Skip to footer

'Magna Carta Holy Grail': Jay-Z will release new album with Samsung on July 4

The rapper Jay-Z showed his versatility on Sunday night during the NBA Finals with a sleek commercial promoting his new album, 'Magna Carta Holy Grail.' The project will be released on July 4 in conjunction with electronics giant Samsung.

|
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
Jay-Z arrives at "The Great Gatsby" world premiere at Avery Fisher Hall in New York. He is teaming up with Samsung to release his new album, having released a three-minute commercial about the CD during the NBA Finals and announced a deal that will give the music to 1 million users of Galaxy mobile devices.

Rapper. Club owner. Clothing line creator. Entrepreneur. These are some of the many hats worn by the rapper Jay-Z, who demonstrated his versatility yet again Sunday night when he announced the upcoming release of his new album "Magna Carta Holy Grail."

During ABC's television broadcast of the fifth game of the NBA Finals between the Miami Heat and the San Antonio Spurs, a three-minute commercial aired depicting Jay-Z working in a studio with superstar producers Timbaland, Rick Rubin, Swizz Beatz, and Pharrell Williams. The men discussed the music they were creating, nodding their heads to the beat and laughing as wisecracks were made. Jay-Z, born Shawn Corey Carter, described the new music as "lush" and full of live instrumentation.

"That's what hip-hop is," he said. "It's the emotion."

The commercial was produced by electronics giant Samsung, who reportedly signed Jay-Z to a $20 million deal in early June. The New York Post's Page Six quoted a source on June 4 who spoke of the artist's desire to create a "new music-streaming service to promote his acts and music on mobile devices."  And that’s exactly what the 43-year-old rapper has done.

The Game 5 advertisement directed viewers to MagnaCartaHolyGrail.com, a website providing further details on Jay-Z's latest project. The album, described by the rapper as "revolutionary" on the Magna Carta Holy Grail site, will be given away for free on July 4 to the first 1 million users who claim the offer on the Samsung Galaxy S III smartphone, the Galaxy S4 smartphone, or the Galaxy Note II tablet. The Wall Street Journal reported that Samsung paid $5 million to offset the costs of the 1 million albums being released for free – $5 for each album download.

"Magna Carta Holy Grail" will initially be made available through its corresponding Samsung app. The app, which will feature an "unprecedented look into the album, personal stories, and inspiration," comes out next Monday. But fans will have to wait until the stroke of midnight on July 4 to download the album on their Samsung devices. "Magna Carta" will be released to the general public on July 7, 72 hours after Samsung users get their hands on it.

Jay-Z, a winner of 17 Grammys, hasn't put out a solo project since "The Blueprint 3" in 2009. His most recent work, however, was 2011's "Watch the Throne," an album he wrote jointly with the rapper Kanye West. He also served as the executive producer for the soundtrack to this year's film adaptation of "The Great Gatsby." Overall, the Brooklyn artist has released 11 solo albums, nine of which have reached No. 1 on the Billboard charts.

"The idea is to really finish the album and drop it, giving it to the world at one time and letting them share it," Jay-Z said at the conclusion of the video.

"Great, beautiful," Rubin replied with a smile.

Colby Bermel is a Monitor contributor.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'Magna Carta Holy Grail': Jay-Z will release new album with Samsung on July 4
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Culture-Cafe/2013/0617/Magna-Carta-Holy-Grail-Jay-Z-will-release-new-album-with-Samsung-on-July-4
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe