On one level, Jay-Z's New York is his New York. The city at the heart of the song is both a real, gritty place and an idealized, flashy dream. What makes each of those songs so powerful-and what makes Jay-Z's "Empire State of Mind" such a worthy successor to the crown-is the combination of the deeply personal and the universally iconic.
The A-list of old-school New York anthems might include the jazz standard "Autumn in New York," Frank Sinatra's legendary "New York, New York," and Billy Joel's classic piano song "New York State of Mind." From the hip-hop generation we have Nas' similarly titled but otherwise rather different "NY State of Mind," Ja Rule's "New York," and the Beastie Boys' "No Sleep Till Brooklyn," among many, many more. While tons of those songs are pretty obscure-"We Are New York and We Love Basketball" by Paulette LaMelle, anyone?-there's no denying that over the years we've seen plenty of top-notch New York songs from top-drawer New York artists.
Wikipedia's less-than-definitive " List of Songs About New York City" includes nearly a thousand titles. There's just something about New York City that inspires song, apparently. Over the years, the Big Apple has inspired countless odes and lyrics in its honor. And when such a song is as heartening and well-crafted as "Empire State of Mind" is, it can work its magic even in the face of such divisive infield politics.Is "Empire State of Mind" a new anthem-maybe even the new anthem-for New York City? Times being what they are, the need for this "unifying" type of hit becomes more apparent, acting as a tiny reaffirmation of a collective self that's becoming easier and easier to lose sight of completely.
And Jay, working with an almost exact approximation of his flow on "Run This Town", plays the nonchalant tour guide, pointing out landmarks to fill space even as his train of thought begins to break up. It's not that there's even anything terribly out-of-the-ordinary going on here: Keys' hook swings for the upper decks and subsequently the gut, working that "bright lights, big city" angle that appeals to the bridge-and-tunnel set as effectively as it does to people who've never actually visited NYC. Maybe there's something about the whole concept of the "New York City anthem" that's always going to resonate with and, to borrow a word, inspire us. What makes "Empire State of Mind" so undeniable is its innate magnetism- we can't help but drool over a big hook and even bigger ego, regardless of metropolitan affiliation. This thing was being banged to death, even earlier this week as the Phils stared down the short end of a daunting 3-1 series. But oddly enough, there it was: at the bank and the corner store, pumping out of car windows on just about every block.
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