JAY-Z Closes Paris Run With Timberlake and Pharrell

The final night of JAY-Z’s European run turned into a working history of his cross-genre reach. At the Stade de France in Saint-Denis on September 10, the rapper brought out Justin Timberlake for two songs, including “Holy Grail” from 2013’s Magna Carta Holy Grail and Timberlake’s “Until the End of Time.”

The guest slot carried weight beyond a single appearance. Pharrell Williams later joined JAY-Z for four tracks: “Excuse Me Miss,” “La-La-La (Excuse Me Miss Again),” “Frontin’,” and “Allure.” The pairings reflected the collaborative span the JAŸ-Z30 Tour is built to mark — 30 years since Reasonable Doubt and 25 since The Blueprint.

The setlist leaned on those anchor records without turning into a retrospective replay. Five songs from The Blueprint and five from The Black Album shared space with “Big Pimpin’,” “Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem),” and “Empire State of Mind.” The 34-song sequence opened with “On to the Next One” and closed with “Numb / Encore,” drawing a line between different phases of the catalog.

The Paris show closed a three-night UK and France stretch that began in London, where guests included Lauryn Hill, Wyclef Jean, and Idris Elba. The tour continues October 23 and 24 at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood.