Sinatra was playing over the speakers at Yankee Stadium, but the night wasn’t over, not quite. No, as Frank’s voice rang out at 2:30 a.m., in the wee small hours of Monday morning — “I want to beee a part of it …” — Jay-Z still had a few more verses left in him.
Seeing Jay live is a rare enough treat in these days when the man who was once rap’s most prolific hitmaker is more or less retired, for real this time, emerging only when he wants to say something to the generations of hip-hop fans who still revere him like no other. This past weekend, he celebrated two milestones by looking back with a pair of concerts dedicated to full performances of his 1996 debut, Reasonable Doubt, and his 2001 high point, The Blueprint. Those albums are turning 30 and 25 this year, but they’re only the tip of Iceberg Slim’s unparalleled catalog. So, when those two shows sold out instantly, he added a third night at the stadium and called it “Extra Innings.”
The extreme demand for these shows — driven even higher after two headline-making nights — meant huge crowds of would-be concertgoers outside the ballpark on Sunday evening. Amid reports of gatecrashers forcing their way past security and entrances locking down, the show was delayed more than three hours from its scheduled 9 p.m. start. Those who had made it to their seats sat around in the packed stadium and gradually grew restive. When the house speakers blasted Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise” for a second time that night, it drew loud boos. Rumors rippled through the crowd that the show would be canceled entirely. But hey, it was a beautiful night in the Bronx, and we were already there. What else could we do but wait?
