“I GOT A HERNIA,”MURS SAYS IN THE KIND OF MATTER-OF-FACT TONE most might use to tell a passerby the time. “From over-exerting myself, performing too much. Doing 45-minute sets every night with no hypeman. I do the kicks, splits, jump around onstage like an idiot.” That happened at some point during the 58 shows him and Tech N9ne did in 65 days last year. He needs an operation, but it would require him to spend three weeks resting up, something which if you know the vegan, perpetually sober Murs, you know he has next to no interest in doing, at least until the pain prevents him from performing, in which case he’ll jog to the emergency room that night if he has to.  He says he’s going to do it at some point between this tour and the next tour, which is a funny thing to hear Murs say, because it’s a chore to see where one tour ends and another begins. He seems to remember each one best for the injury he sustained in its duration, like the one last year where he busted a blood vessel in his eye after shouting too loud, too long. There’s nothing you can do about a broken blood vessel in the eye, which is just how Murs likes it. Nothing to do but keep moving.

Murs is the hardest-working rapper alive. If he’s not running circles around America as part of Paid Dues, the annual hip-hop festival that he created and organized, he’s doing backflips across a stage in Budapest, or shaking hands with fans in Japan before catching a bullet train to a packed in-store performance. When he’s not on the road, he’s in the studio, feverishly adding album after album to a cavernous discography which boasts projects released by major-label behemoths like Warner Bros. clear across the industry spectrum to indie powerhouses like Rhymesayers and Def Jux, a testament to the respect this man commands from the underground and commercial world alike. And all from a guy who only got a manager three years ago.

To hear him tell it, he has no choice but to work hard. From the rhymes in his notepad to the hair on his head, Murs is not your average rapper. Hell, he’s not your average guy. Never has been. “I’m just a nerd, man,” he laughs. “I’ve always walked different, dressed different.” His stomping grounds is the Mid-City area of Los Angeles, the kind of neighborhood where cornrows and Chuck Taylors are more common than dreadlocks and Vans, so Murs was on his own from early on. “I would always get on the bus and hear ‘ay cuz, ay blood, what’s wrong with your hair?’” Those were the days when he first put pen to paper and began perfecting what he calls ‘sitcom rap’: songs about the everyday life of those of us who don’t live in the hood, and don’t live in Hollywood either – the life the majority of us are living. Listening to Murs is something like listening to a regular guy who just happens to know how to rap. His lyrics are straightforward, down-to-earth, and honest, delivered with a vocal tone and forcefulness that recalls a relaxed Ice Cube.

If birds of a feather flock together, it only follows that young Murs ended up falling in with some similarly strange birds before long: California underground pioneers the Mystik Journeymen, who drafted him into the Living Legends crew alongside emcees like Eligh, The Grouch and Scarub before going on to tour the world multiple times over with little more than a few backpacks of self-produced cassettes, quite literally creating the underground hip-hop hustle as we know it today. It was during this era that Murs forged his reputation as a beast on all fronts, sweeping the battle circuit, eating up stages, and churning out albums like Freal, Comurshul and Varsity Blues at a breakneck pace. A Murs tape in your collection was proof that you were tuned into the underground. Apparently, fans weren’t the only ones listening: labels far and wide began jockeying for a piece of the Murs brand. 2003 saw the release of the aptly-titled End Of The Beginning on Def Jux, the label run by NYC emcee/producer El-P, the mastermind behind seminal underground group Company Flow. Producer 9th Wonder, originally of NC’s Little Brother, hunted Murs down for a collaboration which materialized as 2004’s Murs 3:16: The 9th Edition.  2005 marked the first installment of the Felt series, a collaboration with Midwest emcee Slug of the immensely successful duo Atmosphere, which was released on his label, Rhymesayers. And finally, Murs recently marked his ascent to the upper echelon with his first major-label release: 2009’s Murs For President, which includes cameos from Snoop Dogg and will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas.

Today, the word ‘mercenary’ both favors his name and describes him as well as any. The Paid Dues stage at this year’s Rock The Bells finale in San Bernardino, CA featured Raekwon, Necro, GZA, M.O.P., Buckshot and KRS-One. From there, Murs jumped straight into a tour with Psycho Realm and Jacksonville, FL punk rock band Whole Wheat Bread. Between Melrose, his collaboration album with West Coast production marvel Terrace Martin, and the second installment of his Varsity Blues series, Murs is already two full-lengths deep for 2011, not counting his Road To Paid Dues mixtape. He’s currently prepping Love & Rockets Volume 1: The Transformation, his collaboration album with Ski Beatz, the NY producer behind legendary tracks from Jay-Z, Mos Def, Jay Electronica and Curren$y. The album is slated for an October release on Dame Dash’s new BluRoc imprint. A new collaboration with 9th Wonder is also in production. He’s still vegan and sober, although he does own up to the occasional cigarette. It may be the one vice he allows himself, but work is his only addiction. “I may not be the most famous rapper. I may not be the best rapper. But I damn sure am the hardest working and I have the most unique story, I think, of anyone who’s been around as long as I’ve been around.”