On Tuesday, on a breezy, cool San Francisco night the On The Run tour officially ended. With it’s conclusion Jay Z and his wife Beyonce took their baby girl Blue, hopped on a private jet and flew away to parts unknown with another $100 million in the bank.
With the end of the highly successful tour so too probably ends a variable that was imperative to its success, the ever-present rumors of the couple’s demise. That’s because, according to Billboard, those rumors were just another tool in the sizeable war chest of the power couple, used effectively in coaxing sales to what was said to be a struggling tour. Now, On The Run is just another in a long line of commercial successes for Jayonce. But, in order to upkeep the luxurious gloss of their brand, they may have sunk to a new low and may have shown just how loose their grip is on not only their invulnerability but also reality as well.
Previously, Bey and Jay were the indestructible, an impenetrable powerhouse couple that could not be bothered with tabloids or rumormongers. Their wedding was a tight-lipped, its guest list diminutive and pictures non-existent. Same for their child, born in secrecy in a hospital on a whole floor all to their own, the first ever pictures uploaded to Bey’s personal Tumblr versus tabloids. For years Jayonce stood as the anti-Kimye. The couple we knew nothing about despite our lust for information, something authentic in a world of celebrity that is increasingly artificial. Now, they have effectively stolen the tabloids from Kim and Kanye and did so in a way that hints that it was all for the money.
Make no mistake, their show is supposedly amazing. A friend who attended Tuesday’s show called it the greatest concert he’d ever attended. Not a dance step wasted, not a note missed. An efficient beast with everything streamlined and calculated down to the second and the inch. Jay, the rare performer with a presence so strong that he could share and even steal the stage from the supernova that is his wife.
However, some apprehension between the two was indisputable, another friend even posted a video on Instagram of an awkward kiss they shared on stage. Beyonce nearly broke down during her rendition of “Resentment” (again). If the rumors are fake, they seemed to be playing to them. If they’re real, it seemed to penetrate through their perfectly orchestrated spectacle. It existed for all to see, whether the aforementioned acts were an acknowledgement of the trouble in paradise or an unavoidable remnant of actual trouble in paradise.
If it is indeed a staged dramatic performance, that level of commitment is both commendable and disturbing all at once. I’d almost rather it be the opposite. An actual shed of humanness peaking through an increasingly inhumane couple. A couple having a rift is something to which we all can relate. A pair of robotic money tree harvesting cyborgs are not.
Maybe this is to be expected from Mrs. Carter. Bred to be a superstar seemingly since birth and famous since her teenage years, life in the limelight is in many ways the only life she’s ever known. But Reasonable Doubt dropped when Jigga was already 26, and he didn’t really blow until Vol.2 two years later. A few shreds of the memory of a normal life should still exist inside the head of Shawn Carter no matter how far removed from normalcy he is. On top of that, the culture that allowed Jay this amount of celebrity and fortune celebrates authenticity and frowns on this type of facade. I feel like the Jay Z I grew up on would know better.
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