Meet Jimmy Luna

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jimmy Luna.

Jimmy, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I chipped one of my front teeth when I was seven years old. When I was in elementary, I was depressed & often pretended to kill myself at home for attention. Fast forward to middle school, this at times continued as I tried my hardest to fit into no avail until I started not to care what people thought of me anymore— ironically enough, people gravitated to me when I stopped trying to enter their orbit. It was at this time I started making art & music after watching my big brother make music & score films while he was in college for audio engineering— I remember my first raps were written to Lil Wayne songs around the time he had his run around ‘08-10. My brother use to come home & play me stuff he made. I thought it was sick, so I started picking up writing, producing & graphic designing here & there— I use to hide my raps in my Xbox 360 game cases.

In 2013, I moved to Las Vegas with my mom— she had bipolar disorder, insomnia & manic depression so living with her was a hardship in itself because she use to sleepwalk in the night and has mental breakdowns in front of me often. At one point, I watched her stab & beat a man near death as revenge for something he did to her sometime before. She even tried to pull a shotgun on me one time— she was my angel though. During sophomore year of high school, I started taking art more serious. I use to watch my favorite artists’ interviews & vlogs on Youtube and just soak up as much knowledge & creative energy from them just trying to understand how real it could be for me to get away from all this madness in my life through something I love to do. I still kept my music a secret from my family & just fleshed out my ideas on my own & practiced everything from production to web design until I could make something I was proud of.

It was at this time I also started to form the idea for my own collective Prism Tribe. The vision was that I started a group filled with people who already do their own thing— with leaders. I knew I wanted people who had promised for longevity & inspired me to get better at my own craft. From that point on, I spent years building up Prism Tribe, releasing 5 projects while in high school, performing shows at venues in Las Vegas & Los Angeles, spending a short amount of time in college in Denver before putting it on hold to pursue music and overall weathering the storm that is being an independent artist.

It wasn’t until the start of 2018 that anything picked up for me & Tribe as we met for the first time in person & released our debut project together as a group & opened for KRS-1 in Hollywood together. However, later that year my father was robbed & went to jail twice, two of my uncles passed away, a few friends passed away & my mother passed away— all in one Summer. In August of last year, I moved back to Los Angeles & couch surfed for 11 months, sleeping at friends’ and relatives’ houses & for the latter half my car. Then I moved back to Nevada with my friend Solo to save money and work on my new project & I’ve been here ever since.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It hasn’t been the smoothest road. To name a few of my biggest struggles along the way, I had to watch my mother struggle w/ her mental health issues for years & then eventually pass away at the young age of 36 last year in July of 2018. I had to watch my dad go in & out of jail for years & then eventually get robbed twice. I was homeless for 11 months while staying in Los Angeles the second time I returned. My brother was shot five times in January of 2019 & although he survived the trauma, he passed away twice in the process of finding his body & resuscitating him. I lost a couple of friends & relatives back to back for months in 2018.

We’d love to hear more about your work.
I rap, sing, produce, direct, coordinate events video edit, graphic design, engineer, act, web design & pretty much everything else you can think of artistically— I’m a one-stop-shop. I learned to be a jack of all trades so I wouldn’t have to ask anyone to do anything for me.

I’m known for my ability to create well put together albums & to create an experience through the promotional rollout around the albums. I rarely release singles unless it’s a song off the project I’m preparing to release.

What I’m most proud about is the consistency of my releases & my persistence to improve & create the best product possible no matter what situation I’m placed in.

What I feel sets me apart of others is just my resilience against the distractions life throws at us all— some might’ve given up on their career or fell apart after finding out one of the closest people to them passed away or if they had to be homeless for almost a year— but through that all, I created 3 EPs & some of my best work up to date. That brought me in a lot of love & respect from people who observed my story from afar online & inspired many to go just as hard.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
The moment in my career I look back most fondly on was back in 2017 when I got my dad to change his mind about my career as an artist— initially when I put college on hold to pursue music, he was angry & disappointed w/ me— after less than a year later of hard work and showcasing my many different talents, he started to see what everyone else seen & revered me as an artist. He’s been 100% supportive ever since— that’s sick to me. I rarely care what anyone thinks of me, but I must admit, proving that I can do this to him felt absolutely amazing.

Pricing:

• PRISM TRIBE BADGE TEE [WHITE] – $25
• PRISM TRIBE BADGE TEE [BLACK] – $30
• PRISM TRIBE BADGE HOODIE – $40

Contact Info:

• Website: PRISMTRIBE.COM
• Phone: 7023010938
• Email: mgmt@prismtribe.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/jimmylxna
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/PrismTribe
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jimmylxna

Image Credit:
Jimmy Poindexter, Andrew Creel, Ben Escobar, Gabriel Zanoff

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