Jay Z's latest album, much like all the projects that came before it, has been a source of extensive conversation since it was released. 4:44 saw Jay Z offer us an unprecedented window into his personal life, dishing on the dirty laundry within his ultra-famous family.
Fans of Jay and Beyoncé even thought they had the title of the album all figured out. The couple is obsessed with the number four, and for obvious reasons—Jay was born on Dec. 4, Beyoncé was born on Sept. 4, and a number of important dates within their extended family can be connected to the number. Case closed... or so we thought.
Early Wednesday morning, a Twitter user pointed out a very important detail about where Jay Z's dustup with Solange Knowles took place at, and it will make you reconsider everything you thought you knew.
The elevator incident is infamous even three years later, and from the very start of 4:44, Jay Z seemed to know it was time to address the footage. On the album's first track, "Kill Jay Z," he spells it out for you himself: "You egg Solange on, knowing all along all you had to say was you was wrong."
And indeed, the soiree the Carter/Knowles tribe was attending when the incident went down was at Le Bain, a penthouse club and bar whose listed address is 444 West 13th Street in New York City. It's entirely possible Jay saw those numbers when he exited the elevator bringing the group down from Le Bain, or that he returned to the scene months (or even years) later in order to draw inspiration from the scene of one of his lowest moments.
Of course, it's not that simple, because technically this all went down at The Standard hotel, which has a very different address from Le Bain. It's also reasonable to believe the incident taking place at that address had no bearing on Jay's decision to name the album 4:44; the numbers are significant to his family regardless, and could be a tribute to that rather than a flash point in his relationship with Beyoncé.
Even if this is just a wild coincidence, it still adds to the mythology of Jay Z. As a rapper, he has been renowned for his double, sometimes triple entendre and ability to weave multiple messages within his lyrics. It's only right that he possibly managed the same within the title of one of his projects.
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