Jay-Z was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and Beyoncé in Houston. But Exhibit A of their global entertainment dominance sits squarely in Southern California on the Malibu coast, a gleaming 40,000-square-foot concrete-and-glass mansion that the couple bought last year for $200 million, a record sum for a single-family home in California. Their combined net worth, according to Forbes, is estimated at more than $3 billion.
The power that hip-hop’s premier couple wields goes well beyond the symbolic. They have teamed up on some of the most storied collaborations of the last decade, traversing stadiums across North America, along with two shows in Paris, for the sometimes bumpy On the Run tour in 2014. Four years later, they ran it back with the more harmonious On the Run II, which grossed more than $250 million. In between, in 2016, they rented out the Louvre and outshone the “Mona Lisa” in the six-minute music video for “Apeshit,” in which Beyoncé shunned her signature vocal runs to instead rap bar-for-bar alongside her husband. (The family collaborations have extended to the couple’s children, with eldest child Blue Ivy Carter joining her mother on the 2023 Renaissance world tour.)
The last few years, though, have belonged to Beyoncé, who outpaced Jay-Z — and most of the recording industry — while touring behind the 2022 blockbuster “Renaissance” album and then releasing “Cowboy Carter,” another record-breaking album that saw the artist plant her flag firmly in country music terrain. The Renaissance tour, which was her highest-grossing (and the eighth highest of all time) included four late-summer stops at SoFi Stadium and a concert movie, which former Times reporter Marissa Evans called “a grandiose dare to anyone who tried to ask us to be less of ourselves.” Meanwhile, the “Renaissance” album continued to shake dance floors across the globe, while also earning Beyoncé, 42, a 32nd Grammy, making her the most decorated artist in the history of the awards show.
Even in an “off year,” Jay-Z, 54, still went where few others have gone. Last summer, the Brooklyn Public Library honored him with “The Book of HOV,” a multimedia exhibit showcasing unseen photos, archived artifacts and some of his original masters. Visitors didn’t even have to step inside the library to marvel at his greatness; some of his most timeless lyrics were stamped along the building’s towering exterior. It’s another reason why galaxy-brained entrepreneurs would line up to pay $500,000 for the chance to pick his mind over dinner — even if the man himself says it’d be a fool’s decision.
