If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it: the Watch the Throne crew is back, temporarily, as Jay-Z and Kanye West have back-to-back rhymes on new G.O.O.D. Music song “Clique,” also featuring an opening verse by Big Sean.
The latter rapper still has some work to do in terms of standing up to the big league bombast of West and Hov, but he does his best with telling a “a bad bitch do whatever I say” and then passing her off like bong hit. He drops the names of 2 Chainz and Bruce Wayne while Jay-Z around the corner with LeBron James and a bevy of new basketball metaphors. Being a minor owner in an NBA team will do that do you. Jigga has fun with the wompy, whirring beat — provided by “N****s in Paris” producer Hit Boy — and giving all aspiring business men a brief lesson in algebra on how to get one’s half-mil.
It’s Yeezy that takes all that buoyant energy and turns it into the biggest climax, starting of with an SEO-friendly boast how his girlfriend Kim Kardashian earned her dollars with a “home movie” (I hear she has a great personality, too). Illuminating on his recent history with Jay-Z by “hangin’ off the Eiffel,” he gets into race and his own tattered past: “You know white people get money don’t spend it… I rather buy 80 gold chains and go ign’ant / I know Spike Lee gone kill me but let me finish,” he says, quoting his own misstep from the MTV VMA incident with Taylor Swift just a few years back. Coincidentally, the 2012 Awards were just last night.
He ends his personal history lesson with a reference falling into a depression after his mom died, referencing his own suicidal thoughts and then admits his prayers to God. It’s all fulfilling bluster until that abrupt ending, the only mar on this otherwise pristine, blaring track. Hit Boy should show up everywhere. Hit Boy for president.
The Kanye-credited “Clique” — the word repeated enjoyably on the refrain of this guy — will be on “Cruel Summer,” G.O.O.D. Music’s compilation release due out on Sept. 18. It was preceded by smash “Mercy,” “New God Flow,” “Cold” and “Don’t Like,” the group’s redux on Chief Keef’s hit.
UPDATE: “Cruel Summer’s” tracklist has now been revealed. Check out what all made the cut, and who’s been added. Marsha! R. Kelly! Oh my!
1. To The World – Kanye West, R. Kelly
2. Clique – Kanye West, Jay-Z & Big Sean
3. Mercy – Kanye West, Big Sean, Pusha T & 2 Chainz
4. New God Flow – Kanye West, Pusha T, Ghostface Killah
5. The Morning – Raekwon, Pusha T, Common, 2 Chainz, CyHi Da Prynce, Kid Cudi & D”Banj
6. Cold – Kanye West & DJ Khaled
7. Higher – The-Dream, Pusha T & Ma$e
8. Sin City – John Legend, Travi $ Scott, Teyana Taylor, CyHi Da Prynce & Malik Yusef
9. The One – Kanye West, Big Sean, 2 Chainz & Marsha Ambrosius
10. Creepers – Kid Cudi
11. Bliss – John Legend & Teyana Taylor
12. Don”t Like (Remix) – Kanye West, Chief Keef, Pusha T, Big Sean & Jadakiss