Jinx
Jinx
was an Yonkers artist that had a buzz in 2003 after being
on a couple of DMX sound tracks. You can read more about
Yonkers and where their artist are now in issue #22 of 4Front
Magazine.
“Yonkers
is small but it’s big enough to get lost in and small
enough to where you can know everybody. We have about six
hoods and four projects. I’m from the 70 Building we call
that murder gardens. Where I’m from there are a lot real
cats.” That’s how rapper Jinx describes Yonkers. Jinx has
been rapping along side DMX since the early days of X’s
career. Now that the door is open Jinx plans to make his
mark in Hip Hop. “I have recorded a lot of joints. All
together I have about two hours of s#!t. Lately though I
have just been doing freestyles. I haven’t done any songs
so I just have to get back in the studio and knock out
another album. Most rappers listen to a beat and format
their songs, most of my songs are formatted already. Now I
just need the beats. If I find the beat give me two months
and I will give you two albums.” Even with his hard work
and association with DMX, entry into the Hip Hop industry
has not been an easy one. “This has been a long up hill
battle. There are a lot of people in Yonkers waiting for me
because they know I’m due. My track record shows that. I
have won hundreds of battles. For two year I was locked
down in four different jails. Every jail I went it was 20
different battles and I was taking cats out. I went to a
lot of different places. In those years being with X I was
taking cats out. All those f@$king college battles I was
taking cats down. So called rappers that are signed out
here (in Yonkers) they don’t want to battle. We put up
paper and cats are supposed to met in different places but
cats duck out.
At one time Jinx was supposedly a member of DMX’s
Bloodlines Record label. The creation of Bloodline at one
point was rumored to be the reason behind a dispute between
X and Ruff Ryders. Even though Bloodlines has been heavily
advertised and DMX mentions it in interviews the label
hasn’t done much. “There was never an official Bloodlines.
They were in the process of signing and the process of
looking. Nobody real signed anything except for a demo deal
or production deal. Nobody ever signed a long contact
deal.” Early last year Jinx shined on DMX’s “Cradle to the
Grave” soundtrack. He and another artist Loose recorded the
hot track “It's Gon' Be What It's Gon' Be.” “At that time I
wasn’t f@$king with Bloodline’s any more. I was just
chilling taking it day by day. Then they called and asked
me if I could do a track on the “Cradle 2 the Grave”
soundtrack. Other artists on Bloodlines had solo track so
they wanted me, Loose and X had to do a track. I went to
the studio and laid my verse then X, and Loose laid their
verse. Then they told Loose and I we had to lay an
alternate track because Eminem wanted to do a song with X.
He’s a big dog so we had to bow down. So Loose and I
knocked the song out in a day. I got a little bit of love
from that track so I’m trying to take it somewhere.”
"I look at cats and be like you guys are on. You got a record deal you have a chance to let the world hear your music and you guys aren’t taking advantage of it. I don’t understand how these cats be putting out this so so s#!t everyday."
Another Brooklyn rapper goes by the name Jinx (who puts the tag Da Juvy at the end) might get confused with the Yonkers Jinx. “Duke (Jinx Da Juvy) isn’t even nice but he’s on Def Jam so he gets a lot of chances. This cat is on mixtapes and is featured with Fabolous and he’s not shining yet. The little chance I got I have had more of a buzz.” Two rappers with the same name just can’t make it in this competitive industry someone will have to fall back soon. Jinx from Yonkers wants to be the only rapper with the name Jinx and tells a story about how one day he almost caught up with the Brooklyn Jinx to rectify the situation. One day I almost caught him (Jinx da Juvy) in the Def Jam building. Jinx Da Juvy’s man was standing there while he was one of the offices. I was reciting my verse from the Great Depression album and I was like I’m the real Jinx. His man disappeared but never came back out with Jinx Da Juvy. Since we are in the Def Jam building that was the perfect place to battle. We both are not a hundred deep, we both are here to handle business I had one or two people with me and he had one or two people with him. I wanted to be like I’m the real Jinx you’re the fake Jinx we can battle for the name but I never got to see him that day. Jinx wants to plan a battle on 106 Park a special edition of Freestyle Friday to compete for the name.
“I look at cats and be like you guys are on. You got a record deal you have a chance to let the world hear your music and you guys aren’t taking advantage of it. I don’t understand how these cats be putting out this so so s#!t everyday.” Jinx says he will hit you with many subjects on his album. “ Me, I’m thug music all day but you have to put some diversity on your album. You got to have something for the kids, something for the older people, something about life. It can’t be all about shot’em kill’em and the cats that talk the street s#!t don’t have the rap sheet to prove it. I will take you to some of these cats blocks you will be like where the hell are we, is this Connecticut or something? This isn’t the Yonkers I heard of.” Jinx is working with Superior and Bloodline Records and will be on the “Never Die Alone” soundtrack. “In next five year I will be either at the top of the rap game or in jail because these cops hate me around here.”.
If you liked what you read in this interview then click here and order a copy of the issue it first hit the streets in and catch all of the other great articles you missed. This maybe your last chance to catch-up on everything that's going on in the HIP-HOP game.