Our story begins at a radio station…

In 2002 I was volunteering at a local radio station as a deejay with a couple of buddies from high school. We had a four hour weekly show called Mixtape Meltdown that we used as a platform to be audibly ridiculous for a marginal market in eastern Kansas while playing the best in positive hip-hop. In our heyday there were four of us behind the mic: myself (Jargon), Kris Demeter (Krees), Michael Yates (Mello Mike), and Tony Gott (Tony the Sports Reporter Guy who later became Da Tone).

After a couple of years we got restless. Or, I suppose, I got restless. I had been freestyling/writing stupid raps with Krees for a couple of years and always had the desire to record an album. But somehow the cockamamie idea of a rap group was conjured up. Our grand scheme was to have the four deejays plus one Joey Harris (The Oey) merge to create a rap crew and give the proceeds to the radio station. Terrible idea? Of course. We had no choice but to do it. The only thing missing? A name.

We really didn’t think too hard about a name, we didn’t really care. A name just sort of, well, happened. A fellow deejay and friend, Rob Hale, would randomly drop by the grand ol’ Mixtape Meltdown on occasion. For some reason he found it humorous to refer to us as the Cracker Jack Crew. We adjusted Cracker Jack to Crackajack for street cred and it was clear–we were primed for rap world domination.

The first attempt at music…

The only one in the group with any true musical ability was Mello Mike (trumpet, drums, and some keys). But Krees and I could certainly download instrumental beats from the interwebs. As some wannabe rappers do, we found a couple of solid beats from the likes of Jay-Z and 50 Cent to create a short mixtape. The lyrics were dreadful and the production quality was laughable. We recorded the entire five-song-nastiness live on to tape and then transcoded it onto hard disk. It really was wretched but we had a blast making it! But don’t take my word for it…

Download the original Crackajack Crew EP mixtape entilted “Crackajackin’.”

We did some shows and sold out of our 100 printed albums pretty quickly. We had friends, okay!? Our befuddled compandres urged us to forge on. Foolishly, we listened.

The second attempt at music…

We really wanted to make an original album but we didn’t have the training, knowledge, equipment, or money. There was no hope. So back to the web we went for more beats. We knew some hip-hop producers from our radio show and snagged some original beats but the majority of what we ended up with was jacked. That means… Another mixtape! Our general attitude, as I hope you can surmise, was, “Hey, let’s have lots of fun making goofy rap that sort of makes fun of rap, but yet, it is rap.”

We purchased a cheap condenser microphone and discovered Adobe Audition (formerly Cool Edit Pro). Using this equipment we were able to get a slightly better sound as well as the ability to actually get some nifty (in our opinion) audio effects. We still didn’t quite have the whole recording thing figured out. We made a step in the right direction but were still at the base of an Everest-sized staircase.

To spice things up a bit we wanted to have some featured artists come on board. Every rapper knows you gots to get guests on your disc for credibility! I met this really rad fellow Cash Hollistah at a local live show we hosted for L.A. Symphony. He agreed to be on board for two tracks. We suckered my girlfriend wife Kimberly (K-Flo K-Beats), local friends B Thompson and D Frack (The P-Town Rollaz), and Da Tone’s brother Andrew (Andy-Rou) into recording songs as well. It took us a summer and it was pretty fun. Check it out for yourself:

Download the second mixtape, “The Surprise Inside.”

The loss of a member…

So… There comes a time when you know things just aren’t working out between you and your significant other. You’ve had good times and you’d like to remember them, but the bad is glaringly obvious. You’ve both worked hard at making it work but over time it has become very clear that you aren’t compatible. Such was the case of the union between the Crackajack Crew and member Da Tone. Tony did his best to be a rapper but he ironically lacked tone and, even worse, the ability to keep a beat.

The break up was mutual. God bless his soul.

Tony loves this photo and has asked that it be posted as many places possible on the web. Tony hates this photo.

