S. Samuel
R&B singer The-Dream recently talked about keeping busy churning out new tunes and revealed mega producers Swizz Beatz and Timbaland are working on Jay-Z's upcoming solo album.
Careful with his words, The-Dream suggested fans can expect much more than Hov’s new “Open Letter” tune from the elite producers.
Jay-Z is calling on some heavy-hitters for his new album. While details remain scarce, The-Dream has revealed that he has been in the lab with super-producers Timbaland and Swizz Beatz. He once again confirmed that the Roc Nation mogul is recording new material. “Jay of course is working on an album,” the Grammy-winning hitmaker tells Rap-Up.com. While he remained tight-lipped, he did share that he has been working closely with Timbaland and Swizz Beatz. “Mostly close to Tim. Both of them actually. We were all in the studio together. We were all in the same building, working on Bey’s album and Jay started working on his,” he says. (Rap-Up)
Last year, Young Hov’s longtime sound engineer Young Guru dished out a few details about the LP.
“Jay-Z is always working on stuff, it’s a concept that I can’t talk about but I’m marveled at how smart this guy is. When he told me the concept, I was like ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ It was just so simple. It’s not a concept album though. It’s not like American Gangster, it’s not a Beatles concept album. It has a concept and a title, and the title and the concept fit him so well that people are going to be like ‘Wow.’,” he explained. “I like certain writers because it takes me 8,000 paragraphs to get my full point across. When somebody can take what I just said and condense it into two sentences and still have the same effectiveness, that’s a good writer. The simplicity of the title and the concept that it conveys is incredible.” (Complex)
Guru also said fans would be amazed at the album’s simplistic yet perfect name.
“I can’t tell you the title, it’s so good it’s like, ‘Oh my god why didn’t I think of that? What made you think of that and why haven’t we done that before?’ It’s just staring us in the face all these years, we could’ve been put that out as an album concept.” (Complex)
A month prior, hitmaker Pharrell Williams kept mum on his forthcoming Jigga collaboration.
In December, Hovito said we might get a solo LP from him and a second Throne album in 2012. There hasn’t been any talk since, but when MTV News caught up with Pharrell earlier this month, we had to ask if that’s still the plan. “We’re working on something, it’s crazy,” Skateboard P said after a long pause. With things still in the works, Pharrell is reluctant to let go of any info. Instead, he’d rather just let Jay speak on things when he is ready. “Well, you know, he’s very discreet about details and stuff,” P said. “I’m just a filmmaker, musically. I let everybody else play the roles.” (MTV)
