Not a huge fan of them, but that era: King Giddra (I first started giving Japanese music a chance because of Bushido by Zeebra on Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan!, so Zeebra is king for me lol), Buddha Brand, Lamp Eye (I've listened to a good 200+ J-Rap songs over the past decade and Shogen is still the best J-Rap song, IMO), Twigy, Muro, a bit of Soul Scream, a bit of Microphone Pager, TAK the Rhyme, all of those guys that came just after SDP lol.
I don't know how Dev Large was as a person, but he is such an underrated player in rap, on the entire scene all over the world. The guy wrote fantastic stuff and his flow on EVERY song is just phenomenal, it's a shame he passed away. After Zeebra, he'd be my favourite rapper (and I mean anything he does, be it Buddha Brand, solo, guesting, etc.).
Wouldn't consider myself an expert by any means (and a lot of stuff from the last decade is derivative shit like how it has been in the west {on the whole} for the past 2 decades), but what I'm into, I'm REALLY into lol.
Who do you listen to mainly? :)