The Blueprint 2: The Gift and the Curse

Grade:

C+

Last year, Jay-Z released the hip-hop classic The Blueprint. Then, Jay decided to take his blueprint for The Blueprint and build on it for a second at-bat.

On The Blueprint 2: The Gift and the Curse, he stretches one amazing single album into two discs of coasting excess.

What happened is Jay took a warehouse full of party/Hot 98.3/Life and Times of S. Carter-type tracks and crammed them all together on The Gift, the album's glucose-saturated first disc. The Gift is spent celebrating affection for the good life/radio airwaves, leaving the listener wondering if Jigga spent too much time with R. Kelly.

The second disc, The Curse, is the supposed underbelly of The Gift. With clever packaging, behold Jay's concept album.

The Curse deals with grimier subject matter, but altogether doesn't really say that much.

"Guns & Roses," however, reveals itself as the product of an MC at the pinnacle of his career. It's hard to imagine anyone right now who could outshine Jay on this track.

However, where The Blueprint relied mainly on sharp wordplay, The Blueprint 2 clings to expensive production, not unlike a bloated Hollywood sequel.

Jay needs to realize he doesn't need the Neptunes' price tag to sell records. It's his bladed wit that makes him special. Here, however, it is just drowned out in layers of synthesizers, samples and keyboards.