You can say a lot of things about Tech N9ne, but you can’t say this guy hasn’t been shaking up the game for a minute now.

Pigeons and Planes recognizes this facet of Tech’s storied career and reaffirms his status as being relevant-as-ever with The Kansas City King’s inclusion in the list of “20 Alternative Hip-Hop Artists Who Are Making Things Interesting.”

Peep what they had to say:

Tech N9ne isn’t scared of doing things differently, and he never has been. What might stand out at first is his unusual look (face paint and masks are a staple of his videos and live performances) or his rapping style, fast-paced and packed with different rhyme schemes, but it goes deeper than that. The content of Tech N9ne’s music is also far from standard rap fare, sometimes touching on the realities and struggles of everyday life and sometimes veering into hardcore or even horrorcore territory, but there’s more to him than that. He’s also never afraid of collaborating inside and outside of hip-hop, having worked with T-Pain, Serj Tankian, ¡Mayday!, Cee Lo Green, and Kendrick Lamar, all on 2013’s Something Else.

What makes Tech N9ne stand out most, however, is his staunch commitment to being an independent artist. Over the course of 14 studio albums and numerous other releases, the Midwest rapper has sold over 1 million records independently, and will probably hit the two million mark in the not too distant future. Tech has also co-run a label, Strange Music, since 1999, which, alongside his own and other artist’s music, makes just shy of $7 million per year in sales of merch, according to a 2013 Billboard story.

Overall, Tech is a shining example of when doing things differently, and not giving up, works out extremely well. Keep doing you Tech N9ne.

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• Do you think Tech N9ne is still shaking up the game? Why or why not?

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