R.A. The Rugged Man News — News

With his new album Legends Never Die in stores now, R.A. The Rugged Man is back in the spotlight, and a number of prominent peers have been singing his praises. Most recently, Strange Music don Tech N9ne sat down to reflect on the Rugged Man’s otherworldly lyrical skills and the success of the R.A./Tech collaboration “Holla-Loo-Yuh” off Legends Never Die. “A lot of people can’t even handle his lyricism,” says Tech. “Listen to his verse on ‘Holla-Loo-Yuh.’ He just murdered it. He’s the type of MC who says, ‘I can do this and you can’t’.”

A few days after his historic R.A. The Rugged Man collaboration “Learn Truth” hit the internet, Talib Kweli is offering a little more insight on the relationship between the two underground hip-hop icons and former Rawkus labelmates. In a new interview, Kweli unexpectedly compares R.A. to Kanye West, speaking on the Rugged Man’s versatility, his influential legacy, and the lessons he’s taught Kweli. In addition, “Learn Truth” producer Mr. Green speaks on R.A.’s feared status, even among the top rung of today’s emcees (Black Thought of The Roots included).

With his highly-anticipated new album Legends Never Die set to hit stores on April 30th, legendary rapper R.A. The Rugged Man is back in the spotlight. Recently Hopsin and his Funk Volume compatriots Jarren Benton, Dizzy Wright, SwizZz, and DJ Hoppa met up with the Rugged Man and spoke on his influence. “This guy’s a legend. I get excited meeting the people I grew up l listening to,” says Benton. “He’s basically one of my biggest influences,” adds Hoppa. Hopsin and R.A. also spoke on “Underground Hits”, their “crazy, wild, raw” collaboration off Legends Never Die, and touched on the internet haters who think the legend and the new school star shouldn’t work together.

In the latest edition of his MTV web series Film School, R.A. The Rugged Man goes on location on Hollywood Boulevard and disses pretty much everyone on the Walk of Fame, harasses Superman, and gets flipped off by Jason.

Newsday recently published a piece profiling the late Staff Sgt. John A. Thorburn, a decorated Vietnam war hero who was also the father of underground hip-hop icon R.A. The Rugged Man. In the video, viewable below, R.A. and his family discuss the tragic effects of Agent Orange, including birth defects that led to disablility and, eventually, death for two of R.A.’s siblings.

If this story sounds familiar to some hip-hop fans, it’s because R.A. told the story of his father in vivid detail during his guest verse on the Jedi Mind Tricks song “Uncommon Valor: A Vietnam Story.” This verse earned R.A. much acclaim, including a long-overdue Hip-Hop Quotable in The Source magazine.