Young Guru talks new Jay-Z album & 'Watch the Throne' sequel

After sharing his view on the Paris vs. Poorest debate, Young Guru sat down with Complex to delve into two projects that are likely to keep the music industry in check – Jay-Z’s new album and the Watch the Throne sequel. As Mr. Carter’s sound engineer of choice he was subject to have a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process and continued evolution of the mogul. Here’s what he had to say on both projects.

On Jay-Z’s upcoming solo album:

“Jay-Z is always working on stuff, it’s a concept that I can’t talk about but I’m marveled at how smart this guy is. When he told me the concept, I was like ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ It was just so simple. It’s not a concept album though. It’s not like American Gangster, it’s not a Beatles concept album. It has a concept and a title, and the title and the concept fit him so well that people are going to be like ‘Wow.’”

“I like certain writers because it takes me 8,000 paragraphs to get my full point across. When somebody can take what I just said and condense it into two sentences and still have the same effectiveness, that’s a good writer. The simplicity of the title and the concept that it conveys is incredible.”

“I can’t tell you the title, it’s so good it’s like, ‘Oh my god why didn’t I think of that? What made you think of that and why haven’t we done that before?’ It’s just staring us in the face all these years, we could’ve been put that out as an album concept.”

On the possibility of Watch The Throne 2:

“It’s definitely a serious consideration. Hasn’t been underway yet but definitely serious consideration. Has been talked about but hasn’t been executed yet. Definitely could happen. A lot of artists just say shit too but if you think about it, this is just my opinion, the way I would like it to go-I would like Kanye to do the G.O.O.D. Music album and Jay-Z to do a solo album then they go out and tour and do all that shit and then next year, or the end of the year, we get Watch the Throne 2. To me, that would be the best thing to happen. I think the G.O.O.D. Music album is necessary for Kanye to establish that brand because they need to establish [themselves].”