Jay-Z and Kanye West Now Collaborating on a Full Album

In an interview with MTV after the premiere of his Runaway mini movie, Kanye West revealed that Watch the Throne, his collaboration with Jay-Z, has grown from an EP to a full album.

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"We're putting out a whole album now," Kanye said. "We had done five [songs] so far and then a few of them kind of were out there" — "Monster," also featuring Nicki Minaj, Rick Ross and Bon Iver, was one of Kanye's weekly "Good Friday" releases — "and I put them on my album. Sorry, Jay!"

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Such a heavyweight team-up naturally brings with it major expectations, but Kanye seemed relaxed about the project. "We're going to the South of France at the end of this month just to record new ideas," he said. "We'll probably be done with the album in like a day or whatever," he added, seemingly joking. "If you think about it, it's really easy [for Jay]: He only has to think of, like, 10 verses!"

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Song Stories

“All Along the Watchtower”

The Jimi Hendrix Experience | 1968

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."

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