The Father, The Son, and the Holy Throne

A few years back, two rap superstars teamed up for one of the greatest collaboration albums of all time. A mogul who was somewhat of a veteran at this point was teaming up with his protégé. The protege had burst onto the scene a few years earlier with much help from the mogul and had, in turn, breathed new life into the mogul’s career. The album cover was a simple expression of the type of luxury they enjoyed. We are obviously talking about Like Father Like Son, the 2006 collab album from Birdman and Lil Wayne. Released in the middle of Wayne’s insane mixtape run and with Wayne handling (most of) the writing, we were treated to an incredible collection of songs about the streets, stunting, and family. A recent re-listen of the project led me to draw parallels to another much heralded collaboration, Watch The Throne. Rap mogul Jay-Z teamed up with Kanye West, who at that point was at his peak, to release one of the biggest albums of the decade. Kanye was at his peak at this point, coming off the release of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, the best album of his career. Hov was coming off a rough few years(artistically, NOT financially) and needed a spark, this was it. Watch the Throne album and tour were the biggest events of 2011, the album covered themes of fatherhood, race, infidelity, friendships, and most importantly, “black excellence, opulence, decadence”. The tour was popular in its own right, with the duo styled exclusively by Riccardo Tisci, then creative director of Givenchy, who also designed the album cover. West attempted to popularize the leather kilt and the pair performed Niggas In Paris up to 10 times at some stops on the tour. It was indeed a cultural moment, but there would be no Watch the Throne without Like Father Like Son