Can someone explain to me how Jay-Z's career wasn't a complete failure?

Commercially of course he did fantastic and continues to, but if you look at his discography, it's pretty much all garbage. Don't get me wrong, I like Jay-Z quite a bit at times, and Reasonable Doubt is one of my all time favorites, but here's my take on his discography;

Reasonable Doubt: Classic, stylish mafioso album, one of the best debuts
In My Lifetime 1: Decent overall album, I didn't really care for the production and I can't say his rapping was really up to par with RD, and also he didn't fit on it well.
Vol 2: Kinda bad album, few songs I like, mostly just crap though.
Vol 3: Same with 2, but more quality.
The Dynasty: Pretty weak album, beats boring, his voice annoyed me there, nothing I'll probably ever listen to again.
The Blueprint: I think it's highly overrated, it isn't garbage like the 3 before but I could personally never see it as a full album really, it just seemed like a collection of songs compiled on one album and never really crafted well.
The Best of Both Worlds: If you've heard it, it speaks for itself, it's garbage.
The Blueprint 2: Same as 1, this one is just too long and not really any of the standouts from the original.
The Black Album: I think even though it was pop oriented more than I personally like, I also think it was an overall pretty good listen, though I can't say it was a crafted masterpiece, it seemed plastic at points. For what it's worth, I think it's a good album.
Unfinished Business: Garbage
Collision Course: Terrible, I'm not a huge Linkin Park hater but this was just retarded.
Kingdom Come: Total shit
American Gangster: Since he had only released one good album to me since his debut, and this point in his career, it's an amazing album, very impressive. Without looking at the significance of it being a good album after his pointless retirement, I think all in all it's not fantastic but it's one of the stronger points in his discography, his best lyrically since RD, possibly even surpassing.
The Blueprint 3: I don't personally care for it, however it's not too terrible honestly, but I won't give it credit as a good album, overall about 5/10
Watch The Throne: This will probably be the most credit I've given this album, but it was a bad album. Not complete trash, but I wish Jay would have never met Kanye. This album is pretty weak, not really his peak even at brag rapping for pop audiences, and the production was pretty lame.

Overall I think he has about a 4/10 career, and for a clearly talented artist, that's not good. I also don't see how he's clever, at least to the point where people act like he is, I always felt like his strong suit was his smooth complex rhyming at some points, which fit well within the song structures.

Your thoughts?

Look at KRS he is also riding on the success of his early two or three albums, now he is horrible but considers himself as one of the best. Jay-Z has the same problem, except that Jay-Z at least sells, KRS does neither. Jay's Catalogue: 5,5/10 KRS: 5/10

I don't think Kingdom Come is total shit just because the second half or so of it is.

For how many albums he's made, the quality just isn't there. I hate on Jay-Z a lot, but it's not because I don't think he's talented. He just hasn't put out consistent quality to warrant how rich, famous and long lasting he's been. Out of the 15 albums you listed, I'd give maybe 5 of them better than like a 7/10. His career should have died 10 years ago and honestly, if he hadn't found Kanye, it probably would have.

As for wishing Jay never met Kanye, that relationship has provided us with enough good albums to cover for the garbage. It's not it's hard to just not listen to the bad ones.

For the amount of albums he's released, his career has mostly been terrible.

His ratio of good to bad is unbearable.

He has four good-very good-classic albums (Reasonable Doubt, The Blueprint, The Black Album, and American Gangster.)

The rest range from decent to complete garbage. For the quality to garbage ratio, I wouldn't rate his discography a lick over 5.5/10. However, he has four albums that I rate 8.5 and over and a few that are hanging around in the 2s and 3s.


How can a MC as talented as he is be so inconsistent?

He's a nigger, you shouldn't even had set expectations for him


THIS IS HILARIOUS RIGHT WIRFTGU

How did I miss this thread?

Anyone you guys are focusing too much on his skills as an artist and forgetting that Jay-Z is a BRILLIANT business man. As a rapper, yea he's has some hits and some misses but his albums don't have to be great as long as he can sell it.

He isn't a failure because people buy his stuff. I've learned that you kind of just have to take stuff how it is, and if you don't like it then so be it. I like Jay-Z.

I agree. He fell off big time from dropping dope verses on tracks like Show & Prove, and Danger Zone to having some of the most simplistic raps in the game. In my opinion, even Reasonable Doubt is a mediocre album at best.