IN MY LIFETIME
From his early days hustling in Brooklyn’s Marcy projects, to Biggie and Tupac, Foxy and R. Kelly, and the downside of rap superstardom, VIBE’s Best Solo Artist, Jay-Z, has a story to tell. Following the release of his seventh solo studio album, The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse, he writes about how he got to the top, who helped him along the way, and why he’s determined to stay there.
By Shawn Carter
Photographs by Sacha Waldman
I was 4 years old, but I remember that morning clearly.As my mom left for work, she told me to wait till she got home to practice riding my bike. My uncle had promised to put training wheels on the secondhand bike I’d received from my cousin, but he hadn’t gotten around to it. Me being the youngest of four kids, I was determined to be independent and not spoiled. (Although my family will tell you I am the latter.) I took the bike outside, and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. taught myself how to ride without training wheels. Because I was so small, my whole block in Brooklyn was watching in amazement. It was my first feeling of being famous. n Getting that same buzz as a rapper wasn’t all that different, really. Fast forward to the late '80s. At Gordy Groove's house, Big Daddy Kane, Jaz, and myself are about to put vocals on a tape (not a CD, a tape), a freestyle over a beat Gordy created. Jaz goes first, I go second, Kane goes last. I still remember Kane’s rhyme: “Setting it off / Letting it off / Beginning / Rough to the ending.…” I was inspired and went directly home to write a thousand new and improved rhymes. During the next few months, the tape circulated and the feedback was positive about “the second kid who rapped.” I was taught in my family to believe that anything worth having you had to work extremely hard for. But rap came easy for me. I wouldn’t say I took it for granted, but I didn’t realize I had a gift until I made that tape.
Over the next couple of years, Jaz and I went back and forth to each other’s mother’s apartments in Marcy writing raps. Contrary to the claims he’s made in recent interviews, when I met him, I already had a notebook full of problems, heat, raps, whatever y’all call it nowadays. Jaz shared his dream of getting a recording deal, and I was like, Great, homie, but I need paper now. I started getting serious about hustling, and Jaz stuck to his music. We had an agreement: He’d holla when something real popped off (a show, a session, a deal), and I’d drop what I was doing and be right there.
When Jaz got a deal with EMI (for $400,000, or some outrageous number for a rapper back then), he kept his word and took me with him to London, where the label set him up to record his album. When I left the block, everyone was saying I was crazy. I was doing well for myself on the streets, and cats around me were like, “These rappers are hos. They just record, tour, and get separated from their families, while some white person takes all their money.” I was determined to do it differently. Rap was my way out, the only talent I had, and my shot at making something of myself. And it was legal! I wasn’t signed directly to EMI, but the plan was for Jaz to blow, and I was to sign and be next. But things never go as planned. EMI convinced Jaz to work with Bryan “Chuck” New, a producer who was riding on the success of D.J. Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince’s multiplatinum album. They released Jaz’s “Hawaiian Sophie” as the first single, and when it bombed, they abandoned Jaz’s album altogether. I didn’t necessarily have a plan B, so it was back to hustling, the only thing I knew. I didn’t show it at the time, but I was crazy disappointed and discouraged about the music business.
The Gift
Even though I was back on the block, my heart was still in music. I was preoccupied with numbers, weight, and my business, but my mind was flooded with ideas about songs, hooks, and verses. When my thoughts began to crowd each other, I would go to the corner store, get a pen, and empty my head, pouring rhymes onto pieces of paper bags. But how many scraps can you fit in your pocket? I had to start memorizing my ideas until I got home, which was usually in the wee hours of the morning. Ironically, using memorization to hold on to my lines is the way I developed the writing style I use today. No pen, paper, or paper bags needed. Just point out the track and I’m all over it.
And yet, after witnessing firsthand what happened to Jaz, I became really committed to putting my hustle down. I kept moving further south—from Trenton, N.J., to Maryland, and finally to Virginia. I spent less and less time in New York, but when I did come home, I would go to parties and jump on the mike, freestyling here and there. From time to time, I would bump into a DJ named Clark Kent, who would stress me about returning to New York and taking this rap thing seriously. Clark had started an A&R gig with Atlantic, and he swore he could do this or that for me, and even though he was a cool dude, his words went in one ear and out the other. I didn’t want to set myself up to be disappointed again. Rap was the real gamble; hustling was the sure thing.
It was in Virginia that I met my second serious girlfriend, Stephanie (everybody called her Fannie). What people don’t know about me is that I’ve always been in long-term relationships. My first real relationship was with this girl from Long Island, and it lasted five years; I was with Fannie for another five. It was on a long drive from New York to Virginia that I really bonded with Fannie. She told me her dreams of going back to school and making something of herself, and I told her my dreams of being an MC. She was the first person I let know how discouraged I was by the music business. When I finally took Clark Kent’s advice to commit to making it in music, Fannie followed me to New York. And even though I put her up in a nice apartment in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, and took care of her material needs, my level of commitment to her couldn’t compete with what I was willing to give to make this rap thing work. I didn’t record it till years later, but “Song Cry” had been writing itself in my head ever since Fannie left me to go home to Virginia.
