In the summer of 2011, the economy is still incredibly volatile, there are riots and protests going on all over the world,  violence in many inner cities is out of control, and the disparity between the rich and everyone else continues to increase; this is a perfect album for these times.

             The opening track “No Church In The Wild” is a ideal tone setter for both the current mood of the world and the rest of the album. Jay Z’s opening verse of the song is a technical master piece with relativist philosophical underpinnings. At one point, I listened to the opening Jay verse a solid 25 times in a row (no bullshit) without even letting the entire song play through because it contains so much brilliance. The opening line is “tears on the mausoleum floors- blood stains the coliseum doors.” The two lines end with words that have 4 syllables that rhyme with each other (mausoleum and coliseum) followed by single syllable words that rhyme (floor-doors). If you don’t appreciate how hard that is, go and try to write a good rhyme that follows that rhyme structure. The opening line also symbolizes how the magnificent structures like coliseums and mausoleums are usually built by the excretion of blood and tears. The verse continues with lines that segue from historical hypocrisies (“lies on the lips of the priests-Thanksgiving disguised as a feast”) to the thoughts of a paranoid drug dealer praying to not get caught and wondering if his prayer falls on deaf ears. The verse persists with a relativist world view when he asks “Is Pius pious cause god loves pious?-Socrates asked whose bias do you’ll seek-all for Plato, screech” First, let’s just point out the complex internal rhyme structure using the words  “pious” and “bias” in the middle of the two lines. Second,  he uses both connotations of the word Pius (the title of many Popes) and “Pious” (a devoutly religious person) both is posing an interesting philosophical question and  in way that sonically sounds great.  Third, going back to the previous drug dealer thoughts, the way he says Plato is actually a pun Plato/playdough” referring both to Socrates’ most famous student and playdough as extra money. Jay transitions into the chorus by rapping “Jesus was a carpenter, Yeezy he laid beats, Hova flow the Holy Ghost, get the hell up out your seats, Preach!” which is just a freaking awesome way to end a verse. The chorus sung by rising RNB   star of the moment Frank Ocean with lyrics that  take the relativistic moral world view that Jay raps about and then applies that relativism to the idea of power when he sings “human being to a mob-what’s a mob to a king?- what’s a king to a god?-what’s a god to a nonbeliever who don’t believe in anything? No church in the wild” I would argue that the “No Church in the Wild” metaphor described here in the chorus where there is no central locust of power is a perfect description of what is happening it many current events around the world from the riots in London and the uprising in the Middle East to the debt ceiling debate and flash mob attacks.  

            The track “Murder To Excellence” is another stand out. Jay Z starts off dedicating the song to the memory of Danroy Henry who was from Easton MA and died after being shot by a police officer in New York in an incident where many of the facts are still in dispute by the parties involved. Kanye in his verses laments the murders that happen in many inner cities with lines like “314 Soldiers died in Iraq, 509 died in Chicago”, Is it genocide? Cause I still hear his mama cry”, and “Its time for us to stop we redefine black power, 41 souls murdered in 50 hours”

Jay Z comes in on the next verse to flip the script and instead of lamenting the various tragedies that occur in the black community to celebrating some of its and by extension his accomplishments. However, he laments that the more achieves the few blacks he has as peers with the line “ only spot a few blacks the higher I go-what up to Will? Shout out to O? that aint enough, we gonna need a million more”

            On the track “New Day” Jay Z and Kanye stop taking more of a societal view and get more personal by penning a track dedicated to their unborn sons. A song like this has the risk of becoming corny, but lucky that does not happen here. The production is some of the best on the album with RZA coming in to lend some assistance to the soulful production style that fits the theme wonderfully. Kanye implores his son not to make the same mistakes that he has had telling to “never leave his college girlfriend and get caught up with the groupies and the whirlwind.” Jay Z comes in to promise never to abandon him like his father did even if things don’t work out with him and his mom. At the risk of being corny myself, this songs will most likely strike a chord with fathers and sons everywhere.

            This album is called Watch The Throne and is by Jay Z and Kanye, so of course it is not going to be all social, philosophical, and personal commentary, some of it is going to be about the opulence and partying that sitting on top of throne allows one to do. Not to get too meta, but again this can in some sense be looked at as cultural commentary since the gap between poor and rich is getting bigger in this country and the world allowing some to live the sumptuous lifestyle that Jay and Kanye describe in this songs while others remain in the poverty that Jay and Kanye describe on other tracks.

            The track “That’s My Bitch” samples James Brown, Sugar Hill Gang, and Elly Jackson to create an old school sounding party anthem that sounds like it could belong on the Boomerang soundtrack. Jay Z even gets a little political on his verse asking “why the pretty icons always got to be white?” before praising his wife Beyonce as well as others.

A track like Ni**as in Paris hits an apex showing off Kanye ability to uses random samples for perfect effect; case in point, at the end of Kanye’s verse he throws in a random cut from the Will Ferrell movie Blades of Glory with Jon Heder asking “I don’t even know what that means?” with Will Ferrell responding “ no one knows what it means, but its provocative-it gets the people going.” It is still funny the 20^th time you hear it and it illustrates an important point about lyrics and poetry in general, sometimes it does not have to make complete sense as long as it sounds cool.

Kanye made his bones as a producer using soul samples and Watch The Throne contains some of those; most notably the single “Otis” which samples Otis Redding’s “Try A Little Tenderness.” In some sense, it is borderline cheating sampling a classic Otis Redding song, but Kanye and Jay talking shit over the sample still sounds great and both have some quotable boastful lines like Kanye’s “sophisticated ignorance-I write by curses in cursive” and Jay Z’s “photo shoot fresh-I am looking at wealth-I might call the paparazzi on myself.” The track “The Joy” samples another soul legend in Curtis Mayfield and again with Kanye delivering funny lines like “one room got Bridget, the other got Gidgit-whats tripped out dawg is they sisters-nah you aint listen, they black, they sisters- their momma named them after white bitches”

Not every track works perfectly. My biggest complaint is “Welcome To The Jungle” because the Swiss Beats chorus is pretty annoying after a few listens and Jay Z’s verse is kind of phoned in. Kanye’s verse on H.A.M. is similarly underwhelming; however, Jay Z’s subliminal diss of Lil Wayne and Baby from Cash Money Records is nicely just slipped into his verse. The beat during the versus of the song can be a little clunky too, however when the verses stop and producer Leg Luger goes all epic with the soaring operatic vocals, strings, and more at the end it is pretty kick ass.

While it is not the actual album closer, the track “Made in America” feels like the closer after all an album that is filled with both celebrations of American excess as well as discussions of our deep seeded problems. The theme of the song is nothing new for either rapper or either rappers in general; they both tell their stories off how they came up from nothing to reach prominence. As fucked up as the country and world is, both Jay and Kanye are testament that the American Dream is still alive and well while paying homage to Martin, Malcolm, and others to made that possible.

Overall Album Grade: A-