RJD2
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RJD2 is Ramble Jon Krohn, born in Eugene, Oregon in 1976 and based in Columbus, Ohio, and he has spent twenty-odd years making sample-built instrumental music that sits between hip-hop, soul and film score. 'Deadringer' (2002) is the record that made his name and still supplies the tracks people shout for; 'Since We Last Spoke', 'The Colossus', 'Dame Fortune' and 'The Fun Ones' followed on his own label, RJ's Electrical Connections, after early runs on Definitive Jux and XL. Most listeners have heard him without knowing it - 'A Beautiful Mine', his collaboration with Aceyalone, is the Mad Men title theme. The reason to see him rather than stream him is the rig: he works four turntables plus an MPC and drum pads live, switching between them in the space of a second, and the sets run long and drift toward a house party by the end.
Popularity
How this is measured
An absolute, national (US) measure — not a ranking against the other artists on this site. We take the strongest of three open signals: ListenBrainz listens, English Wikipedia pageviews, and the number of Wikipedia language editions that have an article. The strongest one wins, so a signal we couldn't read never drags the result down. Bucket 1 means measured and small. Unrated never means small — it means we don't have the numbers.
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Top songs
Upcoming shows
Nothing on the calendar for RJD2 right now. They've played the region 2 times before. Browse all events.
What listeners say
RJD2 has a solid, well-sampled live reputation: LiveRate aggregates 30 critic concert reviews at 75 percent, and the recurring description is dynamic, funky, cinematic and genuine. The consensus is about craft and presence rather than spectacle - LiveRate singles out engaging stage presence and production-focused, theatrically experimental sets, and a New York reviewer credited the live-band version with rapper STS with elevating the night, calling the result a jazzified take on rave stylings that felt 'surreally fun and relaxing'. The caveat: at 75 percent there are clearly less enthusiastic reviews in that pool, and the show varies a lot in format - solo turntable set versus full live band - so what you get depends on the booking.
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Gripes
Gathered 2026-08-24 (high confidence) from musicbrainz.org, en.wikipedia.org, liverate.com, diandrareviewsitall.com, officialrjd2.bandcamp.com, rjd2.net, news.google.com, https://www.deezer.com search API — artist image via exact case-insensitive name match, highest fan count