Uh Oh Tre Five
Audio By Carbonatix
Jaughn Meshack is a millennial through and through. Also known as Uh Oh Tre Five, he is a gamer with a love for music – all music. His beats find inspiration from Eurodance and trance, rock, country and the old-school funk albums played by his dad growing up and represent a much different style from those of his older brother, Dallas rapper J4 Mane.
“I credit that to the Catholic school upbringing. … I have friends of every race whose houses I’d go over to and hang out with,” Meshack says. “Me and J4, we were legit minorities. There’d be four or five Black kids in the class, but we’d be the ones to be like we’re not scared to let you know we like this too. We can be together on this.”
Meshack found solace in video games and sports.
“I was a quote unquote ‘good kid.’ I was in after-school activities,” he says.
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Meshack had a different view, though, after leaving to play Division 1 sports and returning home from college.
“I come home for a break, and it was a bunch of musical talent going on in my room,” he says. “My brother is recording in my closet. … I went back to school, and I had to hear it again. I’d been thinking about it. I unbiasedly liked his music. But I unbiasedly like most music. I started thinking deeper about it.”
He started mixing beats of his own, bending genres with styles adapted from his dad’s vintage soul and funk, ’90s metal, New Age electronic music and other sounds he had come to be interested over the years; he remained uninfluenced by genre stereotypes or expectations.
“I was naturally presented with different music, and I liked the Chainsmokers with no shame,” Meshack says. “I remember, I was in my room listening to ‘American Bad Ass’ by Kid Rock – I got my shirt on for him,” he says while pointing to his Kid Rock T-shirt. “My roommate came in like, ‘Jaughn, what the hell is wrong with you?’ I said, ‘Don’t be mad at me because I like music played with actual instruments. Don’t be mad cause I like rock music.”
Paying homage to others became a theme in Meshack’s music, where he does follow-up projects to reference his inspirations.
“I want to show where my influence legit came from,” he says. “Like in my beats, you can hear the Daft Punk, you can hear the Eiffel 65, you hear the Gorillaz.”
“Call me delusional, but you know, I’d say I’m a trailblazer in this shit.” – Uh Oh Tre Five
His start in the music production was a tad unplanned.
“Because my first beat, I released it on accident,” he says. “And it uploaded the whole album. I accidentally dropped it. I saw it upload and I said, ‘Fuck it. I got it.’ Went into college scared to take my shirt off at the pool. Flash forward to sophomore year with my shirt off on stage.”
And his “abnormal confidence,” as he describes it, paid off, with positive feedback from the gaming community, which he was deeply into. After his accidental debut, the artist known as Uh Oh Tre Five found himself creating AMVs (animated music videos) of his avatars playing video games with his beats playing in the background – similar to other YouTube gamers, but with the added factor of having music produced by the gamer.
“I realized I have a niche in video games and instrumentals,” he says. “It happened 100% organically. One of my guilty pleasures, I was playing Lego Star Wars, and I knew it was made for children, but I’d have music playing in the background and it went right along with the track. I knew it was more than a sign; I had to make music.”
Meshack didn’t let his newfound confidence elude him, as he discreetly persuaded his brother J4 Mane to customize a character of his own in the game, then went on to make a streaming video synchronized to J4’s own rap bars in the song. This likeness became a theme in his videos, where the video gaming content relates directly to the lyrics and theme.
“The average music listener might see it as a song with no words, but when you present it as a video game, if anything, it could change the way they look at it,” Meshack says. “Call me delusional, but you know, I’d say I’m a trailblazer in this shit, because I’m just imagining Metro Boomin or any one of these producers came out with the beat being presented by their own game play.
“I understand how people can’t see it how I see it. Some might be like, ‘He’s a nerd, he’s bored at home.’ But it’s an art.”
