Down the corridor from the Blunt office sits a man known only by his real name, Daniel Findlay. By day, he edits children’s magazines. By night, he also edits children’s magazines because deadline is a state of mind mannnnn. To assist him in this process, he listens to a dangerously large amount of gangsta rap. So of course, when we were asked if Blunt would like to talk to Jay Z about his new record, The Blueprint 3, Dan was the man for the job. Here is his story with hip hop’s big cheese .
“Jay,” I say, “what’s up with your new joint?”
Jay takes a bite of his diamond dusted truffle and wipes his mouth with a Damien Hirst original napkin. He crosses his live alligator slippers and shifts elegantly on his dodo feather stuffed Louis XIV high-chair. Rihanna reaches over and clips his cigar, which he gives to someone else to smoke and gently waft the perfume in his direction.
“This one,” he says, in a surprisingly modulated voice “is all about taking it back to the streets.”
There’s a polite cough from behind me and I turn to see one of his lawyers discreetly shaking his head.
“My bad, my bad,” says Jay with a wide smile, his perfect teeth reflecting all eighteen plasma screens showing his new film clip. “This one, is all about NOT taking it back to the streets. This one is about moving on and having no real angst behind making these albums any more but doing it anyway.” He thumps his chest. “For the love!”
Behind me one of the lawyers starts a slow clap that quickly fades to silence.
“Do you still have 99 problems?” I ask.
“Bitch!” he shouts at me, spitting diamond dust onto my face, “You want my old shit then buy my old albums!”
“But, what about before all of this?” I say.
“Let’s talk about Kanye.” says Jay, smiling again.
“Uh, ok.”
“That motherfucker is IN-SANE. Quote me! IN, dash, SANE.”
I write down IN-SANE, even though I’m recording everything. The waft of Romeo Y Julietas is making my eyes water and Rihanna is giving me death stares from behind her white-tiger encrusted shades.
Jay sighs on his throne.
“Let me give you a little list,” he says, relenting, “Auto-tune is out, synths are in, collaborations are very, very in, guitars are in, John Mayer is out, Beyonce is in, Sasha Fierce is out, Luke Steele surprisingly is in. Don’t ask me about that one, ‘cos I don’t even know. Lastly, journalists who make up interviews – they are OUT, OUT, OUT!” He spits a chunk of diamond onto the whale fur carpet and a gentle but firm hand falls on my shoulder.
My time is up.
Thanks for that Mister Findlay. For the sensitive members of our reading public, read this before getting irate and mailing us letter bombs.
