That Time JAY-Z Told DJ Premier to Produce the Entire ‘Dynasty’ Album

Primo x Jigga

This weekend marks the 19th anniversary of Jay-Z’s 2000 album, The Dynasty: Roc La Familia. Coincidentally, DJ Premiere was on promo run for his new Gang Starr album, One Of The Best Yet.

While discussing time in Houston and helping create the ‘90s NYC sound; he shared a rare story involving Jigga. During the initial creation process for the Dynasty album, Jay wanted Primo to produce the entire project by himself.

Jigga told him to lock in with him for two weeks in a studio; but Primo had other previous obligations to go on tour. Considering Premier helped create some of Jay’s most memorable songs from his early catalog; one can only imagine things would’ve went if Jay did an entire project with Primo.

Take a look at the story below.

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Jay-Z, photographed at Baseline Studios for the cover of the French hip-hop magazine Groove, by Armen Djerrahian in October 2003. The photographer used a Nikon F4 camera with Polagraph film, which allows the user to create a black-and-white slide. “This pose with the diamond symbol was synonymous with the Roc-A-Fella family and has become one of my best-known shots,” Djerrahian once told The Guardian. “But when Jay threw the sign initially, I was almost annoyed because it hid most of his face.” During an interview on the New York Said podcast he spoke further about this famous image, saying that Jay throwing up the Roc was “his vision, him posing. I just said ‘try to look through your hands.'” The French photographer had first worked with Jigga back in April 1997, taking a photograph that Roc-A-Fella Records later used as the cover of his In My Lifetime, Vol. 1 international single “Wishing On A Star,” released in March 1998. He also took a famous mid-performance shot during the “Hard Knock Life Tour” in 1999. #JAYZ @armenexpo

A post shared by Hovstorian (@aintnojigga) on Aug 28, 2019 at 3:24pm PDT