Aesop Rock (aka Ian Bavitz) is a critically acclaimed Hip-Hop artist/producer, recognized for his dense and abstract word-play. His career rose to fame early on as a prominent member of El-P’s now defunct label, Def Jux. Since 1997, he has released seven solo albums, three EPs, a 45-minute Nike-commissioned piece of music designed for runners, and more. His lyrics have been published in the New York Times Best Seller Hip-Hop Speaks to Children, by author/activist Professor Nikki Giovanni (Oct. 2008), as well as Yale University's Anthology of Rap (Nov. 2010). In 2014, Aesop was also recognized in a study conducted by data scientist Matt Daniels as one of the most verbose MC's in Hip-Hop, today. His music has also been featured in numerous video games, including Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, Underground 2 and American Wasteland; The 2K Sports series' NBA 2K6, wherein he was also one of the featured playable characters and returned as a playable character again in NBA 2K7; and he also voiced one of the characters in Rockstar Games' The Warriors. In the past year alone, he’s landed two more music placements; Forza's Horizon 3 and Madden's NFL 2017.

Aesop has also taken part in an eclectic mix of collaborations, landing him both behind the board and in front of the mic. He provided music for the short film Wallyball (Apr. 2008) for the McSweeney’s “Wholphin” short film series, scored the Ace Norton-directed short film Dewana's Bridal (Sep. 2009), produced the third installment of Slug & Murs’ collaborative Felt series, A Tribute to Rosie Perez (Nov. 2009), contributed beats and vocals on Kimya Dawson's album Thunder Thighs (Oct. 2011), created music in collaboration with Jeremy Fish's “Ghosts of the Barbary Coast” art show in SF (2009), co-produced SF rock outfit Dirty Ghosts' debut album Metal Moon, (Feb. 2012), and has also started and recorded multiple albums with three new groups – The Uncluded (with Kimya Dawson), which released Hokey Fright in May 2013; Hail Mary Mallon (with Rob Sonic), which has released two albums; Are You Gonna Eat That? (Jun. 2011) and Bestiary (Nov. 2014); and LICE (with Homeboy Sandman), which has released two EP's (Nov. 2015 and Sep. 2016). In 2016, after scoring Cary Murnion and Jonathan Milott’s action-thriller feature, Bushwick (set for release in Aug. 2017), Aesop released his seventh full-length solo album, The Impossible Kid.