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Today I'm here with a creative director and choreographer who has made up some of
the coolest moves to ever hit the stage and screen. He has worked with the biggest stars
in the industry, including Usher, Madonna, Justin Bieber, Jennifer Lopez and Justin Timberlake.
Aakomon Jones is the definition of smooth and we couldn't be more excited to have him
here with us today. I am your host Galen Hooks. Hi AJ. AJ: Hey. GALEN: Welcome. AJ: Thanks for having me.
Now, every time we see you you say tell me something I don't know. AJ: Word. GALEN: So now I'm gonna
ask you, tell me something I don't know. AJ: Hmm, I've shot here before. GALEN: Really? AJ: I did GT bicycles
commercial. It was the funniest thing. It was like one of the first times I've had to
do comedy inside of what we do. And it's pretty funny. GALEN: What was the comedy in it?
The comedy in it was because it was about gold diggers. It was cash prize and this gold
bike, this gold GT mountain bike. So we had these girls who were the gold digger girls.
It was really on some other stuff. GALEN: Sounds fun. AJ: Yeah, it was fun and funny. GALEN: Gene
Kelly said that he started dancing so that he could get girls. What made you start dancing?
It wasn't that. It definitely wasn't that. I started dancing because of watching New
Edition and Michael Jackson and James Brown. There was always music in the house, you know?
My dad, and I used to hate it, my dad would, he had like floor speakers and he would blast
jazz music in the morning and then me and my sister would hate it and he'd wake us up
for school blasting some old Coltrane or whatever he was playing at the time. So there was always
music in the house. My mom used to dance. She never got a chance or an opportunity to
chase that dream of hers, cause back in those, you know the 50's and 60's for her it was
all about go get a job, go get married, go be a nurse, go be a nurse, go be nurse. So
no one ever was like well try it. That's... you think you can do that and you like
that, you enjoy that, well try it. So she never had that. So they tried to put my sister
into it, bought her tap shoes and whatnot. She wasn't feeling that at all. So I would
sneak and grab her tap shoes and put 'em on because, not cause I was trying to tap and
find a hard surface, but on carpet tap shoes, you can slip slide like nobody's business
and they showed a little bit of white sock in the front. So that was the little Mike
that I had. Oooh, nice. So I would just wear her tap shoes and dance around the house.
Wow, that's so chorus line that song "I Can do That?" Do you remember that? AJ: That's very
what it was. GALEN: Wow, cool. So you grew up in Decatur, Georgia right? AJ: For the most part.
For the most part, which is very close to Atlanta, which has its own pretty rich
dance scene already. What was it like? AJ: Correct. Well, it was a culture shock for me
because I didn't really grow up around black people. So outside of family everyone
else was white, Fort Wayne, Indiana. When I went up to Massachusetts everyone was white.
So I was like I was the only one you know dancing and just exploring movement and just
feeling a certain way when I see videos or movies or what have you. And I had no one
to bounce this back and forth off with, until I moved to Atlanta, right? Straight A student
until I moved to Atlanta. So I moved to Atlanta and I'm in elementary school and in seventh
grade and it was this style of dance that I had never seen before. It looked nothing
like what was going on mainstream, funk, jazz, hip-hop, none of that. It was this other thing.
The music was different and you know how kids would sneak off in the bathroom
and be showing off moves. And I'd be like what is this? I did what I could do, which
was different for them, so they kind of respected it and they recognized the style from the
DVDs and the different MC Hammers, like they rec-, but that wasn't their style, but they
recognized me as understanding what that was. So we kinda had a relationship. And from that
point I was like Atlanta is where it is. And luckily Mom's never left. GALEN: Do any of those
people that you danced with in school still dance now? AJ: No. You know everyone doesn't make
it at the same time, nor does everyone make it period. I'm lucky enough that my story
turned out that way, but I have a lot of friends who's story was not that way. GALEN: But
they tried? AJ: They tried, absolutely. We tried together. And the irony is, a lot of my
old homies would bring me up or they would take care of me and I'd be sleeping on their
floors and practicing with them and they'd be picking me up, taking me to and from
school and to work and we would hang out and I'd be using their fake IDs to get to these
dance clubs and what have you. But you know certain people who have the opportunities
to give, they you know those specific individuals you know saw something in me that they wanted
to try me out and wasn't really interested in my friends, which sucked, you know what
I mean? Cause not only was I comfortable with them, I felt like they were responsible for
me even meeting these people who were trying to take me away from it, you know. GALEN: How
did that happen? AJ: Um, there's this choreographer Devyne Stephens, well he used to be a choreographer.
