Killer Mike’s Atlanta plays big role in biography of rap duo Run the Jewels

Credit: Photo courtesy of University of Georgia Press

Credit: Photo courtesy of University of Georgia Press

Though van der Doelen also discusses Meline’s Brooklyn upbringing and New York influences, it’s Atlanta that has the biggest impact in this narrative, due in large part to Render’s background: The rapper’s childhood was steeped in the Black activism that defines much of the city’s history, and he came of age amid the blossoming of southern hip-hop culture.

Van der Doelen begins the book with Render’s speech in the wake of the protests that followed George Floyd’s 2020 murder by Minneapolis police officers, which had turned violent. In that speech, Render spotlit Atlanta’s unique status as a mecca, albeit imperfect, for Black Americans: “Atlanta is not perfect, we’re a lot better than we ever were and we’re a lot better than [other] cities are.” He went on, discouraging protesters from burning and looting Atlanta businesses: “If we lose Atlanta, what else we got?”

This opening, focused on the city’s political and socioeconomic role in Black American culture, bears out in the rest of “Kill Your Masters.” Van der Doelen depicts Render’s career as a microcosm of the city’s role in the evolution of rap and current status as rap music’s unofficial capital. The rapper’s life in Atlanta is intertwined with the city’s musical and political history. Recognizably a creature of Atlanta, Render pops up, like a conscientious Forrest Gump, in nearly every important cultural and political moment in Atlanta since his upbringing in the working-class neighborhood of Collier Heights.

For example, Render met his first musical benefactor, Antwan “Big Boi” Patton, half of groundbreaking Atlanta hip-hip duo Outkast, when he was a student at Atlanta’s Morehouse College. His featured verse on OutKast’s “The Whole World” won Render his first Grammy, and he released his first solo album via OutKast’s Aquemini Records.

A subsequent feud with Big Boi was resolved in part through the intervention of none other than the late Civil Rights icon John Lewis, who represented Atlanta’s 5th congressional district for decades. Render had known Lewis since childhood through his grandmother, an activist and member of Martin Luther King Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference along with Lewis.

In van der Doelen’s telling, the story of Run the Jewels often feels like the story of the political decade between 2013 and 2023, largely due to Render’s commitment to community activism. “Kill Your Masters” spends a great deal of space revisiting that period of U.S. politics, particularly in Georgia, contextualizing Render’s activist influence on Run the Jewels’ music and decision making.

Much of this context will be familiar to U.S. readers who are even moderately engaged in politics or current events and tends to feel a bit like a civics course at times. However, it’s useful context for understanding the group and its surprising impact on U.S. politics. The duo’s support of Sen. Bernie Sanders during the 2016 Democratic Party presidential primary is a case in point.

Credit: Photo by Fred von Lohmann, licensed by Creative Commons

Credit: Photo by Fred von Lohmann, licensed by Creative Commons

Still, despite the often-political bent of “Kill Your Masters,” van der Doelen suggests that the perception of Run the Jewels as a political group originates in its anti-authoritarian ethos. Its music, he writes, “transcend[s] the obvious markers … often abused to create superficial ‘us’ versus ‘them’ by whatever powers may be. Those nebulous powers are the ‘them’ that Run the Jewels vigorously points back at, inviting everyone else to become part of the ‘us.’” The group, according to the author, works to form that “us” through music.

Van der Doelen suggests, however, that along with that anti-authoritarianism comes a fierce empathy. The collaboration between Render and Meline allowed Render to access that empathy for the first time. The author quotes him: “I have never allowed myself to fully show the type of empathy and compassion I have. That was something I had hidden in that hip-hop veneer.” Render continues: “But now I could show where that anger comes from. It comes from empathy. From compassion, sympathy, care and concern.”

At its core, “Kill Your Masters” portrays a group born of and nurtured by a deep love of hip-hop and a desire to place music, rather than commercial success, at the center of the musicians’ career; that shared love of music facilitates the duo’s love toward each other and toward their audience.

Nowhere is the duo’s combination of fierce anti-authoritarianism and fierce compassion clearer than in van der Doelen’s account of a St. Louis show following prosecutors’ refusal to press charges against the police officers who killed unarmed Black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. While violent protests erupted in Ferguson that night, an emotional Render stood before his distressed audience in St. Louis — Meline in silent support beside him — and told them, “The one thing I want you to know: It is us, against the motherf---ing machine!”

At these words, van der Doelen recounts, the music started and the concertgoers “erupted into a fireworks of raw emotion.” His description of the show that followed brings to mind James Brown’s concert in Boston after King’s assassination, channeling his audience’s grief and rage into musical catharsis. Van der Doelen writes: “There were tears, there was pain but there was also a lot of love and joy. Because nobody in that room needed to be alone in their pain.”

Similar moments of musical catharsis and community appear throughout “Kill Your Masters.” In the end, the book depicts Run the Jewels as a musical act that tells its audience, above all else, to live through hard political times with their head held high and their arms around their friends — a message perhaps timelier now than ever.

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Rachel Wright has a Ph.D. from Georgia State University and a master’s degree from the University College Dublin, both in creative writing. Her work has appeared in the Stinging Fly and elsewhere. She is currently at work on a novel.

Credit: ArtsATL

Credit: ArtsATL

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