Chris Jackson was born Oct. 20, 1982 in the town of Aurora, CO. (a suburb of Denver). Chris
was the youngest of 2 children. His father, Don, was a used car salesman, and his Mother, Judy, was a stay home
mom. Chris has an older sister, Jolene. The family spent quite some time moving about through Chris' younger days,
from Colorado to Kansas, Missourri to Iowa. They then settled down in the town of Marion, IA.
Chris was an artistic and musically talented individual. His older sister was in piano lessons
for quite some time when Chris then followed at the age of 7. Later on in life, Chris played trumpet in the school band
at the age of 11. After that, he discovered his amazing ability to play guitar and compose music at the age of 12.
Between him and his friends, he played in several garage bands over a couple years, dabbling in lead guitar,
bass, drums, vocals, and keyboard. But the 'frontman' posistion was not in mind for Chris. He later
on discovered his true love of being a song writer and a record producer.
At the age of 16, Chris began composing beats for local hip-hop acts. He began bulding
his own recording studio out of his parent's garage, and started investing every dollar he had into music equipment.
After attending Marion High School, he put his music on hold to attend Kirkwood Community College as an
Art major. Not long after, Chris realized that music was his only carreer option.
Chris then studied Audio Engineering at the Recording Connection, and interned at
Dreamtracks Recording Studio as an assistant engineer. Later on he met his future music partner and mentor,
Troy Williams.
Troy was known as the Cedar Rapids legend of D.J. Commando. They combined forces and Chris
joined Troy's entertainment company, Step in Command Productions. Together, their objective was to create an entertainment
management and artist production label, along side of being a mobile D.J. business. They began signing hip-hop and RnB
acts from Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. Chris, being the executive producer of all music, started song writing, and recording
and producing artists, and completed over 75 songs within a few months. Step in Command Productions had the intent of
gaining a distribution deal through a larger corporation to release the music they had produced. But all failed when
things fell apart after a financial investor had backed out.
Back to square one, and being extrememly broke, Chris decided to pursue other options in the music
business. After working several telemarketing jobs, Chris decided to follow his partner and began to D.J. He started
out doing house & frat parties at the University of Iowa, then broke out into the hip-hop scene in several Cedar Rapids
clubs. After becoming one of Cedar Rapids most widely known hip-hop DJ's, it was time to move on to the next step of
his love for music, radio.
Chris dropped all of his DJ gigs to attend Radio 1 Broadcast School in La Crosse, WI. With
intent of being a production director, he began seeking work in the radio market. But with no experience, he had a hard
time. He then landed a part time on-air position at KZIA in Cedar Rapids. Though he never intended to be an on-air
personality, things just began to build for him. He later took on the niteshow position, and became Z102.9's Evening
Personality.
Which brings him to today, where Chris is one of the highest rated night time DJ's in the market.
He also took on duties as Assistant Music Director and Imaging Director. He also stills runs a mobile DJ business on
top of his long-time love of being a record producer.
To this day, he continues to manage and produce local acts, as well as continuing his love for music,
as the host of the Niteshow on Z102.9 FM........
