Jay-Z Celebrates Live Instruments on "Blueprint 3 " Album Cover

Jay-Z posted the above image — a cornucopia of white-painted instruments — on his official Website today, which implies he'll be using the graphic as the cover of his eagerly anticipated The Blueprint 3. The cover echoes BP3's aesthetic, Jay's reliance on live instruments — he brought a 10-piece band with him for his All Points West performance — as opposed to studio trickery, which Jigga officially declared "D.O.A" with his first BP3 single. As for those three red streaks, we're assuming it represents that this is the third Blueprint and not an homage to the equal sign on the cover of U2's No Line on the Horizon.

In addition to the album cover, Team Supreme Music is reporting that they have the official Blueprint 3 track list. As Rock Daily previously reported, the album will feature contributions from Rihanna (who appears on second single "Run This Town"), Drake, Kid Cudi and MGMT, who are reportedly listed as co-producers on the track "Unforgiven." According to this found track list, the bulk of the songs on BP3 were produced by Kanye West and No I.D., but Timbaland's name pops up as producer of a song called "When It Comes To This." Additionally, Nas reportedly features on a track called "Empire State of Mind." The track list also includes two Kanye-produced bonus tracks, "Sound of the 70s" and "We Made History."

Also on the official Jay-Z site, Jigga is streaming "Run This City," which includes a verse from Kanye West along with Rihanna on the chorus. Blueprint 3 will hit stores on September 11th, exactly eight years after the release of the original Blueprint album.

Related Stories:
• Jay-Z Breaks Out Blizzard of Hits, Pays Tribute to Michael Jackson at All Points West
• Rihanna Returns and Kanye West Shines on Jay-Z's "Run This Town"
• Jay-Z's "Blueprint 3" To Feature Rihanna, Drake, MGMT

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Song Stories

“Tonight's the Night”

The Shirelles | 1960

The lead cut and title track from this girl group's debut album, "Tonight's the Night" was written by 19-year-old bandmember Shirley Owens, who sings lead, and producer Luther Dixon. The band from Passaic, New Jersey met in high school, first calling themselves the Pequellos. The song's frank thoughts about sexual and emotional surrender was racy for the time, but that didn't stop the Chiffons from cutting a similar version immediately after the original came out. "We were the first female group to write some of our own material," band member Beverly Lee recalls. "We did have some say-so in our writing."

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