Run-DMC Stays True to Its One-of-a-Kind Mix

Grandmaster Flash and the Sugar Hill Gang were key groups in the rise of rap, but it was the Queens trio Run-DMC that put rap on a collision course with mainstream culture in the mid-’80s.

Not only did they employ fashion elements (unlaced athletic shoes, outsize gold jewelry) that eventually attained icon status, they also infiltrated rock audiences with meaty guitar work, either played by Eddie Martinez or cleverly sampled from popular tunes. The Knack’s “My Sharona” gave “It’s Tricky” its sassy bite, and a shrewd collaboration with Aero-smith to revamp that group’s “Walk This Way” yielded Run-DMC’s biggest hit.

The trio’s most influential early work is startlingly spare, a blend of deft rhythms, crisp tag-team rapping and liberal doses of an attitude that packs the same no-nonsense allure as punk. It was those bare essentials that made Run-DMC’s performance at Dragonfly on Monday so rousing.

The diverse crowd packed into the steamy club was totally in sync with the group, chanting en masse and providing a sea of waving arms on cue. At other times, the dramatic focus shifted to blistering verbal repartee between Run (Joseph Simmons) and DMC (Darryl McDaniels) or to Jam Master Jay’s (Jason Mizell) blazing turntable maneuvers.

In recent years, Run-DMC has overcome substance abuse, embraced Christianity and come to grips with maintaining a niche in the wide and varied music scene it helped build. On Monday they made it clear that they still know where they stand. At one point, Run told the story of a fan who asked if the group would make a new album and whether it would be jazzy or gangsta style, to which he replied with absolute confidence, “We got our own type of music.”