Leave it to Beyoncé to drop the ultimate Father’s Day tribute.
On Sunday night (June 21), Queen Bey’s haircare brand, Cécred, closed out Father’s Day by sharing a link to a seven-minute vlog titled “The Blueprint.” And, when it comes to The Carters, the whole world knows exactly who “The Blueprint” refers to.
Narrated by Beyoncé, the new clip follows the complete timeline of Jay-Z’s hair journey — from a low-cut Caesar to his Basquiat-esque wicks and now, his voluminous Afro, which he debuted during his headline-dominating Roots Picnic set last month (May 30).
“Jay told me a few months ago he was planning on combing out his locs for the Philly show with The Roots. He wanted to do this in honor of his father… his dad used to rock a fro, so he wanted to rock a fro in his honor,” Beyoncé explains between bits of behind-the-scenes Roots Picnic rehearsal footage, including a sweet clip of Rumi, their youngest daughter, shadowing her father onstage. “I wasn’t all the way convinced that he would be able to comb out his locs, considering he had such thick, long wicks, and his hair had been locking for over eight years. I thought it was always beautiful that the real reason Jay grew out his hair was to show Blue that her hair was like his hair.”
Those old enough to remember will recall the way the world treated Blue Ivy when she was born in 2011. Both online and in real life, people lambasted The Carters for “not combing” Blue’s hair and denigrated its look and texture. According to Beyoncé, Blue was around five years old when she first expressed a lack of confidence in her hair, which, in turn, inspired Jay to start growing out his. “We really wanted her to love and embrace every inch of her gorgeous curls,” says Beyoncé.
Pouring into their daughter eventually became part of Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s artistic mission. Blue appeared with her natural hair in both Beyoncé’s Grammy-winning “Formation” music video and Jay’s Ava DuVernay-helmed “Family Feud” clip, provided guest vocals on her mother’s “Brown Skin Girl,” and even narrated Matthew A. Cherry’s Hair Love audiobook, picking up a voice arts award in the process (best voiceover — children’s audiobook). The Carters also used a photograph of a Black woman picking out a Black man’s Afro for the cover of their 2018 Everything Is Love joint album. Blue Ivy also appears in the new Cécred clip, pitching in to help comb and detangle her father’s hair while quipping, “I’m gonna be an influencer!”
Even though Beyoncé wasn’t initially on board with Jay taking out his locs — “It’s a lot of memories stored in locs,” she muses over a clip of Jay holding and kissing their twins Rumi and Sir. “Locs can be like antennas, connecting us to frequencies and energies” — she understood that this was also an emotional transformation.
It took six days for Beyoncé, Blue and Houston loctician Letisia “Lety” Ravelo to comb out Jay’s locs — and an additional day just to detangle his hair. They exclusively used Cécred products, which Jay has also been using for his hair for the past eight years, including the brand’s parting tail comb, detangling spray and hair and scalp balm.
“And on show day, his fro was beautiful, from start to finish,” Beyoncé closes out the vlog, complete with family-centric backstage footage from Hov’s fiery Roots Picnic headlining set. “I wanna thank Jay for trusting Cécred on his hair journey.”
It’s been a banner year for Jay-Z as he celebrates 30 years of his debut studio album Reasonable Doubt. The New York Times hailed him as one of the 30 greatest living American songwriters; he fired back at everyone from Dame Dash to Nicki Minaj in his buzzy Roots Picnic freestyle, and he’ll play a trio of Yankee Stadium shows next month (July 10-12), one of which will honor the 25th anniversary of his classic The Blueprint.
Check the full Cécred blog recounting Jay-Z’s hair journey below.