The Crackajack Crew minus Da Tone: Mello Mike, Jargon, Krees, The Oey (from left to right):

The podcast…

Somewhere along our travels we decided to make a website and podcast. The website was actually pretty cool but it has since died. We only had a couple of podcast entries and here they are:

• Fall Festival
• Christmas Time
• Two Thousand & Seven Million Fillion
• Story Time
• Da Tone Lovin
• We’re Still Alive

The third attempt at music…

After a couple years of college and a couple dollars of investment, our recording capabilities were increasing. With the combination of my new lovely M-Audio Firewire 410, Condenser Mic, midi keyboard, and Logic (audio software made by Apple, think Garageband on steriods) I was able to actually make rap beats! I wasn’t really up for producing enough tracks for a full album so we scoured the web for free, original beats. We ended up purchasing the rights to a couple but had many “boom-boom-kats” given to us.

For some rather odd reason, half way through we made a couple of Christmas rap songs. I was rightfully lambasted for desiring to make our first full-length, original album half-Christmas half-not-Christmas. We had no option, create more Christmas songs and put out an original Christmas rap EP! Are you feeling festive? I thought so.

Download the Crackajack Crew’s Christmas EP, “A Crackajacked Christmas.”

The fourth and final attempt at music…

Over the course of one year in my sweaty dorm we put together what would become our first and only full length, fully original album. Every track sort of has a story behind it. A very talented, professional producer by the name of Tony Stone created the beat for our first and only single, “Happy Hip Hop.” Mello Mike and I had a blast writing that diddy. We felt like the song did a really good job of summarizing what the Crackajack Crew was all about–creating fun, positive hip-hop. We just wanted to be us and make goofy raps. Looking at the project as a whole, I think it’s safe to say we accomplished just that. Here’s a music video proof:

The album progresses from fun, to dance, to topical, to gangsta’, to lo-fi, to death. It’s not a perfect science, but if you listen to each track sequentially I think you’ll hear what I mean. There are a couple of songs I’m particularly proud of.

Here are some thoughts:

The melody on “Happy Hip Hop” is one of our best. The beat I produced for “Dance Party” is most likely the best I’ll ever pump out in my little life. The song “Cliche'” is a ton of cliches that somehow make sense. I came up with the concept but it was Krees that made it happen. I was against it because I thought it might not work and I knew how much effort it would require. But Krees and I sat down and hammered it out. It’s a lot of fun and many a fan favorite. Perhaps the biggest crowd pleaser is “Butt Cracks Aren’t Attractive.” We created it to be funny but also as a creative way to speak about modesty. Lastly, the beat on “Do Your Diddy Like This” gets me hyped er’ time I put it on. Hopefully that get’s you a bit excited to…

Download the Crackajack Crew’s first and only original full-length album, “The Crackajack Crew Has Gone Stale.”

The best live show friggin’ ever…

Once we had performed our tracks from the Has Gone Stale album a couple of times we had a really legit live set put together. Most of the songs were written for the live show. We didn’t care about the tracks being on the radio; we cared about how much the party people could get funky at one of our gigs! If you’ve ever been to a rap show, you know how they go: dudes rap, you throw your hands in the air, ect. We wanted something more, something ridiculous.

To type it would be an injustice. You had to be there:

The Crackajack Crew has gone stale…

We named our album with dismantling the group in mind. After the album released we performed about a dozen shows sprinkled over 1.5 years time and then the magic ended where it began–Pomona, Kansas. Our last show was our best performance ever. There wasn’t any pressure to do well or sell records for the station. We were just us, having fun with a crowd of mainly family and friends. There was something special in the air. An energy. It was divine in a weird way.

The After Party?

I did have hopes of continuing on and making more music with Krees or perhaps all by my lonesome, but it’s been weird. I used to have these crazy songs come to my head but now everything feels forced when I sit down to write. Perhaps now is not the time. Perhaps the next party is a different story entirely.

Until then…