Jay-Z has said he isn’t making any music right now – but this doesn’t mean he’s taken himself out of the game.
"I don’t know what happens next,” the 52-year-old rap star told Kevin Hart on Hart to Heart. “I’m not actively making music or making an album or have plans to make an album but I never want to say I’m retired.
“It’s a gift, and who am I to shut it off? It’s open to whatever. It may have a different form. Maybe it’s not an album. Maybe it is. I have no idea, but I’m just going to leave it open.”
Jay-Z, who hasn’t released a collection of his own music since 2017’s 4:44, announced his retirement in 2003 but then made 2006’s Kingdom Come.
“I just needed a break,” he recalled. “I really thought that I was really burnt out at that time. I was releasing an album every year – ‘96, ‘97, ‘98. And then in between that, soundtracks, other people’s albums, Roc-A-Fella, touring back-to-back.
“And you know, I just looked up one day and I was like, ‘I’m tired.’ I had never been on a vacation until like, I want to say 2000, like my whole life. And I was just really burnt out at that moment.”