Jurassic 5

The six-piece rap group Jurassic 5 redefined what it meant to be a hip-hop act in the ‘90s. Emerging out of the famed underground poetry scene at L.A.’s Good Life Cafe in 1994, the group stood as a defiant alternative to gangsta rap cliques in the city, laying the groundwork for underground, backpack and art rap to emerge in the 2000s. The sextet, which consists of Chali 2na, Akil, Soup, Marc 7, DJ Nu-Mark and Cut Chemist, were celebrated as connoisseurs of heady, introspective, conscious hip-hop. Their debut LP, 1998’s Jurassic 5, earned them a record deal with Interscope, which proved that their playful, intellectually demanding rhyme schemes and subjects had a place in the mainstream. They continued to explore their crossover potential up to their 2006 swan song, Feedback, which featured the Dave Matthews Band-assisted “Work It Out”, before reuniting for a 2013 tour and again for their 2016 single, “Customer Service".