Journey of a Bay Area Rapper

By Armando Gonzalez

he’s either Selling his branded Gear  TankSh*t in his box truck or selling exotic  snacks and as well as his very own Mix tapes Yonex jones does it all 

Yonex Jones born on August 15, 1992. Spent most of his childhood in the 90s to early 2000s in San Jose During the hyphy movement, During that the Hyphy era It was a lot of Oakland and San Francisco influence and San Jose didn't really get much Representation When it was Apart of the hyphy movement as well, Thats where TankSh*t Stems from, Just embracing the Culture that comes out of San Jose

 Yonex Jones grew up in the environment surrounded by art, He’s always loved art and then growing up in the hip hop community and him becoming more open to his options and started to make his own mix tapes when he was younger embracing the flow of
His influences include Tupac,Mac Dre,Lil boosie and Etc.

Yonex Jones; “growing in the hip hop community and just, you know, becoming more public and more popular, I've been able to reach out to the homies and put them on a good position so.”

Afar from that Yonex would also promote his homies by hosting opens mic  at his own own tank shop and hosting to give people a plat form, to now making music in the studio with other artist generally just keeping the grind and the hustle and never stopping,

To Yonex he likes to do very little effort  or at least not putting energy behind one specific event, everyday is a new exciting day and he likes to keep a healthy pace along the way. 

 community is somewhere We have to get along with each other and having to deal with everybody’s differences  and learning to embrace and just love along the way, From his fans Screaming “TankSh*t” to people buying his Gear and his mix tapes or exotic snacks, Yonex is a humble person  who goes out himself selling his mix tapes genuinely accepting any support from people to put his name out there.

Yonex Jones; “It's the unity and the community. So it's like, you know, it's the people coming together is what makes the community, you know, some big old melting pot”

 But with the way someone can dress there can be challenges with that One of Yonex Biggest Challenge was fixing his face card for the community when people see a person dressing like that they see them as  “hoodlum” people judge a book by its cover without even reading it, but to Yonex he’s not trying to change up for anybody, but just tries to be present himself better to everybody. 

Yonex may not do murals but he definitely Has found his own way to integrate his artistic creativity.

Yonex jones “art is deeper then pen on paper kind of thing” 

The five pillars to hip hop would be the beats,the dancing, the graffiti, the whole environment. 

Some advice Yonex would like to give to the youth is to keep your head up. Although the road is tough, refusing to dwell on that difficulty  allows you to overcome the easy, tempting traps the world presents. While many fall into these short term escapes and later regret it, you have the strength to be up there and stay on course 

Yonex jones; “it’s easy to be bad, it’s hard to be good, and everybody wants you to be good and everybody wishes they were good”