Jay-Z Discography

Jay-Z Discography

The discography of American rapper Jay-Z consists of fourteen studio albums (including three collaborative albums), one live album, three compilation albums, one remix album, one soundtrack album, four mixtapes, one-hundred one singles (including sixteen collaborative singles and forty-one as a featured artist), sixteen promotional singles and eighty-one music videos.

Jay-Z began his career by performing on tracks by fellow rapper Jaz-O during the early 1990s. Under his own record label Roc-A-Fella Records co-founded with friends Damon Dash and Kareem "Biggs" Burke, Jay-Z debuted in 1996 with Reasonable Doubt, which debuted at #23 on the Billboard 200 chart but gained classic status among fans. Its singles included "Ain't No Nigga", which featured Foxy Brown and reached #4 on the Billboard Hot Rap Singles chart, and "Can't Knock the Hustle", which featured Mary J. Blige and reached #7 on the rap chart. Jay-Z's follow-up In My Lifetime, Vol. 1 reached #3 on the Billboard 200 with the help of popular producers Sean Combs and Teddy Riley. In 1998, Jay-Z released Vol. 2... Hard Knock Life, which reached #1 on the Billboard 200 and included two singles that reached the top 20 spots of the Billboard Hot 100: "Can I Get A..." (featuring Amil and Ja Rule) and "Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)". Vol. 2 was certified five times platinum in the US and won the Grammy Award for Best Rap Album in 1999. Another successful chart-topping album, Vol. 3... Life and Times of S. Carter, followed in 1999, with hit single "Big Pimpin'" featuring UGK. Jay-Z's 2000 album The Dynasty: Roc La Familia was again #1 and included the hit single "I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)" and many guest performances by Roc-A-Fella artists.

Jay-Z's 2001 album The Blueprint, the first in a trilogy of albums under that title, became controversial for including lyrics attacking other New York City rappers like Nas and Prodigy. Still, The Blueprint included two top 20 singles "Izzo (H.O.V.A.)" and "Girls, Girls, Girls". The Blueprint2: The Gift & The Curse followed in 2002, with two singles reaching the top ten on the Billboard Hot 100: "'03 Bonnie & Clyde" featuring Jay-Z's future wife Beyoncé Knowles and "Excuse Me Miss" featuring Pharrell Williams. Jay-Z planned his 2003 album The Black Album to be his last album. The Black Album included the hits "Dirt Off Your Shoulder" and "99 Problems", went triple platinum, and inspired a bootleg by the DJ Danger Mouse titled The Grey Album that mashed up Jay-Z's album with The Beatles' The White Album. In 2004, the concert film Fade to Black was released. Jay-Z became president of Def Jam Recordings in 2005 and resumed his rap career in 2006 with Kingdom Come. That album reached #1 and went double platinum. The concept album American Gangster followed in 2007. In 2009, Jay-Z released a mixtape, A Prelude to Blueprint 3, and then surpassed Elvis Presley as solo artist with the most albums to have had reached number 1 on the Billboard 200, after the actual release of his 11th studio album The Blueprint 3. His studio albums have sold over 26 million units in the United States alone.

In addition to his solo work, Jay-Z has also done several collaborative albums. In 2001, he released Jay-Z: Unplugged, a live recording of his performance on the program MTV Unplugged 2.0 with The Roots as his backing musicians. In 2002 and 2004, Jay-Z released albums with the singer R. Kelly, The Best of Both Worlds and Unfinished Business. As part of the MTV Ultimate Mash-Ups series, Jay-Z and Linkin Park released the album Collision Course, consisting of combinations of their hit songs. Few mixtapes have been released, many unofficially.