Run the Jewels are hip-hop's preeminent anti-oppressor, anti-sucker, anti-wack-shit menace: the party band for the revolution or the apocalypse, whichever comes first. A collaboration between two veteran rhyme-slayers — Brooklyn's El-P and Atlanta's Killer Mike — Run the Jewels have gone from a whim-driven underground rap project to a worldwide sensation, headlining festivals, topping critics polls, nabbing Grammy nominations, soundtracking movie trailers and striking fear in any group unfortunate enough to follow them on a concert stage. Mixing the industrial grime of New York City with the vibrant bounce of the dirty South, Run the Jewels forge hip-hop's future while adhering to the core tenets of its bedrock: gymnastic displays of skills, incendiary political rhetoric, furious scratch solos, merciless braggadocio, battle-honed assholery, R-rated punchlines and a back-and-forth that brings the interplay of the shell-toe Adidas era screaming into our contemporary nightmare.