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In honor of Jay-Z and Rocky, who are both out of retirement, a pop quiz to test your boxer-versus-baller acumen.
1. To which upcoming project did Coldplay’s Chris Martin make the biggest contribution?
A. Jay-Z’s Kingdom Come (out November 21), with vocals on the foreboding “Beach Chair.”
B. Sly Stallone’s Rocky Balboa, for which the song “Fix You” was an interminable source of inspiration. I mean, shit — “When you try your best but you don’t succeed/When you get what you want but not what you need”? That’s a Rocky screenplay right there.
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2. Which project most unapologetically and ridiculously exploits “technology”?
A. Rocky Balboa. The climactic final fight hinges on a “computer simulation” pitting virtual Rocky against the virtual current champ. You can e-mail Sly Stallone with comments. He’s got Internet now, did you hear? Also a fax machine. And a ColecoVision.
B. Kingdom Come. Pharrell produces a track. Pharrell has no musical talent beyond owning a computer.
3. On which project is Lauryn Hill’s presence most felt?
A. Kingdom Come, wherein Jigga does his best to acknowledge, pay homage to, then cold rip off Ms. Hill on “Lost One.”
B. Rocky Balboa, because the sheer lunacy of the sixty-year-old Mr. Stallone thinking he can sell a Rocky with “calcium deposits in [his] joints” approximates Ms. Hill’s own meltdown.
4. Who indulges the most shameless metaphor?
A. Jay-Z, in comparing a hypothetical future deluge of haterade surging his way with levees breaking on “Trouble.”
B. Stallone, for writing, directing and starring in what amounts to a two-hour-long metaphor for Viagra.