Change the Game
When I first met Damon Dash, around the same time, he was doing artist management. All I could think was, Damn, this Damon guy talks a lot. If he shuts up for two seconds he might give someone a chance to say he’s smart. He loves attention—reminds me of an old hustling buddy I used to have. Damon is from Harlem, and I’m from Brooklyn. And anyone from New York will tell you how different cats from Uptown and BK are (“Manhattan’s always makin’ it / Brooklyn keeps on takin’ it”). But I always had the get-mine mentality Harlem is famous for, and Damon was so hungry for this music paper that he could have been a stick-up kid from Brooklyn. What started out as mutual respect and a management agreement between us grew into a fifty-fifty partnership and a lifelong friendship. I’m godfather to his son, Boogie, and Uncle Jay to his beautiful daughter, Ava.
After shopping our demo to almost every label and them front-in’ on what we had, we founded Roc-A-Fella Records. Later, another friend, Kareem “Biggs” Burke, joined us as a partner. It was on! We put in so much work over the next couple of years that there was no way we could fail. My first album, Reasonable Doubt, was about what I knew best: hustling. I felt like other rappers had touched on the subject, but I wanted every hustler I ever knew to feel like I had been reading his diary. I wanted to write an album that was honest about the glamour and materialism, because living large was real for us. But I also wanted to talk about the depression, the drama, the sacrifices, and the pain that come with the street life. I made that album like it was my first and last. We pressed up our own records, shot our own videos, turned our own cars into tour buses, made our own jackets, you name it. I even had my cousin Bryant (who’d always told me I was wasting my talent hustling) make up gift baskets with champagne in them to give to DJs along with copies of my first 12-inch single, “In My Lifetime.”
When I finally released Doubt in 1996, hip hop was as hot as the streets. I had known Big since high school, and when we reconnected to do “Brooklyn’s Finest” for my album, we became real close. He was hilarious, with a big heart, and I never doubted he was keeping it real with me. I thought he was smart to stay quiet when Tupac started his war of words. And on the real, I could tell the whole situation made him depressed. We had worked hard to leave a certain kind of life behind, and from the beginning, that thing felt like more than a rap battle. I didn’t take it seriously when Tupac dragged me into it. I knew he was just trying to get at anybody who was associated with Big. But I never stopped bumping ’Pac. I had been a fan of his since Digital Underground, and when he was killed, I knew we had lost someone irreplaceable.
From his early days hustling in Brooklyn’s Marcy projects, to Biggie and Tupac, Foxy and R. Kelly, and the downside of rap superstardom, VIBE’s Best Solo Artist, Jay-Z, has a story to tell. Following the release of his seventh solo studio album, The Blueprint 2: The Gift & the Curse, he writes about how he got to the top, who helped him along the way, and why he’s determined to stay there.
By Shawn Carter
Photographs by Sacha Waldman
I was 4 years old, but I remember that morning clearly.As my mom left for work, she told me to wait till she got home to practice riding my bike. My uncle had promised to put training wheels on the secondhand bike I’d received from my cousin, but he hadn’t gotten around to it. Me being the youngest of four kids, I was determined to be independent and not spoiled. (Although my family will tell you I am the latter.) I took the bike outside, and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. taught myself how to ride without training wheels. Because I was so small, my whole block in Brooklyn was watching in amazement. It was my first feeling of being famous. n Getting that same buzz as a rapper wasn’t all that different, really. Fast forward to the late '80s. At Gordy Groove's house, Big Daddy Kane, Jaz, and myself are about to put vocals on a tape (not a CD, a tape), a freestyle over a beat Gordy created. Jaz goes first, I go second, Kane goes last. I still remember Kane’s rhyme: “Setting it off / Letting it off / Beginning / Rough to the ending.…” I was inspired and went directly home to write a thousand new and improved rhymes. During the next few months, the tape circulated and the feedback was positive about “the second kid who rapped.” I was taught in my family to believe that anything worth having you had to work extremely hard for. But rap came easy for me. I wouldn’t say I took it for granted, but I didn’t realize I had a gift until I made that tape.
Over the next couple of years, Jaz and I went back and forth to each other’s mother’s apartments in Marcy writing raps. Contrary to the claims he’s made in recent interviews, when I met him, I already had a notebook full of problems, heat, raps, whatever y’all call it nowadays. Jaz shared his dream of getting a recording deal, and I was like, Great, homie, but I need paper now. I started getting serious about hustling, and Jaz stuck to his music. We had an agreement: He’d holla when something real popped off (a show, a session, a deal), and I’d drop what I was doing and be right there.
