Jedi Mind Tricks

Jedi Mind Tricks (JMT) are an American underground hip hop group from Philadelphia, founded in 1996 by two high school friends, rapper Vinnie Paz (Vincenzo Luvineri) and producer Stoupe the Enemy of Mankind (Kevin Baldwin). In 1999, rapper Jus Allah joined the group to record their second studio album, Violent by Design. Jus left the group shortly after, but returned in late 2006 and began working on the sixth studio album, A History of Violence. In 2011 Stoupe left the group because "his heart wasn't in making JMT records anymore". In 2013, Jus split from the group indefinitely, and Stoupe returned in 2015.

DJ Kwestion mainly scratches choruses on the turntable. Kwestion is also a part of the group Skratch Makaniks. Kwestion, who is the tour DJ, was a replacement for JMT's previous DJ, Drew Dollars, who is no longer affiliated with the group due to creative differences.

JMT has collaborations with both regional MCs and rap veterans, including GZA, Kool G Rap, 7L & Esoteric, Sean Price, Ras Kass, Canibus, Percee P, Killah Priest, Immortal Technique, Block McCloud, Virtuoso, Louis Logic, R.A. the Rugged Man, Tragedy Khadafi, Chief Kamachi, Necro, and Ill Bill. The group has sold over 250,000 albums in the United States and 450,000 albums worldwide, all of which were released independently.

Jedi Mind Tricks officially debuted with the Amber Probe EP.

The Psycho-Social, Chemical, Biological & Electro-Magnetic Manipulation of Human Consciousness, known as "The Psycho-Social CD" for short, was released by Superregular Recordings and was JMT's first full-length LP. It featured 12 tracks and the 2002 re-issue featured 6 bonus tracks, and included all the tracks that had appeared on the Amber Probe EP.

Prior to the release of their first LP, Vinnie Paz had conceived the idea of forming a rotating, collaborative super-group of underground East Coast artists called the Army of the Pharaohs (AotP). 1998 saw the first result of these efforts in The Five Perfect Exertions EP. The release featured Virtuoso, 7L & Esoteric, Chief Kamachi and Bahamadia as well as Vinnie Paz himself. The EP was later remixed for JMT's next LP, Violent by Design (2000), albeit without Chief Kamachi's verse.

The LP was originally titled "Polymatrix: Reincarnation of the Hologramic Christ"^{[citation needed]}. Vinnie Paz's style became noticeably more aggressive, abandoning his cosmic, paranoid rhyme style from The Psycho-Social CD for more violent lyrics. The LP also introduced Jus Allah, a founding member of JMT who had left for college but dropped out a short while after. A self-proclaimed Five-Percenter, Jus was present on every non-AotP track on Violent by Design as JMT's unofficial third member. Violent By Design contained a mix of braggadocio and horrorcore lyrics, combining hardcore/gangsta rap styles with mythological and fantasy imagery. According to Vinnie Paz, JMT used the proceeds from The Amber Probe to buy equipment to produce Violent by Design, which was recorded entirely in Stoupe's bedroom, without a mic booth or soundproofing.

The list of guest artists on this album was also their longest, including Mr. Lif, Planetary of OuterSpace, Louis Logic, Diamondback, Philip King Rappah, Coffee Gangsta Child L-Fudge, B.A. Barakus, J-Treds, Killa Sha, C-Baz and Tragedy Khadafi, plus a couple of odd phone-call interludes by Mr. Len.