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Precious is a new-style weepie but one that is much more bracing than depressing
Precious
Theatre
Ian McKellen is captivating throughout. He delights in the play’s gallows humour, yet is also maudlin and poignant
Waiting for Godot
Theatre
Slight quibbles notwithstanding, this will set the West End’s stock riding high
Enron
Utterly, utterly brilliant. You really are in for a treat
Though 'Trilogy' has won rave reviews, I personally found myself exasperated after about an hour
We went on a quiet sunday evening and the food was excellent, but the experience let down by the service and ambiance
London,
John Aizlewood's rating
Reader rating
Description: The multi-platinum selling Hard Knock Life rhymer otherwise known to the world as Shawn Carter.
Phone: 0870998 8888
Trains: Tube: Chalk Farm 
Spectacle: Jay-Z’s swagger combined with a watertight band and big-screen visuals made a thrilling show
It's not often you get former Stone Roses singer Ian Brown, BBC creative director Alan Yentob and reality TV boy band JLS in the same room.
Then again, it’s not often the world’s most popular rapper, Shawn Jay-Z Carter, plays an intimate London show.
In his spare time, Carter is Beyoncé Knowles’s husband and co-owner of New Jersey Nets basketball team, two sports bars and a clothing brand, but this week his album The Blueprint 3 became his 11th consecutive American chart topper.
In Britain the story is rather different. Run This Town might have given him his first number-one single this month, but until The Blueprint 3 debuts next week, the 38-year-old New Yorker who earned $35 million last year has only had one top 20 album: a collaboration with America’s silliest grungateers, Linkin Park.
Yet, much to the peevish chagrin of Noel Gallagher — who was most certainly not present last night — Jay-Z headlined Glastonbury 2008 and, just to show who has the last laugh, he closed his set proper by cheekily miming along to Oasis’s original Wonderwall. You had to laugh: imagining the steam whooshing out of Gallagher’s ears made it more chucklesome still.
Alas, a distinctly muddy sound rendered much of his and rapping sidekick Memphis Bleek’s whiplash vocal interplay redundant, but with two drummers, a brass section, some coruscating guitars and banks of keyboards, this was the rockiest hip-hop show I’ve seen. If Jay-Z’s ego is no match for Kanye West’s, his swagger and exuberance, allied to that gung-ho but watertight band, plus fabulous giant screen visuals — including, at one incongruous point, footage of Kurt Cobain in instrument-smashing mode — combined to make a thrilling spectacle, especially on the New York triple whammy, Heart Of The City (Ain’t No Love), Run This Town and Empire State Of Mind.
With midnight approaching (recording Jonathan Ross’s show meant he joined us at 10.30pm), he spent the encore rattling through staples including the mighty 99 Problems and the clatter of Big Pimpin’, before spending 10 bizarre minutes thanking audience members with fortune cookie homilies: “Man in the red shirt, don’t take no shit from no one now ... yo, girl in the front row, baby I love you...”
We can only imagine what on earth Coldplay fans will make of this when Jay-Z supports them at Wembley Stadium tonight and tomorrow.
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
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Don't really get Hip hop..doesnt seem particularly musical.
Could someone explain all the arm waving and why do rappers do that weird thing with the mic? Holding i so as their index finger is held straight under their nose? I Mean whats all that about?
- Al Stuart, ealing
Kray- You are wrong the stats dont lie Jay-z has built up a catologue worthy of many accolades. He does not flop in the u.k - have you ever been to one of his shows? He has done allot for music and is a very respect artist. From the Marcy projects to London.!
- Dennis, london
Americans need to check their heads. Why should Jay Z eclipse Elvis Presley's achievements? He is a mediocre rapper. LL Cool J, Melle Mel, Chuck D and Rakim all have superior vocal skills. It is his marriage to R&B diva that keeps him in our papers in the UK. His albums are always flops in the UK. We love hip-hop but it's got to have some class e.g. Kanye West, OutKast and Black Eyed Peas. Jay Z should retire in dignity at the top. He does not deserve these accolades.
- Kray Zee, London
