Jay-Z Samples Regina Spektor For "Crispy Benjamins," Another Greatest Hits on the Way?

Earlier this week, Rolling Stone received a press release about a new Jay-Z song called "Crispy Benjamins," featuring a sample of Regina Spektor's "Chemo Limo." The announcement seemed official, yet somewhat dubious: The song was to be released in "late 2009," but this announcement came less than three weeks after The Blueprint 3 dropped, and the three months left in 2009 seemed too soon for a BP3 reissue. According to MTV, however, "Crispy Benjamins" may be destined for an upcoming Jigga greatest hits collection that might be released on November 24th.

However, Jay-Z's old label Def Jam is supposedly releasing the greatest hits collection, the third in the rapper's career, but "Crispy Benjamins" was recorded for Atlantic's BP3, so it remains unclear if Def Jam would even have access to the track, which falls under Jay's RocNation umbrella. The plot thickens.

The track was produced by Mirk of the New Familiar Music Group, whose members attended the SUNY Purchase Music Conservatory along with Spektor. According to the press release, which neither Jay-Z reps or Mirk claim they're responsible for sending, Jay-Z officially purchased the Spektor sample on September 17th.

In other Jay-Z news, the rapper and Alicia Keys were spotted filming their video for BP3's "Empire State of Mind" around Tribeca and Ground Zero in New York City yesterday, MTV reports. Music video director extraordinaire Hype Williams will helm the clip. The pair previously performed the track at the MTV Video Music Awards, where they got an unexpected assist from Lil' Mama.

Related Stories:
• Jay-Z Talks Rihanna, Teaches Winfrey How to Rap on "Oprah"
• Jay-Z's 9/11 Benefit Turns Into All-Star Marathon With Beyonce, Kanye, Rihanna, Mayer and More
• Jay-Z Burns Through "Blueprint 3," Classics at Tiny New York Gig

• 
  MUSIC Exclusive Live Chat With Linkin Park and Incubus
• 
  MOVIES & TV Peter Travers: 'The Avengers' Has it All
• 
  POLITICS Matt Taibbi: Jon Corzine Is the Original Zimmerman
• 
  VIDEOS Exclusive Premiere: Tenacious D's 'Tinnitus'

Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

More Song Stories entries »

Twitter