Lil Wayne says JAY-Z is the reason why he no longer writes down his lyrics.
On Tuesday, July 11, Weezy F. Baby sat down with The Pivot Podcast to share untold stories about his childhood and the beginning of his legendary music career. During their conversation, Wayne recalled the moment when he decided to freestyle his bars without relying on the old pen and paper.
“Love Biggie, love Jadakiss... I love all that shit, but Jay," Wayne said. "The moment I heard it I stopped. You could ask my boy. ‘I heard that n***a JAY-Z don’t write no more.’"
“We went in the studio and we did ‘10,000 Bars’ and that was the last time I rapped anything off of a paper," he added.
"10,000 Bars" is a 35-minute track that Wayne dropped in 2002. It was originally released as the final mixtape in the New Orleans rapper's Squad Up series. It's also the final time Wayne ever wrote down his bars. Wayne first opened up about ditching his rhyme books during his appearance on VH1's "Behind The Music" in 2009. However, his appreciation for Hov goes back even further.
Weezy has been a devout fan of JAY-Z and has been blessed to have worked with him on several tracks over the years. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Wayne even admitted that Birdman once criticized him for sounding like the Roc Nation founder.
“When you find a favorite artist, you’re going to start sounding like them,” he said. “It took Birdman and them to pull my ass aside and be like, ‘Bro, I’m tired of every song you doing sounding like damn JAY-Z. You’re not JAY-Z.’”
Watch Lil Wayne talk about JAY-Z's influence below.