Roc Marciano

New York hip-hop mainstay Roc Marciano is a trailblazing MC and producer, beloved by fans, critics and peers for his avant-garde ambient soundscapes, hard-knock life story-telling, and free-flowing, jazz-temp lyricism. In 2022, The Elephant Man’s Bones, Roc’s long-anticipated full-length collaborati...

New York hip-hop mainstay Roc Marciano is a trailblazing MC and producer, beloved by fans, critics and peers for his avant-garde ambient soundscapes, hard-knock life story-telling, and free-flowing, jazz-temp lyricism. In 2022, The Elephant Man’s Bones, Roc’s long-anticipated full-length collaboration album with renowned producer The Alchemist, was named Best New Music by Pitchfork, who lauded the release as “one of the most indulgently sinister rap records of the year” and set the stage for Roc Marciano to have an even bigger 2024. Roc is on the heels of his career-minting run of critically-acclaimed solo LPs the past few years, from his 2018 and 2019 albums Marcielago, Mt. Marci to his hailed instrumental project Pimpstrumentals in 2020. He also has been spent the past few years sitting behind the boards for some of hip-hop’s most exciting projects like Stove God Cooks debut album Reasonable Drought, to which Stereogum hailed, “his hazy deep-concentration beats turned out to be an ideal complement to Stove God’s literary crime-life talk” and Flee Lord’s 2021 LP Delgado. Most recently, Nothing Bigger Than the Program, a joint project with Vancouver mainstay Jay Worthy, was noted by Pitchfork for the duo’s complementary creative partnership, noting how “Marci’s minimal, often drumless beats are the ideal backdrop for Worthy, whose push-pull delivery slips easily into each nook and cranny.” Widely hailed as a godfather of the underground, Roc has helped shape the sound of the next generation, with the emcee serving as a key influence and source for the resurgence of contemporary hip-hop that has had. “I want to constantly be in the state of discovery,” he told Vulture in 2022, discussing what he sees himself doing in the next ten years. “From Marcberg on, I always wanted to make music I want to hear.”

Born Rahkeim Meyer in Hempstead, Long Island, Roc grew up in the Terrace Ave projects, studying the artistry of everyone from golden age legends Public Enemy, De La Soul, Rakim, and Big Daddy Kane to new school heavyweights Nas and The Notorious B.I.G. That wide-ranging cultural education paid off, as Roc soon earned a stint in storied Busta Rhymes-fronted hip-hop collective Flipmode Squad. He made his debut for the group on project highlight “The Heist” from Busta’s fourth album Anarchy alongside Ghostface Killah and Raekwon of Wu-Tang Clan and even worked on an unreleased track with Biggie. But while his time in Flipmode Squad helped him make a name for himself, Roc has always been known for his independent streak. He left Busta and Co. to found hardcore Long Island group The UN before eventually taking a leap of faith and going solo. He found critical and commercial acclaim with self-produced 2010 breakthrough Marcberg, which Pitchfork praised for its fusion of “early 1990s boom-bap with an impressive flair for storytelling” and the cult-classic follow-up Reloaded.