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Kanye West and Jay-Z “Gotta Have It”

One of the most interesting things for me about Watch the Throne is listening to Jay-Z, the most imperious rapper in hip-hop, essentially bend to the artistic whims of Kanye West, the genre’s most ambitious auteur of the past half decade. The record is clearly the product of West’s distinct vision, with Jay-Z doing his professional, precise Jay-Z thing. But part of his professionalism extends to adapting to his surroundings, which means that on some tracks, he makes some effort to be revealing and emotionally direct, because that’s Kanye’s thing. And it’s weird and not tremendously convincing.

Kanye can’t help but project his intense insecurities – he’s emotionally transparent at all times, and it’s part of what makes him such a fascinating and magnetic pop star. Jay-Z, however, is the radical opposite – his every word and movement is focused on controlling your impression of him. His songs are essentially a never-ending PR campaign in verse. Even when he’s trying to seem “open,” like on “Welcome to the Jungle,” you can tell how deliberately he is controlling your access and guiding your perceptions. He just can’t spill the contents of his head out on to the tape like West. This guarded quality is interesting in its own right, and I certainly relate more to this attitude than Kanye’s chronic oversharing, but I find that I don’t really care to know much about Jay-Z’s inner life. He’s more compelling as an icon. (In this way, Kanye is analogous to the Marvel Comics model of whiny, introspective, persecuted superheroes [Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Hulk] and Jay-Z is more like DC Comics’ Superman and Batman, who thrive when creators trade on their stoic, iconic qualities.)

In some ways Watch the Throne is disappointing in that it doesn’t do enough to stress the contrast in Jay and Kanye’s personalities. Even when both rappers stick to a basic thematic conceit within a song, they seem like they’re not quite relating to one another. I’m particularly fond of “Gotta Have It” because it’s a major exception to this rule, as both men are actively engaged with each other through the entire piece as they trade off lines. This song finds West stepping more into Jay’s comfort zone — whereas the more Ye-centric tracks have a neurotic buzz about them, “Gotta Have It” has the triumphant, dominating spirit of Hov classics like “U Don’t Know” and “Public Service Announcement.” They don’t really say much of substance to each other, but it’s still exciting to listen to these guys in a dialogue.

Buy it from Amazon.