Memphis Bleek is still holding out hope to do a joint album with JAY-Z one day, despite his longtime friend and collaborator continually brushing him off.
During a brief interview with TMZ at LAX this past weekend, the former Roc-A-Fella signee revealed he’s still plugging away at trying to persuade Hov to record a project with him, even though it’s been years since they last released music together.
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“I’m on that boat too. I wish!” he said when asked about the prospect of a Memphis Bleek and JAY-Z project, which gained traction on social media earlier this year.
Bleek admitted that the chances of it actually happening are slim, saying: “I don’t think so. Hov too far gone, man! I was supposed to try this when he had $100 million, not a billion. When you got a billion, it’s hard to get you in the booth. Only his wife can do it.”
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However, he quickly changed his tune by telling fans they should hold their breath as he believes his persistence will one day pay off — and when that day comes, listeners won’t be disappointed.
“Hold it ’cause I’m trying. I still send him joints, I get shot down like a clay pigeon,” he joked. “But something gon’ stick one day, ya know? But if we could drop an EP together, that would be — c’mon, that would close off the whole trilogy of the ‘Coming of Age’ story. [Fans] need something classic.”
Childhood acquaintances who both grew up in Brooklyn’s Marcy Projects, JAY-Z and Memphis Bleek first connected on “Coming of Age” from Hov’s 1996 debut album Reasonable Doubt.
The Clark Kent-produced song established their relationship as master and apprentice, with Jigga lyrically schooling Bleek about how to hustle while trading rhymes with his teenage understudy.
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“I collared him and said, ‘Look, I’m making an album and you can be on it, but you have to learn this song in 24 hours. You don’t learn it, then you’re not on it,’” Jay recalled in his 2010 book Decoded.
“He took the paper I handed him and looked it over. I’d written the verse down for him in some chicken scratch… He came to my apartment the next day and spit the whole thing like he’d been doing it his whole life.”
The pair delivered a sequel to the street tale with “Coming of Age (Da Sequel)” from 1998’s Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life. And while Bleek would remain a mainstay on follow-up albums like Vol. 3… Life and Times of S. Carter, Roc La Familia: The Dynasty and The Blueprint 2, a third installment in the trilogy never materialized.
JAY-Z has embraced joint albums throughout his career having dropped full-length collaborations with Beyoncé, Kanye West, R. Kelly, Jay Electronica and Linkin Park. But most would agree that Bleek doesn’t quite possess the same star power to lure Hov into doing a full project.
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In fact, it’s been six years since the 53-year-old’s last solo release, 2017’s 4:44, which marks the longest drought in his career thus far, so it’s safe to assume that quality over quantity is Jigga’s musical mantra at this stage of his life.
