Who is Killer Mike, the Rapper arrested for assaulting safety guard

Rapper Killer Mike managed to efficiently win three Grammy Awards earlier than being taken away in handcuffs and charged with battery.   

The 48-year-old musician was an Outkast protégé earlier than changing into a profitable solo rapper and later a member of the favored hip-hop duo Run the Jewels.

Before the citizen’s arrest, Killer Mike received Best Rap Song and Best Rap Performance for his solo track ‘Scientists & Engineers,’ and the Best Rap Album for Michael.

However, he is additionally well-known for his activism and even accepted the Change Maker Award on the 2020 Billboard Music Awards.

So, Killer Mike is a efficiently rapper and activist, however what else will we find out about him? 

Who was Killer Mike earlier than he broke into the music business? 

Born Michael Render on April 20, 1975, Killer Mike grew up within the west aspect of Atlanta.

He and two of his 5 sisters have been primarily raised by their grandparents because the rapper’s mom turned pregnant with him when she was 16.

‘I needed to notice that that is what my mom did for me and for us,’ he advised Billboard in 2023. 

‘But what that mentioned, we by no means as youngsters understood the sacrifice.’

Killer Mike’s grandparents taught him and his sisters to develop ‘a very good work ethic‘ they usually finally pressured the rapper to chop grass free of charge.

‘It was an honorarium to the people who had made a spot for us to develop up and have a wealthy life. We have been by no means taught to consider as free,’ he acknowledged in an interview final November.

Killer Mike attended church frequently rising up and all the time watched musicians carry out at every place of worship he went to.

By the time he was 9-years-old, Killer Mike aspired to be a rapper and even dropped out of Morehouse faculty to purse a music profession when he was 19.

‘I keep in mind my father saying to me, Big Mike, he mentioned, ‘You know they name it ‘ravenous artist’ for a motive.’ And I used that, I put that like a chip on my shoulder, like, ‘I’m gonna present my dad.’ And I confirmed him,’ he acknowledged in an interview final yr.

He has managed to proceed being a household man, and at present shares 4 youngsters together with his spouse of almost 20 years Shana Render. 

How did Killer Mike land his huge break?

Killer Mike was fortunate to fulfill a person generally known as Daddy Phat Sacks within the mid Nineteen Nineties.

Daddy Phat Sacks launched Killer Mike to Big Boi – a rapper who rose to fame as being one half of the hip-hop duo Outkast.

Big Boi had already been aware of Killer Mike’s music previous to assembly him and had even given Killer Mike telephone numbers for label A&Rs.

Eventually, Killer Mike received his huge break after recording a verse in Outkast’s track Snappin’ & Trappin’ off their 2000 album Stankonia.

He launched his debut album Monster in 2003 after signing with Columbia Records and received a Grammy for Best Rap Performance By a Duo or Group the identical yr.

Killer Mike left Columbia Records later that yr, and opted to be an impartial artist as an alternative of signing a take care of Virgin Records. 

‘I received bored with being advised corporately what to do and tips on how to do it, and ‘your identify cannot be Killer Mike’ and ‘you bought to do this sort of single,” he advised CNBC in 2019.

In the years following his debut album, he and his buddy and rapper EL-P turned a critically acclaimed hip hop duo Run the Jewels and launched their first of 4 studio albums in 2013. 

The pair managed to seek out themselves performing in a number of music festivals, and even toured with Rage Against the Machine in 2022. 

What form of activist is Killer Mike?

Killer Mike has been a profitable social and political activist that has targeted on social inequality, police brutality, and systematic racism.

Once incident he spoke extremely of again in 2021 was a capturing that broken his barber store in Atlanta.

However, he additionally rose to prominence for his speeches concerning the Atlanta protests throughout the Black Lives Matter motion and his urging for them to be peaceable.

‘I received loads of love and respect for cops… [but] I watched a white officer assassinate a black man, and I do know that tore your coronary heart out.’

‘I do know it is crippling, and I’ve nothing optimistic to say on this second as a result of I do not need to be right here. But, I’m accountable to be right here as a result of it wasn’t simply Doctor King and folks dressed properly who marched and protested to progress this metropolis and so many different cities,’ he acknowledged in 2020.

‘We do not need to see Targets burning. We need to see the system that units up for systemic racism burnt to the bottom,’ he added.

Killer Mike then urged individuals to ‘sit in your houses tonight as an alternative of burning your own home to the bottom, [so] you should have time to correctly plot, plan, strategize, and arrange and mobilize in an efficient approach’

‘We must be higher than this second. We must be higher than burning down our personal houses, as a result of if we lose Atlanta, what else we received?’

‘I need you to go dwelling. I need you to speak to 10 of your pals. I need you guys to provide you with actual options’.