During the London stop of their On the Run II tour, Beyoncé and JAY-Z took the mic to surprise their audience: “We want you guys to be the first to experience this new project.” After premiering the new “APESHIT” visual to the crowd, they released their collaborative album, Everything Is Love, to the rest of the world without warning. In the “APESHIT” clip, the couple gallivant in an empty Louvre, as dancers come dangerously close to touching the priceless artworks. A black couple, captured with the same stark intimacy as a Deana Lawson photograph, fix each other’s hair in front of the Mona Lisa. Jay and Bey pose with treasured Egyptian ruins, the revered Greek statue of the goddess of victory Nike, and Leonardo da Vinci’s iconic work, and it’s clear what they’re trying to say: their work—and their love—are worthy to be placed within the very white, colonialist canon of art history.
Everything Is Love—plus another standalone track called “SALUD!”—is Beyoncé and Jay’s testament to forgiveness and reconciliation. Featuring contributions from Migos’ Quavo and Offset, Ty Dolla $ign—as well as production from Pharrell, Cool & Dre, TV on the Radio’s Dave Sistek, among others—the nine-track project, credited to the Carters, is the couple’s ode to their daughter, Blue Ivy, and their combined wealth. Here’s a few things to know going in.
As a Relationship Renews, the Trilogy Ends
In case you weren’t up to date, the last two Beyoncé and JAY-Z albums were about a rift in their relationship, caused by Jay allegedly cheating on his wife. On Lemonade, Bey ripped into Jay with tracks like “Don’t Hurt Yourself” and sang about infidelity while referring to the supposed paramour as, “Becky with the good hair.” With Jay’s next album 4:44, he rapped multiple apologies to his wife, apparently turning a new leaf in his “womanizing” ways. Now, Everything Is Love acts as the final installment of the Carter’s relationship saga. And it even apparently helped bring the couple back together. “We were using our art almost like a therapy session,” Jay told The New York Times last year. “And we started making music together.”
Everything Is Love is bookended with songs that address the couple’s marital reunion, as they define their love in different ways. In the opening track “SUMMER,” Beyoncé sings, “Love is universal/Love is going to express itself as a form of forgiveness and compassion for each other,” setting the scene for the album’s overall theme of lovers’ unity. Later in “713,” Jay wistfully recounts the story of their relationship from when they first started dating. But he ends the song by zooming out to speak for all the black American men who “only know love” because of their black women in their lives. “Black queen, you rescued us, you rescued us, rescued us,” he raps graciously.
And on the closing track, “LOVEHAPPY,” the two overtly acknowledge the trials that they’ve had to face in their relationship. But they have a sense of humor about it, as Beyoncé plainly says, “You fucked up the first stone, we had to get remarried,” to which Jay responds nervously, “Yo, chill man.” Beyoncé keeps egging him on though, as she says: “We keepin’ it real with these people, right?/Lucky I ain’t kill you when I met that b—.” All jokes aside, the album ends on a tender and genuine sentiment: “We came, and we saw, and we conquered it all/We came, and we conquered, now we’re happy in love.”
Beyoncé the Rapper Matches Jay Bar-for-Bar
It’s no secret that Beyoncé is an incredible rapper. But on Everything Is Love, she rivals her husband’s spot in the pantheon of rap royalty. On “APESHIT,” Bey acts as the third Migo alongside Quavo and Offset (sorry, Takeoff) as she deploys rapid-fire triplet bars on top of the Pharrell-produced beat. She sounds so at-home doing “skrr” ad-libs that the song is practically “Stir Fry Part 2.” Bey also pays homage to the greats on “HEARD ABOUT US,” borrowing the iconic line from Notorious B.I.G.’s “Juicy”: “If you don’t know, now you know.” And for the hook of “713,” she interpolates a line from Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg’s 2001 classic “Still D.R.E.”: “Representin’ for my hustlers all across the world/Still dippin’ in my lo-lo’s, girl”—penned by JAY-Z himself.
JAY-Z Shades Everyone
On 4:44, Jay rapped some lines that were speculated to be disses about Kanye, Future, and Drake. On Everything Is Love, he bolsters his shady reputation with a few lines that could again be about Drake, Kanye—and this time, the Kardashian-Jenners. On “BOSS,” he raps about a certain someone who is “not a boss.” “N----s getting jerked, that shit hurts, I take it personally/N----s rather work for the man than to work with me,” he says, perhaps referring to Drake and how he turned down a contract with Tidal to accept a $19 million contract with Apple. Later in the verse, Jay raps, “Everybody's bosses ’til it's time to pay for the office/To them invoices separate the men from the boys,” possibly referring to the hilarious “invoice” that Drake sent over to Pusha-T after dropping his “Duppy Freestyle” diss track.
