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Originally Posted by louder
just finished listening to Magna Carta for the first time in a while. only song i can't stand is the first one with Timberlake. such a nice album.
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Thank you!
I've come to the same conclusion. I actually really liked it at first (perhaps you remember) and never outright hated on it, but I don't think I really found its groove, and it's place in JAY's discography, until I stopped trying to tell myself that it was another perfect HOV album, like Reasonable Doubt, Black Album, Kingdom Come (ya'heard me!), American Gangster, Blueprint and Blueprint III.
Once I was honest with myself about how terrible Justin T. sounds when he's trying to "go hard" in that awful and epically ill advised Smells Like Teen Spirit tribute, and I allowed myself to take a step back from my inner fanboy and take an objective look at the record as it compares to the others, I found that it was probably second tier Jay... like Vol. 1, 2, 3 and Roc La Familia.
But that said, it's probably at the top of the second tier. "Fuckwithmeyouknowigotit" is a straight up classic, and will rank among his biggest crowd favorites. I LOVE "FUTW," (that chorus is truly mature hip-hop songwriting... not lame, out of touch billionaire trying to stay ill), not to mention "somewhereinamerica" and "Heaven" and "Picasso Baby" (I can handle JT on that track... He fits) and the highly underrated "Tom Ford."
I think it's probably my 4th or 5th favorite Jay album. It's beautifully designed too, and the themes tie in with a lot of the topics Jay and Kanye touched on during WTT. No surprise that a lot of the MCHG songs were just starting to come together around that period.
It's a really good album, and if it's Jay's last, I won't complain.
I'm really glad I'm not the only one who feels this way.
