User:Greensborotalent

Jay Willz
Jalen William Payton (born February 22, 2000), known as Jay Willz, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, producer, and musical engineer.

Born in New Orleans and raised in Greensboro, Willz first became known as a musician around 2013, recording musical anthems for his middle school basketball team and making homemade music videos around the city of Greensboro.

Willz's biggest inspirations are Kanye West, Lil Wayne, Kid Cudi, Michael Jackson, and his sister, Ciera Payton. In 2015, Ciera flew Willz out to Hollywood, Los Angeles for a movie screening that she starred in titled "The Runner". This allowed Willz to be introduced to well known actors Nicolas Cage and Rob Schneider. It was at this moment when Willz fell in love with the entertainment lifestyle. He went back to North Carolina a few weeks later and built an in house recording studio.

Willz's first mixtape titled "Goated" became available to listeners on his 19th birthday, February 22, 2019. It includes features from artists such as Worldwide$cottie, Lil Dub, and Lil Slab. Not too much is known about Jay's relationship with $cottie and Slab but on "mofthepodcast" season 4, episode 3 (via Soundcloud), Willz and Dub can be heard talking about how they met. A fan favorite on this project is the last song titled "Infinity Stones". It features outstanding production from Jay's childhood friend, Emmanuel Rankin. On this song Willz fantasizes about being older, moving to Los Angeles and feeling guilty about leaving some of his closest friends behind. The title of this song is a play on the movie "The Avengers". Willz drives a Dodge Avenger in real life hence when he says "I just whip the avenger I got infinity stones". In the album credits, Willz says "Honestly I don't know a damn thing about those f***ing super hero movies, i just kept hearing stuff about infinity stones and avengers. I called my good friend Miles Carter who is a huge fan of those films and he confirmed to me that they are related".

Willz's second and most recent project "Bourbon Nights" was made to pay homage to his New Orleans roots. On his personal instagram page (@jalenpayton), he says "During the summer I would just wake up and record whatever my emotions told me to. It started with fun/happy songs but after a heartbreak I dealt with, s*** just got very sad. I had about 7 songs done at the time then all of a sudden my family chose to visit New Orleans like we do every summer. A very popular place to go in New Orleans is bourbon street so of course we did. I want to say we got there around 6 pm when it was still some light outside. All the kids were dancing and it was just really good vibes. We stayed until about 10 pm and this is when s*** got weird. Coke heads started harassing us for money, people start wanting to leave and all that. The vibe was just off. Then I thought to myself... holy f***, this is my album!!! Everything starts off fun and happy then becomes sad and depressed. So I went back to NC, made a few more songs and went with the name Bourbon Nights". On songs like "Upper Hand" and "Beignet Freetyle", you hear a lot of jazz influence. This is Willz attempting to spread light on New Orleans culture. A fan favorite on this project is the song titled "Numb". It's very different from anything Willz released in the past. It has a very techno/pop style sound to it. On the album credits, Willz says "People don't even know this but my favorite song of all time isn't even a rap song lol. It's "Cooler Than Me" by Mike Posner. I wanted to finally make a song that taps in to that side of me. After I dealt with a heartbreak in the summer, I did a lot of clubbing and numb sounds like something that can be played in there to me".