Jay Z has come an extremely long way since drug dealing in Marcy projects. For the cover of Vanity Fair‘s November issue, the Magna Carta MC shared the intimate details of his rags-to-riches come-up. Between the pages, Hov shares what he learned during his time drug dealing.

“I know about budgets. I was a drug dealer,” he says of the skills that’ll come in handy with his newfound role as a sports agent. “To be in a drug deal, you need to know what you can spend, what you need to re-up.”

The charming rapper also gushes about courting his beautiful wife Beyonce back in 2001 during the Vanity Fair Music Issue. “We were just beginning to try to date each other. Well, you know, you’ve got to try first. You got to dazzle . . . wine and dine.”

He later admitted turning everyone favorite Southern girl into everyone’s favorite ride-or-die chick. In a line from his latest cut “Part II (On The Run),” he spit, “She was a good girl till she knew me.” And now? “She’s gangsta now,” he says.

While working on his latest LP, Magna Carta, the 43-year-old dad reveals that his adorable 18-month-old daughter, Blue Ivy may just prefer his music in comparison to Mama Bey’s.

“She loves all the songs. She plays a song and she goes, ‘More, Daddy, more . . . Daddy song.’ She’s my biggest fan. If no one bought the Magna Carta, the fact that she loves it so much, it gives me the greatest joy.” –Shanae Hatchett