15 Alternative Hip Hop Artists You Need To Hear

By Dave Pittaway /

7. Run The Jewels

Run The Jewels are hip hops current super group. Killer Mike has been the best rapper out of Atlanta since Andre 3000 and EL-P has been arguably the best producer out there since the year 2000. They initially worked together on Mike€™s fantastic album R.A.P Music and had so much fun they just decided to keep the party going a bit longer. Run The Jewels are about one thing and one thing only, teeth shattering beats that make your body vibrate like a tuning fork. Just pure, non-stop savagery. Listening to them is like throwing a pulse grenade down a well and wishing for your bones to break. Run The Jewels do damage to you. Permanent, long lasting damage. Politically charged (damn Sanders/ Killer Mike would have been a good card), full of scathing fury and grittier than a concrete factory, Run The Jewels are the best collaboration in hip hop in god knows how many years. Brash, bold and not afraid of anything or anyone, Mike and El-P are the gatekeepers to the promised land of what hip hop has been, should be and will be as long as they are around to have a say in the matter.