Murs

For over two decades, Murs has fearlessly rapped with power, poise, and purpose. Picking up a mic in high school, he founded <a href="spotify:artist:2EbeblguQabGEEYWYtY2CR" data-name="3 Melancholy Gypsys">3 Melancholy Gypsys</a> before logging time in influential West Coast collective <a href="spotify:artist:0E4UA1bttJjSFNgAkLyQuo" data-name="Living Legends">Living Legends</a>. Following his 1997 solo debut <a href="spotify:album:0rodKQQzJOzoXmmJ9aPx8e" data-name="F'Real">F'Real</a>, he unleashed a string of underground classics, including The End of the Beginning for <a href="spotify:artist:57UnSUpae3SbRekxNa5Kgl" data-name="El-P">El-P</a>’s Definitive Jux [2003], the major label breakout <a href="spotify:album:3LgQLDySa6Ef7qK3jsdvRl" data-name="Murs For President">Murs For President</a> [2008], and the critically acclaimed <a href="spotify:album:72ZovczwuVo8LSFFRNcdTY" data-name="Have a Nice Life">Have a Nice Life</a> [2015]. The latter earned praise from the likes of Pitchfork, HipHopDX, and XXL. Most recently, 2017’s <a href="spotify:album:3V0DcPrzdUyOVikmcwLO0q" data-name="Captain California">Captain California</a> maintained that momentum and went Top 25 on the Billboard Independent Albums Chart.
Simultaneously, he remains the consummate “rapper’s rapper.” Between six lauded collaborative releases with 9th Wonder, he joined forces with Sacha Jenkins and iconic Bad Brains bassist Daryl Jennifer in The White Mandingos and shared bars with everybody from <a href="spotify:artist:2YZyLoL8N0Wb9xBt1NhZWg" data-name="Kendrick Lamar">Kendrick Lamar</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V" data-name="E-40">E-40</a> to <a href="spotify:artist:7hJcb9fa4alzcOq3EaNPoG" data-name="Snoop Dogg">Snoop Dogg</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:2B4ZHz4QDWJTXPFPgO5peE" data-name="Warren G">Warren G</a>. 2016 saw him make history by setting a Guinness World Record by “Rapping for 24 Hours Non-Stop” during a Twitch.tv livestream. Entering the studio in November 2017 with producer Michael “Seven” Summers, a series of trials and tribulations triggered the 14 songs comprising his 15th full-length and fourth for Strange Music, the aptly titled A Strange Journey Into The Unimaginable—which drops on his fortieth birthday March 16, 2018. – Rick Florino, February 2018