Young Guru Says Creative AI Has No Place In Hip-Hop, Talks JAY-Z, Erykah Badu And Comic Book Culture

Young Guru: “I Can’t Stand The Creative AI. There’s No Reason For It.”

Young Guru leaves and returns at New York’s famed Comic Con. When he does come back, he has two large bags completely full of comic books. Like…an abmornally large number of boo. The Delaware native has spent decades helping shape the sound of Hip-Hop, but he’s also a lifelong comic book enthusiast. His father collected comics, passing down a passion that continues today. Black Panther holds a special place in his collection, by the way.

At New York Comic Con 2026, specially the Nas/Mass Appeal/Whatnot activation, AllHipHop caught up with the longtime JAY-Z collaborator for a brief conversation. Guru, whose real name is Gimel Keaton, has been an essential figure behind the boards. He’s also been an important voice in the AI debate.

The conversation with AHH’s Chuck “Jigsaw” Creekmur became particularly interesting when Guru challenged the very concept of artificial intelligence. While he accepts certain technological tools, he believes creative AI raises troubling questions about artistic expression, privacy, addiction and corporate control.

On the music front, also revealed that he recently finished mixing Before The World Blows from Erykah Badu and The Alchemist, discussed working with Slick Rick and Ghostface Killah, and offered an update on JAY-Z’s anniversary celebrations.

Here is the conversation, edited for clarity and length.

AllHipHop: First things first, what do you think about the current state of Hip-Hop as it relates to comics and the cultures merging more and more?

Young Guru: I love it. I’ve been a comic head my whole life. My father was a collector, so he passed it down to me. Black Panther being my favorite, but I have everything Marvel.

If we’re talking Avengers, if we’re talking Fantastic Four, it’s very few things in those runs that I don’t have. I still collect to this day.

The merging of Hip-Hop and comic books is just a natural thing. Us in Hip-Hop, we take on a second name. Me taking on the Young Guru name, we take on the thing. That’s our greatest power.

And to be creative, writing stories, being able to express yourself through visual art, through storytelling, through stretching stories out, through having themes that run throughout a whole comic book the same way it runs throughout someone’s career from album to album to album.

That’s the merging of comic books and Hip-Hop. I think everybody here at Comic Con needs to recognize how much Hip-Hop is important to the comic world.

AllHipHop: Do you feel like a pioneer? Some of us went through the mud a little bit differently than others.

Young Guru: Yeah, we did. But one thing I will say is, as an older gentleman, I’m 52 years old and I love Hip-Hop and I teach kids. I want this to be passed down to a youthful generation.

I don’t like when people say, you know, all the youth don’t have this and don’t have that. I’m one of those people that wants to pass everything down to the youth so it can keep going.

So yes, as pioneers in this thing, I look at older gentlemen as pioneers. I look at myself as somebody who’s just passing down legacy.

AllHipHop: Now, let’s talk Hip-Hop and AI. What do you think about how it’s being received? Is it a good thing? Is it a bad thing?

Young Guru: Let’s be very clear. There’s no such thing as AI. We have not gotten to artificial intelligence yet, and hopefully we never do.

There’s been so many warnings across centuries of what would happen with computation. So all AI, or what we’re calling AI, is really just computation.

Now, if we get into the weeds of it, I can’t stand the creative AI. There’s no reason for it. But anything that’s an assistive AI, no, I’m not really mad at that.

But it’s not really about just that. It’s about the other things. How it’s affecting the environment, who controls it, what people are able to look at of your own personal information.

And no one is really understanding how addictive these things are.

It’s almost like gambling, where people are looking for this dopamine hit when they gamble. You’ll be like, why is somebody gambling and losing a bunch of money and they keep gambling? Because they want that dopamine hit.

That’s what social media does, and that’s what AI does to us.

So for me, creatively, I don’t use it. But if it’s something that’s assistive AI, I’m not really mad at it. It’s where the world’s going.

But we definitely need regulation. And we need regulation from people that understand what it is, not somebody that’s 70-something years old in Washington, D.C., that has no clue.

AllHipHop: What are you up to now?

Young Guru: Oh man, I just got done mixing the Erykah Badu and Alchemist album, which I think is super fire.

And let’s not forget that we just came off of the Ghostface for Mass Appeal here with Legend Has It. We just came off of the Slick Rick here with Legend Has It.

But currently, right now, we got one more run of shows in L.A. for JAY-Z. We’re celebrating the anniversaries all year.

As y’all seen, we’re celebrating two monumental albums this year. We’re almost done with that. And next year’s more anniversaries, man.