Jay Z Ranked His Own Albums From Best To Worst

Carl Williott | December 5, 2013 9:41 am

Jay Z took to his Life + Times site to post his own personal rankings of his albums from best to worst (thus, these are the official rankings). He also stacked the physical copies in the same order, as you can see up top — solo LPs only. No surprise, Reasonable Doubt stands at the top of the summit, with Kingdom Come smothered on the bottom. (Someday, someone will be brave enough to write a “Kingdom Come isn’t as bad as everyone says” piece.)

This is so great, though! It’s pretty rare for an artist to get into the catalog self-critiquing business beyond the “well, this one is my favorite right now” or “they’re all my babies, I can’t choose” boilerplate answers. Not only that, but Jay also offers some brief commentary next to each entry, admitting to artistic missteps and misjudgments. (It wasn’t all self-flagellation, of course. Hov posits that the top four selections are “classic.”)

Check out his full list below.

1. Reasonable Doubt (Classic) 2. The Blueprint (Classic) 3. The Black Album (Classic) 4. Vol. 2 (Classic) 5. American Gangster (4 1/2, cohesive) 6. Magna Carta (Fuckwit, Tom Ford, Oceans, Beach, On the Run, Grail) 7. Vol. 1 (Sunshine kills this album…fuck… Streets, Where I’m from, You Must Love Me…) 8. BP3 (Sorry critics, it’s good. Empire (Gave Frank a run for his money)) 9. Dynasty (Intro alone…) 10. Vol. 3 (Pimp C verse alone… oh, So Ghetto) 11. BP2 (Too many songs. Fucking Guru and Hip Hop, ha) 12. Kingdom Come (First game back, don’t shoot me)

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