Ol' Dirty Bastard

Russell Tyrone Jones, known professionally as Ol' Dirty Bastard, was an American rapper who was one of the founding members of the New York rap group Wu-Tang Clan, formed in 1992. Jones also released music as a solo artist beginning with Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version (1995).

Russell Tyrone Jones arrived at Wu-Tang Clan's 1992 foundation as its most unpredictable force—a rapper whose voice cracked and warbled like a man possessed, whose lyrics bent grammar into abstract shapes, whose very presence felt dangerous. "Shimmy Shimmy Ya" announced him as something other, a threat to rap's conventional wisdom, and *Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version* (1995) proved the solo album could be a Wu-Tang member's personal laboratory rather than just a side hustle. His partnership with RZA formed the sonic spine of the clan's mythology, but ODB always seemed to operate on a frequency only he could hear—*Nigga Please* (1999) remains a bewildering masterpiece precisely because it refuses coherence.