Remember when Jay-Z was actually a pop artist. He was making songs like “Big Pimpin”, “Hey Papi”, and “Give it to Me”. This is really the Jay-Z I want to see brought back. I love Reasonable Doubt Jay, but I hated that he had to succumb to the pressure of the critics by making conscious street songs. After all, isn’t Jay’s biggest selling album (Vol 2) the most commercial rap album ever made next to Mase’s Harlem World?

Why would Jay stray away from success only to appease the critics and return to less sales by creating more art. The reason: Kanye West. Jay sees how well fans relate to Kanye’s conscious raps [sidebar: Kanye is now more Timberlake than Talib] and therefore reformulated his style to tap into Kanye’s market. Jay has always done this, when Cash Money was hot, he did a song with Juvenile, when Puffy was Puffy he put on the shiny suit, when JD was having his run he screamed money aint a thing, when Timbo and the Neptunes were killing it…you get the point. Jay-Z is the real chamillionaire.

He changes styles to fit in with the times. Nothing wrong with that. But I guarantee the next Jay-Z we see will be giving us that ignorant shit that we love. He’s already done the throwback Reasonable Doubt style twice and I’m sorry but there are no CLASSICs on American Gangster. Leave the conscious street music to Saigon…or whoever takes his place now. Now back to being ignorant.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ar6yL37XifU]