Eric Barrier (Eric B.) and William Griffin (Rakim), were a hip-hop duo known as Eric B. & Rakim.

The pair is generally considered to be one of the most influential and groundbreaking groups in the history of hip hop, due to their dark production and Rakim's revolutionary rhyming style, which was smooth, seemingly effortless, and used remarkably complex rhyming schemes involving internal rhymes and sophisticated metaphors.