‘Watch the Throne’: Listen to Jay and Kanye’s newest

“Watch the Throne,” the long-awaited collaboration between Jay-Z and Kanye West drops this week, but you can stream the album on Grooveshark starting today!

Some thoughts on the album:

–It will surprise nobody to learn that there are a lot of songs about how much money Jay-Z and Kanye West have. Good to see their self-esteem is still up!

–Everyone hated “Otis” when it came out, but to our minds its the perfect summer single: Light, sprightly with a hopping Otis Redding (neatly credited as a featured artist) sample. “Got to, got to, nah nah nah!” The raps aren’t memorable (“In my other other Benz” is the only standout) but in this season that’s secondary.

–But “Lift Off” is the standout single from the album. Jay’s wife positively bellowing “Take it to the moon, take it to the stars!” is going to blast out of car windows until Halloween.

–Yes, that is a Will Ferrel quote from “Blades of Glory” in “Ni**as in Paris.” (They couldn’t afford to license “Anchorman”?)

–Kanye brags in “Murder to Excellence” that he’s from “the murder capital,” but that’s not really true. Chicago isn’t even in the top 10 American cities by murder rate.

–Funniest line? Kanye talking about his future son in “New Day”: “I might even make him be Republican / So everybody knows he likes white people.”

–Second funniest: Jay and Kanye comparing themselves to LeBron James and Dwayne Wade in “Gotta Have It.” Have fun parsing who is who, and whether that’s meant to be ironic!

–”Sunglasses and Advil / Last night was mad real” in “No Church in the Wild” sounds like it belongs in a Drake song.

–Like true moguls, Jay and ‘Ye are reaching out to all the quadrants here. They got Frank Ocean to sing on a few tracks to co-opt the Odd Future set, a sample of Michael Buble favorite “Feeling Good” on “New Day” to make the Volvo crowd feel comfortable, and enough shoutouts to black history to assuage the “positive rap” crowd.

Listen below! What do you think?

Grooveshark widget via State.