Young Noble

Born on March 31, 1978, in Sierra Madre, California, Rufus Cooper III, later known professionally as West Coast rapper Young Noble, navigated a turbulent youth shaped by family instability and encounters with law enforcement. After moving to New Jersey as a teenager, he divided his time between selling drugs and pursuing a professional basketball career. That stretch included repeated interruptions to schooling, multiple stays in juvenile facilities, and repeated travel between the two coasts. During these unsettled years he began recording rhymes under the name Young Noble.

Residing with his sister in California while attempting to stabilize his circumstances, he received an invitation from acquaintances working on sessions with Tupac in Los Angeles. An introduction at the studio led to his full-time addition to Tupac’s group the Outlawz. Although Tupac was fatally shot soon afterward, Young Noble’s recorded contributions continued, beginning with appearances on the 1996 album Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory and extending across subsequent releases of previously unreleased material. The Outlawz carried forward after Tupac’s death, issuing Still I Rise in 1999, Ride wit Us or Collide wit Us in 2000, and Novakane in 2001.

Young Noble’s first solo project, Noble Justice, appeared in 2002. He remained active with the Outlawz throughout the following decade and beyond while steadily issuing solo material and participating in numerous collaborations. In 2006 he teamed with Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s Layzie Bone for the joint album Thug Brothers, and during the 2000s he also released mixtapes and collaborative projects with Lil’ Flip, Hussein Fatal, and Deuce Deuce of Concrete Mob. His second solo album, Son of God, arrived in 2012 and was followed in 2016 by Powerful. Krayzie Bone replaced Layzie Bone for the next two installments, Thug Brothers 2 and Thug Brothers 3, both released in late 2017.