Hollywood Popular Artists

May 10th 2012, 20:21

Lupe Fiasco has kicked, pushed, and coasted all the way up to #2 on the MTV Music Meter earlier this week, but he's not just any hip hop skateboarder. The "Kick, Push" rapper -- who recently announced the completion of his next album, Food and Liquor II, and has a sick new collaboration with Bassnectar -- has been an active philanthropist since his debut back in '06. For example, did you know that…

+ ...he climbed Kilimanjaro for charity!

While many rappers are sipping expensive champagne (or bypassing drinking it altogether, and instead pouring it all over video girls in hot tubs), Lupe acknowledges that there are people in the world who don't even have access to clean drinking water. In early 2010, he climbed Mount Kilimanjaro for MTV's "Summit on the Summit" -- a 90 minute documentary aimed at highlighting the global clean water crisis. Lupe was joined by Kenna, Jessica Biel, Santigold, and a host of other celebrities and activists. "The unity of the groups was amazing. It was a group of very powerful, and radical, and focused individuals," Fiasco said of those who took the difficult seven-day, 19,340-foot journey, which raised funds for the Children's Safe Drinking Water Program.

+ ...he started the Lupe Fiasco Foundation.

The Lupe Fiasco Foundation hosts leadership and artistic programs for Chicago's inner city youth. This summer, in partnership with Skill Up Chicago, Lupe's foundation will send a group of teens on a cultural and philanthropic tour of Ghana.

+ ...he uses his Twitter for good, not duck-face evil.

Be a BUZZKILL Help fight #malaria by sending a life-saving bed net thru @NothingButNets TODAY!!!Join me and help spread the buzz!

— Lupe Fiasco (@LupeFiasco) April 25, 2012

While I'm busy tweeting kissy-faces at my followers (I do realize how obnoxious this is. I do not know why I continue to do it.), Lupe is always tweeting about some real ish. He recently urged his followers to support Nothing But Nets -- an organization that sends bed nets to people in malaria-stricken areas. According to the World Health Organization, one child dies from malaria every 60 seconds. Support Lupe and Nothing But Nets in preventing malaria by taking action below.

+ ...he doesn't wear his jeans below his boxers.

I'm not sure when this became cool (probably around the same time making platypus lips in photographs did), but I am so glad Lupe doesn't do it. And guys! I think he wears real glasses, and not the plastic, non-prescription kind I don as part of my daily hipster uniform. I salute Lupe for making "nerdy" cool, which sounds superficial, but is growingly important as we hear more and more tragic stories of schoolyard bullying. Lupe shows us that rappers don't have to be gangsters, that celebrities don't have to be selfish, and that love beats kicking and pushing any day.

Now that you know more about all the action he's been taking, head over and explore some of his music on MTV Music Meter!

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