JAY-Z - Please educate me fellas

[Gandalf]

I used to be into my hip-hop a few years back but not so much now. I'm still an expert though

Jay-Z is okish. But really is just one of the better commercial artists. There are far far better artists out there.

try a few of these -
Non - Phixion (listen to the track 'black helicopters').
Jedi mind tricks (check out album 'violent by design')
Saul Williams
Anit-pop consortium

And for a bit of lightweight but infectious student hip -hop its got to be Jurassic 5.

Miles, i'm not impressed. I thought you were a man of the world. Sure, acts like 50cent etc are crass and boring as sin, but there is a whole wealth of really good underground stuff. Intelligent people making intelligent music and not a single mention of hoes or guns.

If people like rap and hip hop then that's fair enough, but from what I have heard nothing has ever really grabbed me. I have a couple of Dr Dre CD's, but I never listen to them. I gave it a try, but nothing stuck. I'm willing to give anything a try musically, but if it doesn't stick, there isn't much I can do. I have two Eminem CD's too, but again interesting for a couple of days and seldom listened to again since. Admittedly, there are a handful of tracks on both albums that I think are pretty decent, but that's as far as I will go.

I'm drawn to what I think is good, and unfortunately rap has never really been something that I relate to all that much. It all boils down to individual taste I guess.