JAY-Z is releasing his new 4:44 album next week

When it was originally teased people assumed Jay was prepping his next record, but a trailer for a film featuring Mahershala Ali and Danny Glover (and crediting Lupita Nyong'o) extinguished those hopes - briefly. Now it turns out that there is an album as well as a film... and both are being released next week on 30 June.

The new album is a TIDAL exclusive, obviously, with Sprint customers in the US also getting access. It's still unclear whether Jay is Lemonade-ing the LP - that is, releasing a full film/visual component - or the album and film are separate entities.

As Billboard note, this new collab between Jay/TIDAL and Spring is a big deal - in more ways than one: "the corporate partnership behind the US release is the first in a series of music exclusives, according to a joint statement, and it follows the announcement in January that Tidal sold a 33 percent stake in the company to Sprint for $200 million, giving it access to the telecom company's 45 million customers."

So is this essentially a commission by Sprint? Or is there some dignity behind it?

.@S_C_ ‘4:44’ https://t.co/mM3hBjHr84 #TIDALXSprint pic.twitter.com/dZIddQsz5t

— TIDAL (@TIDALHiFi) June 19, 2017

.@S_C_ x ‘4:44’ album x 6/30 https://t.co/mM3hBjHr84 #TIDALXSprint pic.twitter.com/zwaUlFrbwx

— TIDAL (@TIDALHiFi) June 19, 2017

Pitchfork also note that Jay has changed his name again - for MCHG he dropped the hyphen, but it's back. It's also all caps now.