A young Kanye raps for Jay-Z

WorldStarHipHop’s throwback footage of the week is like candy for hip-hop heads. Kanye is rapping in the studio, mostly freestyling, and beginning at 2:08 he’s doing it for Jay-Z.

WorldStar doesn’t appear to know the exact year, but I put it at 2002 or 2003 because: a) someone is wearing a David Carr Texans jersey (hilarious) and he played for Houston from 2002 to 2006, and b) Kanye doesn’t have any album out yet (says so at 4:20) and College Dropout came out in 2004. He seems to have only just met Jay, or at least doesn’t know him very well yet. For fans of both, it’s intensely satisfying to see the young kid sweating it out for the veteran’s approval.

On his way out of the studio, someone asks Jay-Z what he thinks of this Kanye West character. “Ye West? Hot. Fire. Put my money on it.” Good call, buddy…

For my money, the best Kanye line in the whole video comes from an earlier part, before the Jay-Z scene: “How you goin’ to New York but you ain’t never took a tour there, you ain’t know you gotta be rich just to be poor there?”