I’ve been dreading this day for a long time now. Ever since Kanye West & Jay-Z began the serious push for “Watch The Throne” once the cover art was revealed more than a month ago. I saw it and I immediately thought of when I saw the many different versions of Kanye West’s cover art. This album was simply not made with me in mind. When I finally heard the album, my suspicions were clinched. It was termed “progressive” or “avant garde” and people left and right called it the album of the year. I just heard a bloated, overdone Rap album that couldn’t fuck with “Marcberg”, “Gas Mask” or “You Need This Music!”. Not even close.

This album cover and it’s packaging tells you everything you need to know about “Watch The Throne” musically. It was designed by Riccardo Tischi, the creative director of Givenchy. Givenchy? Whatever man. It’s all about the music. The first song I heard for said project  back in January was the epic clusterfuck generally known as “H.A.M.” which also screamed that this album was not going to be made for my ears or cats with my blood type. What is this bullshit supposed to be? Who was it supposed to be made for? These cats are on some real John L. type shit…

Let’s begin with Jay-Z’s “Blueprint 3” which came out in September 2009. I wasn’t moved by this album at all and felt like it was the textbook definition of a mediocre album with big singles by an iconic artist that sold strictly off name recognition. As for Kanye West, he’d dropped “808’s & Heartbreak” which I considered a push album given the passing of his mother and the end of his engagement. I recognized the album for what it was. Catharsis through art. I never actually LIKED it, though. I derived no enjoyment from hearing that album. NONE WHATSOEVER.

In November 2010, Kanye West dropped his second straight album that failed to resonate with me on any level. The short film “Runaway” and the GOOD Friday music series with the ridiculous lineups were the vehicles that helped create buzz for this event album that was once thought to be his “return to boom bap”. I heard about Madlib, Pete Rock, DJ Premier and RZA being involved with the project at first. Then I heard the title and I saw the cover art. WHAT THE FUCK, MAN? *Facepalm* What the fuck? All this did was provide ample joke fodder for me. There was no Yeezy in my Serato afterwards. None.

That brings us back to “Watch To The Throne”. We’ve gone through the recent history of music I wasn’t feeling from either artist going back as far as 2008. We’ve included me not liking the buildups or these individual campaigns or the series of leaks for each previous individual album (no one remembers “Ghetto Techno”?).

Let’s discuss the pre-orders, shall we? Pre-orders were being taken even before there was even a solid release date (which changed several times). It all screamed moneygrab. The iTunes & Best Buy exclusive deals while Jay-Z & Kanye West shitting on those indie marketplaces that ACTUALLY support Hip Hop (i.e. Fat Beats, UGHH, etc.) and struggling mom & pop/indie record stores. I took offense to that. Dissing them is essentially like saying “Fuck you” to me. The same story with the cover art for “Watch The Throne” was EVERYWHERE online. Then came the sickening media push and all of the bloggers trying to create buzz for the project that simultaneously turned many of us off of it.

Then came the mini documentary for ‘Watch The Throne” where we see Kanye West and Jay-Z rent out a private estate including a castle out in Sydney, Australia. They do a gang of rich nigga shit like when Kanye gives Jay a birthday present that cost the Gross National Product of Guam and they play newly recorded songs off their upcoming album for Russell Crowe. I know Russell Crowe has hung with RZA in the studio before so there’s a precedent for it but that doesn’t put me at ease that I’ll personally derive any enjoyment from hearing this particular album. Especially since whatever music I heard in that documentary was mediocre as hell to begin with.

They say you can’t tell a book by it’s cover, but based on the cover of “Watch The Throne” I felt that there was a huge disconnect between Jay-Z, Kanye West and the Hip Hop audience at large. My brother has run out of unemployment benefits. I couldn’t get a legitimate job after 5 years out of the job market even if I wanted to. In “Hollywood Shuffle” they said there’s always work at the post office. Wrong. They’re cutting those in Boston. Christopher Wallace said UPS was hiring years ago. They’re simply not hiring anymore.

I struggle to pay rent. I almost considered going on public assistance to ensure my niece and nephew got fed this summer. That’s some real shit. Fuck your album and your tour. Both y’all niggas are rich already. I was turned off by what seemed to be over aggressive marketing carried out by thirsty zealots, dickriding tastemakers and bloggers tied up in corporate interests. I was incensed by exorbitant ticket prices at a time when the whole debt ceiling voting debacle was happening and the economy was looking to go further into the toilet (which it did, no big surprise). I was completely infuriated by the depths some went to ensure this album was an “event”.

We saw you all. We noticed how quiet you were when Has-Lo’s album dropped. We saw how quiet you were when Random Axe dropped. We saw how quiet you were when Greneberg dropped. When the next highly anticipated album (due to it’s content and not from fabricated hype, mind you) album drops you motherfuckers will go quiet as bitchass church mice once again. Bet on it. But when the money comes, here those same leeches come again waving towels and dropping bombs on mediocre songs solely because of the names attached to it and not because of the music itself. Those sad, pathetic dickriding bastards aren’t even the main problem with “Watch The Throne”, however. Let’s address the music itself.

I don’t know what all of those bloggers and tastemakers that heard this drek were high on or what they consider “quality” Hip Hop when they played it in those private listening sessions in that Planetarium but the music itself is mediocre as fuck. It’s schizophrenic in places and it reminds me of that club music that’s all the rage overseas that I abhor. I felt like this album needed Ritalin, structure and focus. The point of Hip Hop is to move the listener and make their heads nod, not move them from side to side in exasperation. This album sounded forced and piecemeal in so many places. I worry that Kanye West & Jay-Z are so far removed from the fans and Hip Hop heads in general that they don’t even realize what they’re making actually sucks.

Since they’re so high on the totem pole (they apparently both occupy the throne), they have a legion of yes men and professional dickriders on their payroll that know they’ll cake up regardless so no one that tells the emperors that they’re actually naked or alerts them to the fact “Watch The Throne” will make the average Hip Hop head exclaim “What the fuck is this garbage?”. After I gave the album 3 straight painful listens, I began to think that maybe it was an elaborate prank being played when people on Twitter, Google + and Facebook were quoting half ass bars or saying beats that sounded like trash were “cray”. Is this the real life version of “They Live”? *Groan*

I listen to mostly underground Hip Hop but I’d like to think I can recognize quality music when I hear it. I tried to give this album a fair shake but this album is garbage. Some songs I feel never should’ve even left the studio. Then again, it’s painfully obvious that this album wasn’t made for cats like me. I can’t rock with this shit. I hear “Lift Off” and that jawn is clearly made for rich ass party people popping bottles in an Ibiza club. It’s a recession. The streets are on fire. People are broke and desperate out here. Y’all niggas wanna go to the moon? Then go and take this bullshit music with you. I guess y’all forgot what the homie Gil Scot-Heron said back in the days? What are you waiting for? Leave already…

When people bitched about Jay-Z’s “30 Something” on “Kingdom Come” I was confused. The man was a label president. He was approaching 40. He travels the world and Is one of the most recognizable humans on Earth. Why shouldn’t he embrace his age and his new station in life? To not do so would be asinine. I feel in 2011 that Jay-Z and Kanye West may have gone so far out into the stratosphere that they aren’t even capable of making the kind of Hip Hop (or even music) that I can relate to or that I’d care to listen to anymore. The truth hurts but fuck it, that’s why God put me here.

In closing, I wasn’t looking forward to “Watch The Throne” because I knew it wasn’t made for me from jump. All the perimeter fuckery, zealots and dickriders made me hate the album before I even heard it. Once I did hear it, however, I hated it for the all the right reasons. Because it fucking sucked. People will be swearing up & down it’s the hottest shit ever but I’m a backpacker anyways so my opinion doesn’t matter. I’m just a broke ass hater that can’t afford tickets to see two rich bastards perform songs about being rich when the hood could really used some protest music. These cats wanna board spaceships. And NOT for the same reasons Sun Ra or Parliament/Funkadelic did. Whatever man.

One.