Celebrities
Lil Jon
Lil Jon is acknowledged mostly as the pioneer of the sub-genre of hip-hop known as “crunk,” which is a combination of southern hip-hop with bass, bounce, and disco music. Lil Jon has taken crunk to a new level and collaborated on hits with popular artists such as Ice Cube, Usher, and the Ying-Yang Twins. His beats, chants, and catchy choruses have become his signature sound making him in high demand in the hip-hop music scene. Even with his busy schedule; Lil Jon made appearances in Cancun with StudentCity and had the summer break crowd rocking!
Bio
Lil Jon was born Jonathon Mortimer Smith on January 27, 1971 in Atlanta, GA. His start in the music industry began in 1993 when he started to work for Jermaine Dupri’s So So Def record label and stayed there until 2000. It was in the mid 90’s when Lil Jon started making a name for himself with his flair for club music remixes. Soon after, Lil Jon & The East Side Boyz were formed consisting of Lil Bo, Big Sam and of course – Lil Jon. After some guidance from legendary Miami bass artist Rick Taylor, Lil Jon came out with “I Don’t Give a F***” featuring Krayzie Bone and Mystical in 2002, which immediately took to the dance floors. However, it wasn’t until he teamed up with the Ying Yang Twins for the song “Get Low” to bust him out into the mainstream. This proved to be a great year for Lil Jon’s “Get Low” with all the remixes for the song featuring other mainstream artists as well as his album Kings of Crunk making the top twenty in the U.S chart for 2003.
In 2004 Lil Jon produced an Usher song featuring Ludacris called “Yeah!” which quickly took off to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Lil Jon also helped produce two other giant hits in that year with one being “Goodies” by Ciara which reached #1 and Petey Pablo’s Freak-A-Leek which had huge success as well.
Lil Jon continues to top charts and is getting involved with everything from the X-Games to launching his own cartoon airing on his Myspace page and on Will Ferrell’s Funny or Die website.
Fun Facts about Lil Jon
- -Big Fan of NHL’s Atlanta Thrashers and writes a blog on NHL.com
- -Thrashers goalie Kari Lehtonen has a picture of Lil Jon on the back of his helmet
- -Has an energy drink called CRUNK!!!
- -Has his own line of Oakley Sunglasses.
- -Hold the World Record for the ‘Largest Diamond Pedndant’ of the words Crunk Aint Dead. It is 5.11 pounds and 7.5 inches tall and 6 inches wide consisting of 73 carats of diamonds