The track also finds Mike rapping for the first time in a decade without his Run The Jewels partner El-P by his side. “Run” isn’t about running away from tyranny or our oppressors, instead depicting how Black people have run towards knowledge, freedom, and adversity, and faced it head-on. Everyone has been here every step of the way.” “You have been here every step of the way, in fact. “I wanted people to understand that patriotism is not exclusive to white people-this republic is not here simply because of white Anglo-Saxon protestants,” Mike explains. The music video for the track drives that point home, including several historical Black figures who have played integral roles in contributing to American society as we know it today. Killer Mike has always been an advocate for Black liberation and a promoter of Black history in and out of his music, and “Run” continues to paint the picture of why he believes Black people deserve to feel just as patriotic as their white counterparts on the Fourth of July. “The fact that all Americans don’t know that is a problem for me.”Įver since Black people arrived in this country, we have played an intrinsic role in shaping American culture, economy, and infrastructure.

“There would be no Fourth of July without a Black man, and the fact that Crispus Attucks was the first person to die on the behalf of what would become the republic called America,” Mike tells me, as we discuss why he chose to deliver his first solo track in 10 years, “Run,” on Independence Day. Holidays like the Fourth of July have long been understood to be white-centric, but as Killer Mike cites, the first American to die during the Boston Massacre (which led to the Revolutionary War) was a Black man named Crispus Attucks. Too often is Black history and American history viewed as two distinctly different timelines when, in reality, they are deeply intertwined.

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