Jay also seems to address his fallout with Kanye. In his two-hour interview with Charlemagne last month, Kanye admitted that he felt slighted after Jay and Beyoncé didn’t show up to his 2014 wedding. “I was hurt,” he said to Charlemagne. “I understand they were going through some things, but if it’s family, you’re not going to miss a wedding.” On “FRIENDS,” Jay raps, “I ain't goin’ to nobody nothin’ when me and my wife beefin’/I don't care if the house on fire, I'm dyin’, n---a, I ain't leavin’/...If y’all don't understand that, we ain’t meant to be friends.” Plus, the mere fact that Bey and Jay are releasing an album during Yeezy’s ongoing marathon of releases could be seen as a challenge to the prolific producer, as well as to Jay’s longtime nemesis Nas, who just dropped a new album, Nasir. Later on “FRIENDS,” Jay appears to take aim at the Kardashian-Jenner clan. “Y’all put n----s on a t-shirt, it hurts you ain’t never meet ’em,” he raps on the track, seemingly referencing the fact that Kylie and Kendall put pictures of Tupac and Biggie on T-shirts for their clothing line without licensing the images. After a legal battle with the estates of Tupac and Biggie, the suit was recently dropped.
The Carters Are So Rich They No Longer Give Two Fucks
Now that the Carters have reached new heights of superstardom and wealth, they truly give no fucks about taking shots at any institution or company that doesn’t serve them on their terms—including the Super Bowl, the Grammys, and Spotify. On “APESHIT,” JAY-Z addresses rumors that he was asked to perform at the Super Bowl 2018 halftime show, rapping, “I said no to the Super Bowl/You need me, I don’t need you/Every night we in the end zone/Tell the NFL we in stadiums too.” But considering that the Super Bowl doesn’t pay its performers, the decision seems less of a slight and more of a smart business call. Later in the same verse, Jay is more clear about his feelings toward the Grammy committee, who shut him out of the 2018 Grammys despite him leading the nominations with eight in total. “Tell the Grammys fuck that 0 for eight shit,” he says about the institution who has also continuously failed to give his wife the Grammy for Best Album.
On “NICE,” Beyoncé is equally as bold as her husband by name-dropping their competitor streaming service, Spotify, from where her music has been absent. “If I gave two fucks, two fucks about streaming numbers/Would have put Lemonade up on Spotify,” she raps. This release is, of course, Tidal-only.
But just because they’re tossing around insults to major cogs in the music industry doesn't mean Jay and Bey aren’t dead serious about their financials. The duo, who have been known to discuss how to build intergenerational wealth in black communities, use the album to address how they’re building a legacy and portfolio for their descendants. “My great-great-grandchildren already rich/That's a lot of brown chil’ren on your Forbes list,” Beyoncé raps on “BOSS,” thinking of how children down the line will benefit from her inheritance. She also makes it clear that they’re doing it all for their daughter, Blue Ivy. “I ain’t never seen a ceiling in my whole life, that’s word to Blue,” Bey raps, referring to the popular “glass ceiling” metaphor to explain how minority groups are institutionally barred from high-achievement.
The Story Isn’t Over...
On the standalone single “SALUD,” Bey and Jay toast to each other, as if to say: “We fixed our marriage AND made three whole albums about it. We did that.” And “SALUD!” features the same adorable sign-off from Blue Ivy (“Shoutout to Rumi and Sir, love Blue”) that appears on the album cut “BOSS,” revealing that the track and the album should be regarded as companions. "SALUD!" could easily be the victory lap that rounds out the LP, but the song was conspicuously released separately. It’s possible that the intentional omission of the track could be a reassuring statement to fans: just because the Carters made an album doesn’t mean it’s the end of their work together. In fact, Everything Is Love and “SALUD!” comprise just one touchstone in their collaborative history as a couple. From “03’ Bonnie and Clyde” and “Crazy in Love” to “Drunk in Love” and “Family Feud”—Jay and Bey have consistently made music with each other, even through the ups and downs in their relationship. These days, it looks like it’s mostly ups.
