Watch The Throne: Jay-Z, Kanye West ‘Watch The Throne’ Album Preview Reviews

In a small, intimate listening session hosted by Jay-Z, several prominent journalists and even a couple of random fans, the highly anticipated Jay-Z/Kanye West collaborative project, Watch The Throne, was unleashed. The reviews are in, and despite what many feel was a bad omen in the form of “H.A.M.” (like us), word on the e-street is that Watch The Throne may end up being largely worthy of the hype.

No, your friendly neighborhood hip hop site was not present at the event. Our invite must have gotten lost in the (e)mail, but it’s ok. We’re sure Jay an’ ‘nem will realize their mistake and give us a one-on-one exclusive soon. In the meantime, if you’ve been watching the Watch The Throne progress, and wish that there was one place that you could get all the good reviews for the upcoming project, we got you.

Chuck Creekmur, from AllHipHop.com was there, and he breaks down his thoughts on a track-by-track basis. He gave insight as to the rules and regulations of the session, and gave a decent overview of the project.

Jermaine Hall, Editor In Chief of Vibe, give a 10-list of “things we learned” from the listening session, providing interesting tidbits like, “You didn’t like “Ham?” Well guess what? They two titans got the memo,” and “Jay wants to surpass the Beatles’ record for most #1 albums. They’re at 16. He’s at 11.”

Rolling Stone provided a thorough review of the event, and the music therein, as Simon Vozick-Levinson echoes the other men in his enthusiasm for the project, especially songs the “Otis Redding” song and co-sign of Frank Ocean’s contributions.

Listen to Jay-Z and Kanye West ft. Otis Redding – “Otis”

MTV was there, and also broke down the music, relaying some additional information gleaned from a friendly, but mostly tight-lipped Hov, and GQ’s Sean Fennessey detailed the event from his perspective as well (accurately calling out how useless most listening sessions are).

Lastly, the Voice of New York Hip Hop, Angie Martinez was in the proverbial house, and had this to say about the project.

All in all, the consensus seems to be that these hip hop heavyweights are bringing something notable to the table with Watch The Throne. The album is available for pre-order now through www.kanyewest.com, and is expected (for now) to drop on August 2.