When Jaz got a deal with EMI (for $400,000, or some outrageous number for a rapper back then), he kept his word and took me with him to London, where the label set him up to record his album. When I left the block, everyone was saying I was crazy. I was doing well for myself on the streets, and cats around me were like, “These rappers are hos. They just record, tour, and get separated from their families, while some white person takes all their money.” I was determined to do it differently. Rap was my way out, the only talent I had, and my shot at making something of myself. And it was legal! I wasn’t signed directly to EMI, but the plan was for Jaz to blow, and I was to sign and be next. But things never go as planned. EMI convinced Jaz to work with Bryan “Chuck” New, a producer who was riding on the success of D.J. Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince’s multiplatinum album. They released Jaz’s “Hawaiian Sophie” as the first single, and when it bombed, they abandoned Jaz’s album altogether. I didn’t necessarily have a plan B, so it was back to hustling, the only thing I knew. I didn’t show it at the time, but I was crazy disappointed and discouraged about the music business.
The Gift
Even though I was back on the block, my heart was still in music. I was preoccupied with numbers, weight, and my business, but my mind was flooded with ideas about songs, hooks, and verses. When my thoughts began to crowd each other, I would go to the corner store, get a pen, and empty my head, pouring rhymes onto pieces of paper bags. But how many scraps can you fit in your pocket? I had to start memorizing my ideas until I got home, which was usually in the wee hours of the morning. Ironically, using memorization to hold on to my lines is the way I developed the writing style I use today. No pen, paper, or paper bags needed. Just point out the track and I’m all over it.
And yet, after witnessing firsthand what happened to Jaz, I became really committed to putting my hustle down. I kept moving further south—from Trenton, N.J., to Maryland, and finally to Virginia. I spent less and less time in New York, but when I did come home, I would go to parties and jump on the mike, freestyling here and there. From time to time, I would bump into a DJ named Clark Kent, who would stress me about returning to New York and taking this rap thing seriously. Clark had started an A&R gig with Atlantic, and he swore he could do this or that for me, and even though he was a cool dude, his words went in one ear and out the other. I didn’t want to set myself up to be disappointed again. Rap was the real gamble; hustling was the sure thing.
It was in Virginia that I met my second serious girlfriend, Stephanie (everybody called her Fannie). What people don’t know about me is that I’ve always been in long-term relationships. My first real relationship was with this girl from Long Island, and it lasted five years; I was with Fannie for another five. It was on a long drive from New York to Virginia that I really bonded with Fannie. She told me her dreams of going back to school and making something of herself, and I told her my dreams of being an MC. She was the first person I let know how discouraged I was by the music business. When I finally took Clark Kent’s advice to commit to making it in music, Fannie followed me to New York. And even though I put her up in a nice apartment in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, and took care of her material needs, my level of commitment to her couldn’t compete with what I was willing to give to make this rap thing work. I didn’t record it till years later, but “Song Cry” had been writing itself in my head ever since Fannie left me to go home to Virginia.
Change the Game
When I first met Damon Dash, around the same time, he was doing artist management. All I could think was, Damn, this Damon guy talks a lot. If he shuts up for two seconds he might give someone a chance to say he’s smart. He loves attention—reminds me of an old hustling buddy I used to have. Damon is from Harlem, and I’m from Brooklyn. And anyone from New York will tell you how different cats from Uptown and BK are (“Manhattan’s always makin’ it / Brooklyn keeps on takin’ it”). But I always had the get-mine mentality Harlem is famous for, and Damon was so hungry for this music paper that he could have been a stick-up kid from Brooklyn. What started out as mutual respect and a management agreement between us grew into a fifty-fifty partnership and a lifelong friendship. I’m godfather to his son, Boogie, and Uncle Jay to his beautiful daughter, Ava.
After shopping our demo to almost every label and them front-in’ on what we had, we founded Roc-A-Fella Records. Later, another friend, Kareem “Biggs” Burke, joined us as a partner. It was on! We put in so much work over the next couple of years that there was no way we could fail. My first album, Reasonable Doubt, was about what I knew best: hustling. I felt like other rappers had touched on the subject, but I wanted every hustler I ever knew to feel like I had been reading his diary. I wanted to write an album that was honest about the glamour and materialism, because living large was real for us. But I also wanted to talk about the depression, the drama, the sacrifices, and the pain that come with the street life. I made that album like it was my first and last. We pressed up our own records, shot our own videos, turned our own cars into tour buses, made our own jackets, you name it. I even had my cousin Bryant (who’d always told me I was wasting my talent hustling) make up gift baskets with champagne in them to give to DJs along with copies of my first 12-inch single, “In My Lifetime.”
When I finally released Doubt in 1996, hip hop was as hot as the streets. I had known Big since high school, and when we reconnected to do “Brooklyn’s Finest” for my album, we became real close. He was hilarious, with a big heart, and I never doubted he was keeping it real with me. I thought he was smart to stay quiet when Tupac started his war of words. And on the real, I could tell the whole situation made him depressed. We had worked hard to leave a certain kind of life behind, and from the beginning, that thing felt like more than a rap battle. I didn’t take it seriously when Tupac dragged me into it. I knew he was just trying to get at anybody who was associated with Big. But I never stopped bumping ’Pac. I had been a fan of his since Digital Underground, and when he was killed, I knew we had lost someone irreplaceable.