Author Topic: Jay-Z "Kingdom Come" album cover (Read 450 times)

Meho · « **on:** October 31, 2006, 02:14:37 AM »

Jay-Z has no problem with people doubting whether his upcoming CD can live up to his past glories. "I love that position," he says in an interview in XXL magazine's forthcoming December issue. "I love that challenge. That's the reason I'm making albums. That's the reason why I love hip-hop. It's a challenge every time."

"Show Me What You Got" is the first single from "Kingdom Come," Jay's return to recording since "retiring" in 2003 to become president and CEO of Def Jam Recordings.

Jay-Z (real name Shawn Carter) is taking heat for the perception that he's prioritizing his record above one by his former foe Nas, with whom Jay recently reconciled and then signed to Def Jam.

"It ain't like his album is ready and I'm like, 'No, no, Nas,'" Jay says. "It bugs me out that people really make these things up ... I'm not holding Nas' album back. His album is not ready."

Jay took over Def Jam from Lyor Cohen, who departed to be CEO of Warner Music Group. "I don't have a mentor, but I'd say he's the closest thing to my mentor that I have," Jay said of Cohen, who oversaw much of his hit-making career.

The bitter breakup with his former Roc-A-Fella Records partner, Damon Dash, was a casualty of Jay-Z's move to greener pastures. Def Jam, Jay says, offered him $20 million to dump Dash two years before the 2004 split. He rejected it.

So what eventually changed his mind and made him leave Dash?

"You know, I couldn't live," he said. "It wasn't, it wasn't what it once was, in my eyes. You know, maybe I contributed to it. We all contributed. ... Maybe being 34, as opposed to being 26, contributed to it. It was deteriorating. It wasn't the same thing."

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