From the unique perspective of looking back on his career, Jay Z is magnanimous, honest and raw. Regardless, the album is thematically fixated with the concept of closure and resolution. In fact, many contemporary critics noted that whether or not The Black Album really was Jay Z’s final album was irrelevant. Hov is practically teary-eyed when he listlessly sighs “shit, I know how this move ends, still I play, the starring role in Hovita’s Way.” On December 4 thJay Z tells his audience they may not truly know what they’ve got till it’s gone – “maybe you’ll love me when I fade to black.” The hook in Moment of Clarity cleverly links the titles of Jay Z’s prodigious body of work, noting his “ Blueprint beginning to that Black Album ending.” The strangely melancholic Allure shows a rare vulnerability in the typically braggadocios MC. The album is littered with misty-eyed references to retirement and the closing chapter of the Jay Z story. However both the public and critics alike might be forgiven for falling for such an obvious sales tactic given the seeming sincerity of the gesture. Writing in 2017 as a member of a sophisticated consumer public who has lived through countless faux- John Farnham retirements, it’s difficult to imagine that people in 2003 genuinely believed that this would be Hova’s last album.
Billed as the final studio album of Jay Z, 13 years and 5 albums later, any retrospective of the The Black Album simply has to be examined through the lens of this clever marketing ploy.