The True Story Behind OG Geno

[OG Geno]

Irving "OG Geno" Jones, was born the youngest of 6 children on 6/15/1969 in the city of Chicago to Ruby & Creadel "Red" Jones, the original bass singer of the Chi-Lites, (born 9/26/1940- died 8/25/1994- R.I.P. Dad). His first place of residence was the Robert Taylor Homes housing projects (4525 building) on the city's southside. There is where he spent the first 9 years of his life, learning to play the games that the projects play. From there he lived in a few other southside neighborhoods- 57th & Calumet- 56 & Throop and the Ida B. Wells projects. He attended Coleman Elementary, Carter Elementary & Dunbar High School, where he dropped out in the 9th grade. Geno's mother moved to the northside of Flint, Michigan in 1985. After living in Chicago for another year, Geno's brother & sister bought him a bus ticket to move to Flint with his mother in 1986, which is where he still lives today. Geno found Flint to be much different from Chicago, but as any true hustler, he learned to live there, and gain a few friends along the way. Geno was no stranger to gang life. While living in the Robert Taylor homes at age 7 or 8, he and 2 friends of his started a small gang that they named the Black Dragons. When he moved from the projects in 1978 he brung the gang's name with him & got a few other young boys in his new neighborhood to join up with him. A couple of years later he was associating with the Black Disciples & the Gangster Disciples & would later gone on to form his own street family, called the Guntown Gangster Organization in 1988. Geno is no longer gangbangin. Geno says that spending the first half of his life in Chicago & the later years in Flint, has showed him that every city has ghettos and somebody that's starting trouble. This is where he got most of the content for the songs that he creates. Geno always had a love for music. He became hooked to hiphop after hearing Rappers Delight by the Sugarhill Gang in 1980. At age 11 he learned all the words, and would spit it word for word, while his friends would say, how you remember all of that? His reply would always be "I don't know". By age 13, he was writing to other artists songs, changing the words, but keeping the flow and music of some of the top artist at that time. He did'nt know at the time, that would be the start of his G. Style Records. Thru out the 80's & 90's, Geno kept writing & flowin', then in 1998 he bought his first (well, actually 2nd, but that's another story) keyboard for $312 (the amount of his rent that month) and started writing songs to the beats in the keyboard, as well as songs to the beats he was creating. He would record his songs on a tape deck in his apartment's living room. He had a couple of homeboys (Mizzike & D. Rick) that use to stop by & flow to some of his beats. The 3 of them would also get on some songs together. After months of freestylin' over so many beats, Geno saw they he & his homeboys had it, & that he could make beats that other rappers could feel & want to flow on. This was the 2nd stage of G. Style Records. In 2001, Geno moved from his apartment & bought a house, & this is where the studio really came to be. He bought another keyboard, a 24 channel mixer, a digital recorder & a cd recorder. Thru much trial & error, he taught himself how to write songs, make beats, arrange the songs, perform the vocals on the songs & record the songs. (That's determenation for you) He would pass the cd's off to some homeboys, to see what they thought, and they were all diggin' it. Some of them would even remember the words to his songs & flow to it while it was playing, letting him know that his music could catch a person's attention. In 2005, Geno decided to go worldwide with his G. Style Records & posted his music on different websites like soundclick.com, myspace.com, Independent Artist Company.com & a few others. The response from all has been extremly well, once again showing the OG Geno that there is a place for his G. Style Records, & now he's commited to staying in the studio, making beats, writing songs, and flowin' on the mic the G. style way