You don’t have to be a Jay-Z fan to know putting together a top five list of his best hits is a colossal task. How do you go about listing his best songs? Do you go for the best selling songs or the best lyrical content? How do you encapsulate such an extraordinary career spanning more than two decades?
Shawn Corey “Jay-Z” Carter has had an illustrious career as a rapper and businessman. The man refers to himself as the Mike Jordan of rappin’ and rap’s Grateful Dead. The skinny kid from Brookly’s Marcy Projects has been captivating audiences with his slick raps, reminiscent of his Brooklyn neighbour Biggie, since his debut album Reasonable Doubt in 1996.
Jay-Z didn’t release his debut album until he was 26, an age by which many rappers are already washed up.
From 1998’s Vol 2 Hard Knock Life that sold millions, to the premature farewell of The Black Album in 2003 and the deeply personal 4:44, where he talks about his mother, Gloria Carter coming out as gay. Brookly’s Finest is an undisputed champion.
His catalogue contains some of the most potent imagery and lucid storytelling about hustling and poverty, all while dominating mainstream music charts in a manner that no one else has been able to for the span of time Jay-Z has.
With more than 20 Grammys, he is the only rapper to have top 10 hits in four different decades and the first rapper to have been inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2021.
In between those projects he grew his empire, helming Roc-a-Fella, Tidal and spearheading various film, clothing, sports management and production deals. It’s plain to see why he’s “the best rapper alive”.
In honour of his 53rd birthday on 4 December. Here’s our top five Jay-Z songs.
Can’t Knock the Hustle featuring Mary J Blige (1996):
The track that kicked off Jay’s debut album Reasonable Doubt, Can’t Knock The Hustle became a catchphrase that has endured throughout the decades. This debut single depicts Jay-Z’s life story, recounting growing up on Marcy Projects without a father, being raised by his mother, and eventually turning into a life of crime, peddling drugs. Explaining the song’s meaning during a NPR interview, he said: “It sounds like I’m saying you can’t knock my hustle. But what — who — I was talking to, was the guys on the street, because rap was my hustle and like, at the time the street, the street was my job.” The career defining track was produced by Knobody with Mary J Blidge singing the hook.
Big Pimpin (2000):
In this era Jay-Z was unapologetically savage. From the album Vol 3 … Life and Times of S Carter is one of his most popular songs. It introduced Southern rappers UGK’s Bun B and Pimp C to mainstream music, the catchy song also helped Jay-Z’s fourth album go triple platinum. In the song Jay produces one of the most memorable verses of his career. Everyone knows it by heart, “You know I — thug em, fuck em, love em, leave em, Cause I don’t fuckin need em.”
Reflecting on the smash hit in an interview with The Wall Street Journal Jay talked about his unique writing process, which involves not writing his lyrics down when composing songs. He admitted that while some of his lyrics are “really profound”, he feels differently about Big Pimpin. “It was like, I can’t believe I said that. And kept saying it. What kind of animal would say this sort of thing? Reading it is really harsh.” The father of three may be remorseful about the lyrics but it doesn’t change the effect the song has on hip-hop culture.
Takeover (2001):
One half of the greatest diss tracks of all time. Prior to Takeover, hip-hop’s best diss tracks were Hit Em Up by 2 Pac and No Vaseline by Ice Cube. Back then rappers were known for crossing the line on diss tracks. Takeover went against the trend, typical to Jay-Z’s style, preferring to dismantle his opponent with slow precision rather than hurling obvious insults. At the time New York’s finest Nas and Jay-Z had been entangled in a subliminal war of words for a few years before Jay-Z finally called out God’s Son by name at Hot 97’s Summer Jam in 2001, “Ask Nas, he don’t want it with Hov.” This shot prompted Nasty Nas to drop his infamous “Stillmatic” freestyle which stated H to the Izzo was actually an H to the Omo. What Nas didn’t know was that Jay had an extended, more intricate diss in the chamber, that set out to discredit and dismantle Nas’s career once and for all. Takeover, a Kanye West-produced monster, was more of a well-written essay than a diss song.
Niggas In Paris (2011):
“No one knows what it means but it’s provocative. It gets the people going.” The hip-hop community knew nothing about Will Ferrel’s 2007 film Blades of Glory, from which the line was sampled, but they would never forget those words after listening to Niggas in Paris. The Throne is one of hip-hops best collaborations to date, rappers are still trying to replicate the synergy Jay and West had on Watch The Throne. Jay-Z kicks off the track with, “So I ball so hard motherfuckers wanna fine me, But first they gotta find me, What’s 50 grand to a motherfucker like me? Can you please remind me?” Jay and West famously played the track 12 times during their Watch the Throne tour in Paris.
Dirt Off Your Shoulder (2003): You can’t get better than the greatest rapper alive spittin over a quarter of a million dollar beat by Timbaland. A ridiculous amount of money for you and I, but worth every cent to mark what was set to be Jay-Z’s send-off album. He sold us all a dream when he announced The Black Album would be his last album, but we quickly forgot that when the rapper came back with Kingdom Come in 2006. Dirt Off Your Shoulder is Jay-Z basically telling all the haters he’s the greatest to ever do it, hate it or love it. The song was an instant hit when it was released in 2003 but it was given new life when number 44, then presidential candidate Barack Obama brushed the dirt off his shoulders, which simultaneously made Obama look cool and immortalised Jay’s banger.
