Font Size Sporting gray sweatpants, a black hoodie and Versace sunglasses, Morgan "Mo Green" Jackson strides into the deserted private room of Tommy Nevin's Pub at 3:30 p.m. on Friday, May 18, escorted by his two backup singers and a friend, Jason "Don" Sochol. With only five lights on and three Mayfest committee members casually sitting on a foldout table, the patrons next door hardly notice Jackson through the glass-paned windows. Sochol connects Jackson's Apple iBook to the sound system in the back, and the first beat drops. Jackson screams, bobs his head and jumps up and down on stage. The bass rocks the ceiling, and the patrons can't help but look into the private room. "It's too early ― I don't have the energy for this right now," says Whitney White, a 21-year-old Weinberg junior from Chicago singing vocals for What You Wanna Do. The other backup singer, Rotimi Akinosho, a 19-year-old Weinberg freshman from Maplewood, N.J., practices the lyrics for On My Way with Jackson rapping alongside him. The 6-foot-1-inch mulatto Jackson, a 21-year-old Communications junior from Manhattan's Upper East Side, N.Y., wears a trim mustache and beard as he sound-checks the music for his midnight performance on day two of Battle of the Bands 2007. Placing second at last year's Battle and being able to perform at Dillo Day has left him hungry for more. "There's no way I'm not winning," Jackson later says in the car. "Pay $5, and I'll give you a $40 show." Power-Packed Performer Jackson formally began recording music in the studio in summer 2005. Previously having freestyled informally with his supporting MCs from Battle 2006, Jon Watkins and Alex Wu, "the Battle opportunity just presented itself," says Wu, a 23-year-old Weinberg '06 alum from Evanston, Ill. Watkins, a 24-year-old Communications '06 alum hails from Cleveland, Ohio. Before the contest, they practiced four times for several hours. "I had all the cards stacked against me," Jackson says. "I was the only solo act, only hip-hop act, only one with no live music, and I f**king tore the motherf**ker down." Upon winning one of two available spots in Dillo Day 2006, Jackson assembled a four-man live band to play bass, guitar, keyboards and violin and recruited a backup singer to sing vocals for Hey Love. "It's about making good music," Jackson says. "If that means I got to take a step back and let someone else shine for a minute, hey, that's all good and gravy to me." Wu says he appreciated the "major homie holler," and "didn't want to settle for anything less than their best performance." They practiced five times before the show. Describing himself as the "hype guy," Wu says he and Watkins hyped up the crowd, sang choruses and each rapped one verse in Hey Love. Jackson performed five songs while commanding the stage after Ben Folds' set. "We had this running joke that Ben Folds was opening up for us," Wu says. "Right before, I remember seeing Mo with his jeweled-out Michael Jordan T-shirt, pink hat and blazer. He was chilling by himself by the Lakefill, just dropping his lines over and over. He put his whole heart into it." As a performer, Jackson says "there's nothing better in the world" than "looking out at people and seeing them all feeling you and believing in what you're doing. With Dillo Day, people were like, 'How're you doing? You nervous?' and my [reply] was the Lil' Wayne line-'I have my brim low [and] all I can see is the flow,'" he says. With Jackson sharing the stage with Robert Randolph and the Family Band and Ben Folds, David Felton, a 19-year-old Weinberg sophomore and fellow Chi Psi fraternity member from Manhattan's West Side, N.Y., describes his Dillo Day 2006 performance as the "pinnacle of his career so far." Felton met Jackson in 1997 at Baco, an all-boy outdoor summer sports camp in upstate New York's Adirondack Park. He remembers the 11-year-old Jackson as a "confident, unassuming, fun [and] dynamic guy" with "a ton of energy," yet, his debut performance as a 14 year old stands out most vividly to Felton. Along with a friend, David "DJ Vegas" Dzarnowski, Jackson performed Guilty Conscience by Dr. Dre and Eminem at the 2000 Baco talent show. "People would usually tell jokes, and the bands would play Phish or Grateful Dead," Felton says. "Doing that type of set in a mostly white, Jewish summer camp was something that they'd never seen before. It was a risk, but with Mo's confidence and security of his identity, it was a great performance." With Jackson's "incredible rapping voice and stage presence," Felton says "it was clear he had something going even at the time." "When you meet people when you're 18 years old, it's not quite the same having grown up with them and having seen their development," Felton says. "I definitely have a stronger feeling of loyalty." Jackson and Felton spent 10 summers together at Baco both as campers and counselors, but the loyalty doesn't stop there. When Felton visited NU in spring 2005 as an accepted prospective student, Jackson was "an incredible, accommodating host" and "really influenced [him] to come here," he says. Reciprocally, Felton tries to go to all of Jackson's performances. Having attended eight performances since winter 2006, Jackson calls Felton his "No. 1 fan." "I try to go every time-it's very important," Felton says. "Because I've seen him from day one, I love tracking his growth. It's something I take pride in." Two to three times per quarter, Jackson performs at fraternity parties, fundraising events, friends' private parties, and Evanston bars, like Bill's Blues and Prairie Moon. "He steps up his game and really seizes the moment," says Sochol, a 20-year-old Weinberg junior and fellow Chi Psi fraternity member from Westport, Conn. "He doesn't shy down [or] get nervous up there-he just loves it." Music-Making Man From under a pile of books and clothes on his floor, Jackson unearths a black 7.5 by 9.75-inch battered composition book with yellowed pages and worn-out binding. He bought the book when he first started writing lyrics at 16 years old. His freestyle-rap battles at high school parties against his friend, Zach Frankel, drove Jackson to seek instrumentals of "hot songs" and write down his own lyrics. "I would listen to Jay-Z, Pac and Biggie and think, 'What are they saying? How can I say it differently?'" he says. His first passion was basketball and was the best player until he got to high school, but "when [he] wasn't the best anymore, [he] had to find something else," he says. From kindergarten to 12th grade, Jackson attended Trevor Day School, a predominantly white private school in Manhattan's Upper West Side, N.Y., with 250 students. His graduating class had 56. "I never fit in. I was the only black kid most of my time in both grade and middle schools, so whenever I did anything, I had to be the best," Jackson says. Listening to Nirvana and the Red Hot Chili Peppers in middle school, Jackson says he "really got into hip-hop when Tupac started blowing up with All Eyes on Me" in 1996. In high school, the black students sat together at lunch and brought a boom box to play instrumentals on "Freestyle Fridays." "We'd bang beats on the table, and everybody would have to freestyle whether you could rap or not," Jackson says. In 11th and 12th grade, Jackson rapped in school talent shows with his band, The Gentlemen's Club, but it wasn't until spring break 2006 a man called "Ru" would change Jackson's music career forever. Ruwanga "Ru" Samath, the 22-year-old independent owner and music producer of The Bird Call Production from La Verne, Calif., took a hip-hop music business class with Jackson's uncle, Gary Jackson, a University of California, Los Angeles professor. Samath showed Gary Jackson some tracks and expressed interest in new talent. Gary Jackson hooked Samath up with his nephew, and during spring break 2006, he flew to Los Angeles to record in Samath's studio. Since then, Jackson has flown six times to Los Angeles to record. "It takes more strain on your pockets than your stress and happiness level, but I love doing it, so I don't mind working for it," Jackson says. "I could have almost $10,000 saved up by now if I didn't take these trips to L.A., but it's work. It's going to eventually bring a lot more prosperity to everybody involved." And by "everybody," Jackson means Samath and himself. "Everything is him," Jackson says. "The n*gga works." Samath mixes Jackson's beats and handles anything from production to promotion, though Jackson's production manager is Adam Makowka, a 23-year-old Communications '06 alum from Los Angeles. While Jackson manages collaborations with NU artists, like Gordon "DJ Clash Gordon" Ferris, a 21-year-old Music junior from Boulder, Colo., Samath coordinates Jackson's partnerships with larger acts. During winter break 2006, Jackson recorded the Street Code Remix, featuring Collinz Room, a Bird Call Production rock band. "Ru played them Street Code, and they were like "Oh, sh*t!'" Jackson says. "They recorded with Ru first, and I came in a couple weeks later and put new vocals on top of it. They invited me out to Reno for their show [in March], and we killed it out there." Though a seasoned performer, Jackson has yet to complete an album. He says he's in no rush and would like to complete it by summer 2008. "We're working on a repertoire of music we can have in the bank, go back, edit, and work with until it sounds like the perfect album," Jackson says. "If we're spending so much time, we're going to make something that's memorable and stand-out." And a repertoire of music, indeed. Jackson's original songs include but aren't limited to club jams, heartfelt melodies, politically charged commentary, criticisms of the music industry and good ole self-promotion. Jackson energizes crowds with One Night Pass and Make Em Go (Dum Dum) with its quick beats and catchy choruses: "Damn, I love it how you move it, baby, take it to the floor and drive me crazy." Yet he speaks his mind with Fire Starter: "Give him a taste of genocide he provide in Iraq. On the home front when he and FEMA killed off thousands with Hurricane Katrina, and he ain't give a cold shoulder to lean on." "I like the lyrics to his songs ― they're intelligent," says roommate and best friend Justin Schorr, a 20-year-old McCormick junior from Abington, Pa. "Most rap songs are about getting money and f**king b**ches, but Mo puts it in a way that people can relate to through the unique way of saying what he says." Though called "Mojo" during his time at Camp Baco, Jackson used "Mo Gunnaz" as his first stage name at NU. "Somebody called me 'Mo Guns' because it sounded like 'Mo-Gan,'" Jackson says. Influenced by the rap duo Young Gunz, aka Young Gunnaz, Jackson says he thought "'Mo Gunnaz' had a ring to it." But only seven months later, Jackson changed his alias to "Mo Green." "I was chilling on my roof with my dudes over winter break," Jackson says. "They were like, "Yo, if you're serious about this rap sh*t, the Mo Gunnaz sh*t has got to go. That sh*t's stupid.'" Jackson says he "still feels Mo Gunnaz as an alias, but it's the Mo Green Movement now." It's "Green" because he "smokes weed and makes money," but it's "Mo Green" because Moe Greene was the only Jewish boss in the Godfather series. Having a white Jewish mother and a black father, Jackson says "that's kind of metaphorical in that I'd be the only Jewish boss in the business." Jackson also relates to Greene by putting "such an emphasis on being fly. That was Greene's whole thing ― he was the most stylish motherf**ker in the world." Influence, Intelligence and Innateness Growing up, Jackson recognized Stevie Wonder, Luther Vandross, Marvin Gaye and Whitney Houston as household names. "My pops' favorite artist is Earth, Wind and Fire, so I grew up on it," he says. "I was a mid-80s baby, but my dad was still on his 70s sh*t with his Richard-Pryor afro, mustache-havin' lookin' ass. Soul music's my influence. My sh*t's melodious-it's a song. It's not some beat with some dude rapping." Born and raised in an apartment on 82nd Street near the East River, Jackson returns home to his parents, Keith and Linda Jackson, both 56, and his beagle, Casey, he calls "Snoop." His mom owns an adult contemporary clothing line for women, and his dad formerly worked in marketing for RCA Records up until the early 90s but now works as the Manhattan area coordinator for National Car Rental. Jackson says because of his parents' busy work schedules, he spent most of his early childhood with Joyce, his Jamaican nanny and main guardian. "She was like my second mother," he says. "She was there for everything ― when I took my first step, said my first word." Jackson says his folks were "always traveling," though he says as parents, they weren't distant. "Once my dad left his job in the music industry, they were around more," Jackson says. "As I got older, my relationships with both of them, especially my pops, got a lot better. Now, my pops is my best friend, and I can talk to him about everything." Describing Jackson's dad as "charismatic, funny and outgoing," Felton says "the performer side of Mo you can clearly trace there." But the "very touching, emotional and much deeper side" of Mo-"a lot of that comes from his mom," Felton says. "You can see this duality in his performances." Though Jackson wanted to go to University of Pennsylvania to be near his parents and enjoy the "beautiful campus," it was the only school that rejected him out of his 11 applications. "I went to Northwestern by default," he says. "There's such a limited amount of people who you could actually talk to, hang out with and not want to choke out. But even though most people are not cool and don't know social skills, you're surrounded by enlightened minds. It forces you to feed off of it and step your game up." His three close friends at NU ― Sochol, Felton and Schorr ― all say they admire his loyalty, liveliness and authenticity. "Mo has a good heart," Sochol says. "He knows his rights from his wrongs, and he sticks up for his friends." Jackson says he's "never been as creative" as he is now, and his Communications classes have helped him "put together [his] thoughts and write better." His African-American studies classes teach Jackson the history of hip-hop and rap and "the basis on which it was founded as a revolutionary form of expression against oppression." When he graduates college in June 2008, Jackson plans to record and perform ― whether he's signed or independent. "[My] ultimate goal is to make good music and have people feel it," he says. Yet, he says, he "ain't trying to be a revolutionary n*gga." "I'm not trying to lash out against authority," Jackson says. "I'm not Biggie-I'm not ready to die. But it's not about the business to me either ― it's about the music. It's when you stop thinking about the music, you start having problems." Jackson placed third in this year's Battle of the Bands. The crowd looked confused at the outcome and booed at the winners, Real Lunch, a pop-rock band. "Hey, what can I say? We gave them a hell of a show," Jackson said to Akinosho after the verdict. "They paid $5 cover and got a $40 show." Become a Mo Green Movement activist. Sign up with Nina at n-kim-1@northwestern.edu.