Jay-Z has often boasted about his business acumen, so it’s not surprising that he came up next to Pharrell Williams with a single about the trials and tribulations of the Black entrepreneur in American life.
But such tried-and-true imagery takes on a different luster in the era of protests over the assassination of George Floyd, the disproportionate influence of COVID-19 on minorities and skepticism about capitalism among Gen-hip-hop fans. Their new song “Entrepreneur” joins Williams’ guest editorial edition of Time magazine, entitled “The New American Revolution,” which describes the publication as “a series of talks and essays on creating a more equitable future for Black Americans. “
The song, billed as Pharrell feat. Jay-Z, swings with his falsetto and functional synths from Williams (production credit goes to his duo The Neptunes, starring Chad Hugo), but it has some dark images next to his odes to confidence and initiative. As Williams noted in an essay he wrote for Time, some of those early landings were colonists in his home state of Virginia, seeking profits from the slave trade. This makes the message of “Entrepreneur” intentionally involved then the title would initially suggest. The shaky capitalist almost always leaves a trail of destruction, and the two imagine here the fallout: “In this position without choice / A system imprisones young black boys,” Pharrell sings to stick out the first verse. “The brainwashing became hype-boys … You should not make it out of Section Eight.”
Some rappers like the late Nipsey Hussle used this self-starter ethic to make significant changes in brutalized communities. The video supports a variety of black successes, including Tyler, the Creator and ‘Insecure’s’ Issa Rae, plus local skate shop owners, a midwife and Princeton’s first Black valedictorian (and a moment of silence for Hussle). In a summer of protest that has seen so many images of Black Death over timeless, it’s a worthy counterpoint to just seeing people at work, doing it right, even if the lyrics sometimes turn thirty (“There will be no meaningful days be / If black went away. “)
Meanwhile, some critics were suspicious of the song even before it was officially released, and responded to a post in which Jay-Z evoked an influential atmosphere of Black users of social media: “Black Twitter, what is that? If Jack gets paid, do you?” / Support two FUBUs for each Gucci. ”
Black Twitter was in turn quick to point out that social media and online activism are some of the most effective ways to discover independent black-owned businesses. “Jay-z told us to integrate racism right away on that new pharrell song and I can not stop laughing,” said Charles Holmes of Rolling Stone wrote. “The Jay verse is like self-parody,” added Frazier Tharpe II of the complex.
Jay Z has done prominent work in the prison reform and civil rights advocate recently, while Pharrell has campaigned to make Juneteenth a state vacation in Virginia. A new generation of rap fans could embrace that kind of work even more than bootstrap capitalism.
