Born: 1976, Long Island, New York

It's Aesop Rock time, again. The eclectic rhyme-sayer who burst onto the radar with his universally acclaimed Definitive Jux debut album Labor Days and then followed it up with the anthemic EP Daylight, returns to reclaim the truth and hand out lyrical beat downs to those who stole the up-rock and buffed the trains. Over four albums of futurized funk, Aesop Rock has been blowing minds with detail-driven narratives and dexterity defying word play. From the early records Music For Earthworms, Appleseed and Float to the masterful Labor Days, his singular voice has filtered tales of Lower East Side city life through a highly personal lens. And that voice has reached out and touched an enormous amount of people. Surprisingly, while his last two efforts were legitimate underground hits (moving more units than most indie artists, hip hop or otherwise, do in their entire careers) Aesop went into near seclusion for most of the time, avoiding the spotlight that was desperately seeking him out.