What is your name?
Niam Jones
Where are you from originally? What’s your Origin Story?
I was born in Savannah Georgia. I moved to Jacksonville as a kid and I’ve been here ever since.
Why are you pursuing a degree in Digital Media?
As a creative, I’ve been expressing myself through music for quite some time. A nasty car accident sidelined me from doing a few things, chief of which is touring. So I decided it would be a perfect time to return to school and not only finish what I started, but also expand my spectrum for creativity.
Who inspires you the most and why?
My 6 yr old son and 4 yr old daughter.
They’ve both given me the motivation to finish school. While I don’t connect a degree with success, I do want them to understand that having one gets them off to a good start.
Particularly, my daughter reminds me what it was like to live completely inside the world of your own imagination and my son is a constant reminder that I will never know everything. Creativity and curiosity are things that become more difficult for some people to tap into as our lives become more complicated. Fortunately for me, I’m a large child.
What do you do off campus?
I make audio and visual oddities from the inside of a Cork. I also do sound design (and more recently technical direction…thanks school!) for NPR show host Al Letson! (I may also be known to 1 or 2 people as rap weirdo, Willie Evans Jr.)
What work are you most proud of?
In 2005 I had my first experience with a national music release with a group called Asamov. We were one of only a few hip hop artists to achieve this out of Jacksonville. There’s no way that I can describe in a paragraph what the experience was like, but I will say this:
Some kids say they want to be a fireman, or a doctor, or a lawyer when they grow up. When I was a kid, what I wanted to do most was make music and travel the world letting people hear it. The day that I walked into Best Buy and bought my own CD [Oct 6th 2005 2:15pm], my bucket list shortened significantly! And yes, this was when CD’s were still sold….anywhere.
Interesting facts about you:
I was T-Boned by a dump truck, pulled out by the Jaws of Life, and Life
Flight’ed to the trauma unit a few years ago. Did I survive? Who knows?
Perhaps I’m typing this from my comboooooooooooterrrrrrr!
Happy (belated) Halloween.
Also, I kissed the Blarney Stone when I was 17.
And yes, I do know what the locals do to it…
Favorite Book / Movie / Series / Video Game / Comic?
Movie: The Last Dragon
Book: The DragonLance Chronicles (though its been a while)
Series: That’s tough. TV is pretty good right now…
Video Game: Tekken / Assassin’s Creed
Comic: The (old) New Mutants
What are your future goals and aspirations?
As long as I am a content creator I’m fine.
Oh, and money. Money is… important.
I’d also like to handsome and in shape. Can being taller be a goal?
One thing you wish you could share with others is…
The old adage that tells you to do what you love is an old adage for a reason. There’s a %300 chance that life won’t go the way you plan it to but, when you’re doing what you love to do it doesn’t matter very much.
Click here for Niam’s work:
Our featured students are student-selected. Once a student has been featured, they nominate the next student to be profiled. Come back next month to see who’s been picked!
Have any questions? Please contact Professor Liz Murphy Thomas at Liz.Thomas@fscj.edu