It’s damn good, maybe even great. Is it his best? No.
Second best? Maybe. Third best? At least.

The Black Album, which Jay claims will be his last, plays
a lot like a Jay-Z documentary.

For the most part, he stays away from the typical lyrics about
girls, cars and bling bling that typified his past few albums,
Instead, Jay-Z gives listeners a retrospective look at his past
seven years in the music business and his far-reaching effect on
popular culture.

For an album that Jay-Z is touting as a return to his Reasonable
Doubt days, Black lacks two crucial elements.

First off, former Jay-Z collaborators DJ Premier and SKI are
nowhere to be found. These two famed producers lent an organic,
soulful feel to Jay’s first album with heavy, creatively
placed string samples. Second, while Jay used to be praised for his
lyrical prowess, he admits to slacking off and oversimplifying
Black in order to boost record sales.

On the Eminem-produced “Moment of Clarity,” Jay
admits, “I dumb down for my audience and double my
dollars/They criticize me for it, but they all yell
‘Holla!’”

Does The Black Album work as a farewell? Yes. The album
feels like the closing scene to the last volume of an epic film
series.

Does The Black Album, when viewed in context with his
previous albums, work as a culmination of skill both lyrically and
musically?

Let’s just say that one super-emcee can’t compete
with 10 super-producers.

Toward the beginning of the record, in “What More Can I
Say?,” laced by Brooklyn producing newcomers The Bucannons,
Jay opens with an quote from Russell Crowe in
“Gladiator.” He asks, “Are you not
entertained?,” setting the tone for the epic proportions of
his farewell album as well as questioning the subject matter of
today’s gangster rap — machismo bottom-railers duking
it out simply for bragging rights. Over the beat reminiscent of a
movie score’s ups and downs, Jay concludes that he’s
“supposed to be number one on everybody’s list”
but he’ll “see what happens when he no longer
exists.”

Fellow Roc-a-Fella roster mate Kanye West lends his genius to
the jazzed-out “Encore,” complete with melodic piano
chords, a gentle horn sample and a constant track of applause in
the background.

Kanye also produced what is poised to be the second single,
“Lucifer,” featuring a Kanye signature sped-up soul
vocal sample coupled with a Latin-inspired beat.

Jay finishes up the album strongly with newcomer Aqua, producing
the soulful, borderline melancholy, guitar-heavy “My First
Song,” which is both retrospective and clairvoyant.

He compares his departure from the rap game to his departure
from the drug game: “This is my second major break-up/My
first was with a pager, a hoop-dee, a cook pot and the game/This
one’s with the stu, with the stage, with the fortune, maybe
not the fortune, but certainly the fame.”

Jay-Z’s delivery has changed over the past seven
years.

While his first album was unique because of its conversational
flow and intonation, his last album shows he might really be
retiring. He sounds tired.

While Reasonable Doubt was one of Jay-Z’s most
clever albums of all time, it didn’t go platinum until after
he had already sold six million units across two subsequent
albums.

If The Black Album is how Jay-Z interprets a return to
the earlier days, it’s obvious, despite his supposed
matter-of-fact humbleness underneath the standard braggadoccio,
that his identity — both internally and externally — is
an anomaly.