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On February 16th, king of crunk, Lil Jon, blessed the world with a new project and new approach to music. Known for his high energy style, hyping up crowds with his signature "Yeah!" and "What?!" ad-libs, Lil Jon is usually associated with party and nightclub culture. He has proven himself to be one of the most successful DJ / Producer / Rappers from the south, as he has dominated rap, crunk, and even electronic music. He now surprises us by taking on a new genre: meditation.
At first glance, this may seem counterintuitive for someone as lit as Lil Jon to drop a meditation and wellness-focused album. He is aware of this and opens the project by sharing his experience and relationship to meditation in his personal life. He shares that it is a practice he uses to center and focus himself before gigs, as well as something he uses to calm his mind in moments of high stress and anxiety. In an interview with Rolling Stone he shares, "once I turned 50, a lot of things started to happen. I started going through a divorce. I’m separated right now. Going through that and all of the emotions of the divorce – anger and frustration and all of the ups and downs – I found meditation to calm me and to bring me more at peace; to look at life and situations in a different manner. I really got into meditating and saying my affirmations every day and also into manifestation. All of that tied together."
The project is a 10-track guided meditation album with tracks to help boost focus, relieve anxiety, cope with grief, experience deep sleep, and more. The project was made in collaboration with Kabir Sehgal, a Multi-Grammy & Latin Grammy Award winning, Multi-Emmy nominated Artist/Producer/Author. The magic of the project is truly in the music, as Lil Jon shares him and Sehgal's knowledge and intentional use of particular frequencies in the music.
Lil Jon: I would listen to binaural beats to help me sleep. I’m really deep into binaural music. I’m into frequencies like 285, 396, 528. I’m really into PEMF – pulsed electromagnetic [field]. I have frequencies running in my home at all times.
Rolling Stone: What do those particular frequencies evoke, the ones that you just named?
Lil Jon: 285 is like a cellular regeneration frequency, so it makes sure … When I’ve been working hard training in the gym, and I know I push myself a lot, I put 285 on at night and it helps my cells to repair and grow. 528 is just the all-around best frequency for everything. 528 helps your plants to grow. So, I was into binaural music. My attorney connected me and Kabir together, and I kind of told him what was going on in my life and we put together this guided meditation project. Actually, we got six, seven albums worth of stuff.
It is clear that this album was birthed from a personal healing space for Lil Jon. He shares that this era of his life has propelled him on to a self-reflective, healing journey. This goes beyond meditation as he shares his experience with full body wellness including healthy eating and holistic medicine. Overall he shares that he is at a point in his life where living a life that makes him truly happy is the goal.
"Health is just really, really important. It’s interesting because people compare me and André 3000 now with what I’m doing. Me and André had a talk the other day. I was explaining to him my journey and he was saying, “Yeah, people look at us a certain way, but we showing them that it’s okay to be able to do other things and to care about yourself, your health, and your wellbeing. This image of rappers, blah, blah, blah – we don’t have to be that. We can be other things and show people it’s okay to go do other things.”
Lil Jon and other artists like André 3000 are setting a new precedent for rap artists in the industry, paving the way for others to do the same. The wellness industry continues to buzz with wellness music on the rise. Could Lil Jon's entrance into the space signal a rush of other mainstream artists following suit? Let us know your thoughts on Instagram @healthandbass 🤘
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