Reports of a new Jay-Z project circulated around social media Sunday afternoon (Jan. 28) after director Hidji World posted Instagram Stories implying he was on set with the rapper.
In one Story, Hidji World shared a message that said he was “shooting today” with Jay-Z. In another, he teased a photo of a first-take film slate labeled “JAY Z -2024 ALBUM.”
Hidji’s name was written in as director, and director of photography Leroy Farrell’s name was also listed. The slate alluding to new Jay-Z music was dated today, Jan. 28.
As rumors of an alleged new Jay-Z album began to make their way around, Roc Nation was quick to respond. The company commented on a post on X (formerly Twitter) that had reported “A NEW JAY-Z ALBUM IS BEING TEASED FOR 2024.”
“That’s news to us,” Roc Nation wrote on Sunday.
Jay-Z’s last full-length solo album was 2017’s 4:44, which debuted and spent two weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. In 2018, he released Everything Is Love with Beyoncé as The Carters, which was the first joint set from the husband-and-wife duo.
“I’ll say I wanna make music, but it has to be something important,” he said in an interview with Gayle King last fall. “I don’t wanna just make a bunch of tunes. That’s not gonna serve me. It won’t feed me, first of all. I have to be saying something important. It has to mean something, you know? It has to mean something to a larger society.”
Jay-Z added, “Like 4:44, for example, was a personal story, but the amount of vulnerability in there allowed for a lot of people to explore the space.”