Thoughts On: Run The Jewels 2

Recommended Listening: Blockbuster Part 1, Angel Duster

Welcome back to Thoughts On, this week we will be talking about another one of my huge mistakes from 2014. After making the Hip-Hop list I could not help but search out other year-end top lists and see if any of our results stacked up. Granted websites like Complex, XXL, and Spin (which I have a huge personal gripe with) had way more albums on their list because their job is to listen to music year round; but I still was delighted to know that almost all the albums I listened too were on best of lists in some capacity. To me this signaled that I was pretty good at keeping up with the trendy music and filtering out all the garbage, so imagine my surprise when I see this album called 'Run The Jewels 2' getting critical acclaim and I have never even heard of it. Now for reference when I say critical acclaim I mean CRITICAL ACCLAIM, this 11-track album got a 89 Metacritic and jaw dropping scores all across the music world. I hadn't seen statistics this high since Kendrick Lamar. Even Hot 97 (one of the worlds biggest Hip-Hop radio stations) was raving about the album, and their personalities are comically known for not agreeing on things such as this.

So what exactly is Run The Jewels 2? Well for starters it is the second album in the lineup, with the first being 'Run The Jewels' (which also was very well received), and the albums are made by a rap duo known as, wait for it, Run The Jewels. Pretty simple to remember yes? So with that aside WHO is RTJ? Well the duo consists of El-P ( who has been a major producer in underground hip-hop for years and is a well respected veteran) and Killer Mike (a rapper who made his debut with Outkast in the early 00's and has steadily made his own name in the industry, with a few acclaimed albums under his belt). Both of these two have been in the game for decades and have been collaborating together for years. They made an album in 2012 called 'R.A.P music' which was released to rave reviews, and presumably after that they decided to form a duo and drop some of the hottest albums in 2013 and 2014.

Now onto the important question: how did this duo's album come to be known as an “instant classic” in most circles? The answer lies in what a lot of people consider to be “fundamental” Hip-Hop (I put fundamental in quotes simply because times change and you don't have to have this certain mindset to love this album). This albums is hard. The duo spares no expenses and they hold no punches, this album is a culmination of the classic competitive nature of Hip-Hop. Back when what you said was all you had and you couldn't just say you were number one, you had to live and breathe it. RTJ 2 starts, picks up, gets more and more intense, and never stops. From the first song 'Jeopardy' you get a heavy build up of the duo going back and forth and lyrically showing you why they are the best at what they do. From there each song plays off the last with El-P's production getting crazier and more twisted, a perfect backdrop for the duo's anarchist murder infused lyrics. However this is not just some mindless fight/hype music. In the course of the album they talk about uniting against the police, their roots, how religion is used to control many, and how we should all be dishonest just like the government that is responsible for this country. It is amazing how many complex thoughts they were able to squeeze in as they were rapidly firing off lyrics at an impressive speed. Even in songs like 'All my life' where things start slow, the level is raised to just an that over the top amount so that you can still crank up the music and physically feel the bass in your body.

While the J.Cole's and the Kendrick Lamar's have had the smooth/instrumental Hip-Hop game on lock for awhile, the harder more aggressive side of the music has either been lost or poisoned. Rappers like Waka and French Montana creating what have become known as bangers when real bangers are the kind of songs you find RTJ producing. Hard enough to dance to, to pump you up, but also complex enough to make you think. These two have the advantage of being older men who have been in the game long enough to see trends rise and fall and develop their own unique place in rapdom. Also if it helps this album was released under Nas' Mass Appeal record label (the rap legend backed these two gentlemen and that says something). It might take a second for you to warm up to this album if you aren't used to things this intense, but once you break past that barrier you will wrapped up in the hard world of RTJ, competitive abrasive rappers in their prime. Killer Mike and El-P have found the perfect match in each other and I can only hope that their upcoming album RTJ 3 continues to push the envelope and bring some of the fire back to this industry. I give this album the rating of: Listen Soon...like seriously go slap this album.