Kendrick Lamar famously stated in his song “Hood Politics” that “Critics want to mention that they miss when hip-hop was rappin’/ Motherf***er, if you did, then Killer Mike’d be platinum.”
To those who knew what Lamar was talking about, the line brought an overwhelming amount of joy and laughter. In a way, the song was finally recognizing that hip-hop was dying and that nobody was doing anything to fix it, and perhaps Atlanta emcee Killer Mike was one of the genre’s last hopes.
With a discography consisting of five critically-acclaimed albums, Killer Mike was commonly considered one of the biggest hidden gems in all of hip-hop, an artist only true hip-hop heads knew about.
On the East Coast, something equally as special was brewing. Brooklyn emcee and super producer El-P sat in his dusty studio making beats for the likes of Cannibal Ox and Aesop Rock.
The rapper’s critically-acclaimed underground hip-hop duo Company Flow dissolved around 2001, and now much of his career was spent running his label, Definitive Jux, as well as releasing a few solo projects, that, much like Killer Mike, received praise from those who knew what real hip-hop was meant to be.
Both of these artists were considered out of their prime. Although the quality of their music had not declined, the clock was ticking on their relevance, general market appeal, as well as any level of notoriety they may have had in the past.
And yet, despite all of this, these two artists came together to form possibly one of the most widely-loved, respected and important hip-hop groups since A Tribe Called Quest.
The duo, dubbed Run the Jewels, has risen to fame over the course of the past year. Playing at major festivals such as Coachella and giving live performances on popular talk shows like Jimmy Kimmel Live and The Tonight Show, the group’s fan base can be considered nothing but dedicated.
True fans never leave the house without wearing at least one piece of Run the Jewels merchandise. When there is a Run the Jewels show anywhere near them, they will commonly drive for hours, pay hundreds of dollars and wait in hour-long lines just for the chance to hear the group live.
With this massive yet cult-like following, it is no doubt that both Killer Mike and El-P have a successful future ahead of them, yet the group means so much more than that.
Since the early 2000s, mainstream hip-hop has been going through a dry spell, to say the least.
Hip-hop used to be the music of the oppressed, commonly shedding light on social issues and moral dilemmas and giving a voice to groups of disenfranchised people.
Every song had a social duty to it. Artists realized their platform and used it to further their race, their communities or whatever other issues may be on their hearts.
It was also during this golden age of hip-hop in which beat production took on a whole other level of originality. There were no trends or one unifying sound of the genre of the time. Each song was unique and pushed the boundaries of what hip-hop was meant to sound like.
Yet, the past decade or so of hip-hop has been focusing on anything but such a brand of music.
Apart from the fact that almost every rap song sounds the same nowadays, the message has been watered down to talk solely about money, sex and drugs. This is never what hip-hop was meant to be and many artists who have tried to put it on the right track have been unsuccessful to-date.
This is where the true importance of Run the Jewels truly shows.
Despite being wildly successful in both the mainstream and the underground, the group has truly returned to what hip-hop was meant to be. It is rare outliers and anomalies such as this that define a generation and set the norm for what music should be.
Off of their latest album, “Run the Jewels 2,” alone, the group has made powerful statements regarding systemic racism, police brutality, war, terror and violence.
Each song provides a powerful statement and call to action that spans across multiple races, socioeconomic borders and people groups, and their signature production style is in a whole new genre of its own.
It’s amazing to see what Killer Mike and El-P have already achieved within hip-hop. These two underdogs are on a mission to change how the world sees the genre and, in a way, the future of the music is really on their shoulders.
If you were to ask me, Run the Jewels is the single most important group in music right now, and those who wish to see a brighter future for the hip-hop genre have a duty to support them.
