I remember being in the car with some people who were listing to "JAMIN94.5" or "HOT106" (Boston/Providence stations) or some shit and like 15 songs in a row were autotune-hooks and minimalist keyboard beats with synth blips and fake 808 drum sounds. Then Jay-Z comes on with fairly lush and organic sounding instrumentation with (REAL!) horns blaring all over the place...and...he was actually rapping!

I'm not even sure this would classify for what you're looking for, because content-wise it wasn't outside the realm of what's typical for post-2000s hip-hop, but it didn't SOUND like anything else that was out at the time. The only reason it flew was that it was Jay-Z, and there are really only a handful of people who can put out whatever they want and the radios still have to play it and he's one of em.

(To be honest: Izzo, 99 Problems, and DOA are other Jay-Z songs that also didn't sound anything like anything else on the radio at the time either...and that's what this is about right? hits?)