Photography by Owen Jones
Oak Cliff’s own J. Rhodes co-produced an album for Grammy-nominated Christian rapper Lecrae with S1. He crafted a track for Talib Kweli, “Heads Up Eyes Open,” featuring Rick Ross and Yummy Bingham. Two songs he produced have been performed on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.” He has a Billboard Music Award and a GMA Dove Award.
He’s also a filmmaker, musician, rapper, author and teacher.
And he just added a new one to the list: college graduate. Justin Rhodes, 37, received a bachelor’s degree from the University of North Texas in December.
The 2001 Carter High School graduate works at Kipp Destiny Elementary, lives in Oak Cliff and has four daughters, Savannah, 13, McKenzie, 11, Peyton, 6, and Hallie, 2. He’s the youngest of five children, and his dad owned an auto mechanic shop in Oak Cliff for 40 years.
He got into filmmaking in 2016 with partner Kory Williams. They produced a musical film, “It’s A Wonderful Plight,” in 2020 and an online competition show, “House of Beats,” in 2019.
Rhodes recently posted photos on Instagram of himself in the studio with California hip-hop godfather Dr. Dre. Although he declined to say what they might be cooking up, he says we should stay tuned.
Growing up in the Glen Heights and Red Bird area
People just assume that Oak Cliff is like death, doom and gloom. But I’m from a middle-class family, so I’m blessed. We did the same social activities as people from Singing Hills and all that. So it’s like you get the best of both worlds. Well, maybe not the “best,” but you learn how to survive in a lot of crazy situations. Where I’m from in Oak Cliff, my father works hard, my mother works hard, and they provided for us.
College was expected
I didn’t know about music trade schools. I didn’t know that you didn’t have to go to college. No one was pushing me in the way of pursuing my dreams musically. I always believed I could do it, but I wanted to have something, really just to get people off my back. So I said, “Well, I’m going to do something while I pursue this music,” and that was for me to go to UNT. I didn’t even know what I was going to do, but I was recruited by UNT out of Carter because they were looking for minority students with SAT scores over 1100. They threw me a shirt and said, “Hey, you’re admitted.” But my two sisters graduated from Texas Tech and TWU. So college was just a thing for our family. My mother always said, “Justin is the smartest kid, but he just didn’t apply himself.” My sisters were great students. They were always better students than me. I never really liked school. I just think that my genius, my thought process, works in other ways.
Music education
I went to UNT for computer science, but I hated it. I liked video games, so I assumed computer science was part of making video games, but it wasn’t at all. Four years later, I’d learned to make beats and all that, but I wasn’t taking school seriously. I wasn’t going to class because I was making music, rapping and making beats and stuff. So it got to my senior year, actually it was that fifth-year senior year, and I was like, “Nah, I’m gonna pursue this music.”
Why he went back to college
It’s several things, but really, I found out that having a degree would increase my pay. I spent a lot more time around Oak Cliff during the pandemic, and I just thought, “Maybe I need to get a house back home and teach back home.” You know, just being real community centered. That led to me getting a job here. I signed on [to my UNT account] after a 15-year hiatus, and it said, “You can apply for graduation.” I only had like 15 hours to finish my degree. So I took nine hours in the summer and six hours in the fall, and here I am. It’s something I never saw happening because I was so comfortable and deep into my career. It was really just God pushing me to do it.
Filmmaking and TV
When I left school, I got a job at DFW International Airport in the marketing department, making promotional videos for them. I dusted off the skills I learned at that job when I reconnected with Kory Williams, my friend from college. We didn’t ask permission. Neither of us had done any of these shows, but we had skills, and we had the drive. He was mainly a photographer to that point, and I was mainly into music, but we learned the skills that we needed and got the message out.
What keeps him driven
Once you find your purpose and your passion, there are a lot of other things you need to figure out, but that really is about 80% of it, finding out who you are and the gifts that God gave you and utilizing those every day. Just for a man to know that they’re useful is everything. And of course, just being an example for your kids. My father was a mechanic, and we weren’t that close, but we love each other, and I saw his action in his work. Every day he left the house at the same time and did the same thing, and he was passionate about fixing cars, persistently and consistently just working and building his business and his shop. I’m setting the same example for my kids.
Who he looks up to
The D.O.C. He’s from my area, and he stands for Dallas and Oak Cliff. He’s a Dallas legend and a West Coast legend. I’m a quote “OG” in Dallas, but D.O.C. is the OG’s OG. He calls me little bro, and I call him big bro. He’s really that big brother figure that I honestly never really had coming up in Dallas. But it’s a blessing to be able to look up to someone who is pretty much the standard as far as Dallas, but specifically Oak Cliff. I can’t speak enough about him. It’s nothing but wisdom and spirit from him, and it’s a blessing to call him a friend.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity
