Daily Inspiration: Meet Sterling Jones

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sterling Jones.

Hi Sterling, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I’ve always had a love for music since I was a kid. I started playing the drums in church when I was five years old. Then I started teaching myself the piano and the bass over the years. I originally started producing music in my 7th grade music production class. I used to use GarageBand in the class. When I first started using it, some of my friends would come over and listen to my beats and say that my beats sounded way better than theirs. I stayed on GarageBand for a little while because I was too scared to learn Fl studios. It looked way too advanced to me back then. My parents wanted me to focus on playing instruments at the time and made it seem like producing would be to hard of a route to take. Even though I shouldn’t have that detour me, it did. I stopped producing and focused on basketball all the way up until my freshman year of college. My dad bought me pro tools during Covid. I was extremely confused because I thought he didn’t want me to pursue music production but basically, he told me that that was never his intent. He just wanted me to know it would be difficult. From that point on, the sky was the limit, and I put all my time into producing. This was 2020 going into the year 2021 and I told my parents that I wanted to drop out of college, but they laughed when I told them. I can still remember being in the nail salon with my mom when I told her. She just burst out laughing…. while were still there. I don’t know why I felt like I needed to drop out and go “all in” in order to succeed. Maybe because some of the producers I saw like Kanye West, Metro Boomin, Pierre Bourne and a couple others, that’s the route they took. i didn’t want to spread myself to thin. But I didn’t end up dropping out. I graduated with my bachelor’s and then went and got my master’s degree while still pursuing and building my music full time. And I can 100% say, it did pay off. College isn’t for everybody but I’m glad I finished. it taught me a lot of discipline and allowed me to fail. A couple weeks before I graduated with my master’s degree, one of my beats REALLY blew up. It was called “Malfunction”. Then after that, multiple other beats I made blew up as well and I started to get recognized. It made it seem like everything I was doing was starting to pay off. I’m not where I want to be yet but I’m 10x further than where I would be if I had quit. I guess we’ll see what’s next…….

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Plenty of obstacles.
Figuring things out. People not believing in you. You know, for some reason, when you tell people that you want to take music serious, they tend to laugh you off and not take you seriously. I always remember their reaction when i said that and used it as fuel to drive me to not quit. There have been plenty of times where I wondered if continuing to pursue music was worth it. But then, I think about the look on some of those people’s faces if I were to ever quit. That would make them right and I can’t have that. I just ask God to continue to give me the strength to continue to do what I’ve been doing and not get discouraged. This is what I’m doing full-time now and there still is a lot of risk I’ve been taking. Very untraditional from what you typically do when you graduate college.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I am a music producer right now. I go by the name Sterlingouttapocket. What sets me apart from others is that I refuse to be like every other producer. I’ve always been that way since the very beginning of when I started producing. I don’t want to make “type beats”. I want to “be” the type beat. I want to inspire other people to make music like me, and I’ve always wanted to make a sound that would inspire other artists to want to rap on what I make. The reason why I chose the name “Sterlingouttapocket” is because I wanted my music to sound different and I wanted to approach the way I operated much different than everybody else. And the goal has been to inspire that same feeling in other people as well.

1 Peter 2:9

“But ye are chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of the darkness into his marvellous light”

If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
Growing up, I was the class clown. I was always goofy. I loved to make people laugh. Sometimes this was to my detriment because i would get in trouble in school because of it. But I eventually locked. While I was always goofy, I still was a very respectful kid at the same time. I was raised well by my parents. “No sir, yes sir. No maam, yes maam”. I really loved playing sports in general, but basketball was my favorite. Originally had dreams of going to the NBA. I learned to stand on my own two feet pretty early. The only people I really hung out with until the summer going into my freshman year of high school was people from church and my cousins. The summers would come and go. I would get back to school, and my friends would ask ” Sterling, where you been?” I would be like “shoot, at the crib.” It wasn’t until high school that my parents slowly started to open up a little freedom to me. I lived in a Christian household so some of the values they taught me rubbed off early. Because of this, I became pretty comfortable with saying no and being confident in who I was. Not saying I was never tempted but I always was the one to say no to drinking and smoking and things that could have gotten me in trouble with the police. When I got to college, I realized that I could do whatever I wanted and there was nobody to tell me I was wrong. But because I had a relationship with God and knew that a lot of the stuff would lead me down the wrong paths, I figured it still wasn’t worth it. It allowed me to pour a lot of time into my craft and into more productive things that have now led me to this point.

Pricing:

• 1v1 work with me-$750

Contact Info:

• Website: https://sterlingouttapocket.carrd.co/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sterlingouttapocket_/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvLwltKqqaXcoeKIg25EekA
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/sterlingouttapocket
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@outtapocket_1