When Jay-Z enters the 50th birthday celebration of music magnate Lyor Cohen, his friend and mentor, he’s wearing black from head to toe and his signature Tom Ford sunglasses. His demonstrative wife, Beyonce Knowles, is with him. There’s no need for him to check out the scene because the entire scene descends upon him, and it’s clear it’s something he’s used to.
“I don’t dislike anything about myself,” he says. “I know this sounds a little arrogant but I really accept what God has given me. I’ve got a short temper but I work on controlling it. I can say inappropriate things because I believe them to be true and sometimes that can be hurtful to others. But I think in the long run it is more helpful.”
In the midst of one of the most successful hip-hop careers in history, Jay-Z, who turns 40 next month, has a lot to be thankful for. He was born Shawn Carter in 1969 and grew up in the Marcy Houses project of Brooklyn as “Jazzy.” He was abandoned by his father at 11, shot his older brother for stealing at 12 and sold crack at 13. It wasn’t until he released his first album, Reasonable Doubt, in 1996 on his label Roc-a-Fella Records that the then 26-year old left drug dealing, gangs and poverty behind. “[Making music] is a gift from God,” he says. “I put it to the side for so long because it was so easy. It took me a while to really know it was my true calling. I wanted to tell my story.”
He’s told that story through 11 solo albums, the latest being September’s The Blueprint 3—the third in his Blueprint trilogy, which includes 2001’s The Blueprint and The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse in 2002. While The Blueprint was a soulful return to his musical roots, The Blueprint 2 had him collaborating with artists who make the music he loves—rock (Lenny Kravitz), R&B (Faith Evans) and reggae (Sean Paul). He calls the third installment a “new classic” for the next generation. On the track “D.O.A. (Death of Auto-tune),” for example, over a clarinet-heavy rework of Steam’s 1969 classic “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye,” he raps: “You rappers singing too much/Get back to rap/You T-Pain’n too much.”
The main thread throughout the album is New York City. Heard in songs as literal as “Empire State of Mind” (“One hand in the air for the big city/Street lights, big dreams all looking pretty/No place in the world that can compare”), the nods to NYC abound—but it wasn’t intentional. “I listen to ‘A Star is Born’ and ‘Thank You’ and hear New York City in every hook,” he says. “I guess I was just really centered with my birthplace while I was making the record because it wasn’t a conscious thing at all. New York is alive, real people, it never shuts down, the honesty of it, the variety of it. It makes you look forward to every single season. When it gets too hot, you look forward to fall. When it’s fall, you look forward to seeing the snow. It’s just the most beautiful place in the world to me.”
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