTV with the tight pants, remember all that right? With the different color tights and they all had like the big hair, then Hip-Hop came in and became the voice. Rock music was the voice for America, then Hip-Hop took that over, cus Rock music was as aggressive and it just came [to be] more about a look and a sound than about the emotion of the music. That’s what Hip-Hop was becoming, it was losing the emotion. You can’t have emotion in the robotic voice, like I don’t feel any thing. Then everyone sounds the same. So when that happens, to any genre of music, it’s dangerous. I really wanted to have the conversation amongst us and it went outside the culture. It’s great…so, yes.
Do you plan on having DJ Hero set up on your tour bus and then anything you can tell me what the tour is going to be like?
Well, I don’t have a tour bus…
How do you get around? The plane thing?
Yeah, I’ll fly a plane…not technically.
Are you gonna have it set up in there?
That would be really cool, I’m gonna go for that, but I have it in the dressing room now. So when I get there it’s sitting up in the dressing room. The tour is fantastic. Looking at it, it’s really different. I remember in the beginning, rap music, it took a longtime for us to get to where we are as performers. Look at young guys like Wale and look at how NERD’s playing, even J. Cole, playing with live musicians, taking pride in their showmanship is a big step for us. In the beginning of Hip-Hop, it happened from the song, a lot of times people had a hit record and nev