He's super record mogul guy now. He saw something in me and just told me to just keep coming
back to the studio. He would never hire me, never really have me do anything. He just
said well just stick around, just be around, you know. So I would see all these dancers
from everywhere doing all this stuff and seeing how he ran a room and how artists and the
management and the label would respect him. And then when a couple of tours came up, i.e.
well the first one was Monica, then he put me on it. He was like all right, I'm gonna
give you this shot and see how you do. But by then I was already in artist development
mode, so it's not like I started dancing and then became you know progressed to a choreographer,
I started choreographing. And then, you know when the Monica tour came up he hired me for
it. I'm dancing with these people? It's the best thing in the world and you're traveling
and you're on the bus and you're drinking like crazy. Honestly, you're getting drunk.
And just per diem, like what is per diem? What the hell is that? I can't even spell
that. What is this? So...and the screaming fans and the Nickelodeon tour and just the
this, ah, best times. And then right after Monica, I jumped straight onto TLC. Like I
might not have had a week off between the last Monica date and the first day of TLC
rehearsal. GALEN: Wow. AJ: Like we were an open- ing act for the it was a Nickelodeon tour with
Monica and it was amphitheaters. So it was summer time, so you're hot as hell, you're
hyperventilating, you're sweating, you're passing out. So it was that world and then
I jumped straight to TLC with their FanMail album, which was they were the headliners,
we're in arenas, it was more money, it was costumes, it was full band and just, it was
like wow. So it was awesome. GALEN: Cool. Now you've become your own choreographer in your
own right. You make up the best dance breakdowns ever. They're just so exciting. It seems like
moves just seem to spew out of you. Is it easy for you to choreograph? AJ: it is.
It's easy for me to do what comes naturally. Depending on what the music is I can just
play the music, get up and just start jamming and push record and and we can make a routine
out of what I'm doing if we just look back at it. And other times I have to sit, hold
still and just sit and think and then I can get up and try it and it'll make sense or
it won't make sense and you adjust. That's kind of our process somewhat. GALEN: Let's talk
a little bit about your work with Usher. AJ:Okay. GALEN: Obviously you are closely associated with
him. How did you start working with him? AJ: Through Devyne Stephens. Again it was
one of those jobs. He was choreographing along with Usher's team, his "Yeah" music video. I
showed up and auditioned. They put me on tape, they watched it, whatever. Didn't get the
job. GALEN: What? AJ: Right? Didn't get the job. Fast forward years and years go by. His manager
at the time, Benny Medina, came up to me and he was like Usher is looking for you. I
was like okay. It's a good thing I think. So I show up and he was like hey man I want
you to come rap with me, I want you to work with me. I was like really? Okay cool. And
he was like I'm serious. I was like all right, well yeah, I'm down.He was like all right.
I mean I'm I don't forget. So you gonna get the call just, and I ended up creatively directing
and choreographing the next tour of his. And I was like wow man, I auditioned for you and
was trying to be your dancer last year and now I'm running the show. So I was like well
that's how things work sometimes. GALEN: Wow. So he seemed to really take a liking to you
obviously. What is your guys's relationship like creatively? AJ: It's different. There's
like two different types of ways that he would hit me with things. He would come in the room
and simply be like so what are we doing? And I better have the answer. I've learned that.
I learned what it's like to not have the answer and that is not fun. And I'm selling him,
I'm talking, I'm dancing, so and then we're gonna do this and then when music, hold on.
Okay and then when the music does this we're gonna do this and I'm just selling him
and going through these changes like just selling my life away. And then he was like
okay cool. And he would just like walk out the room and I'm like, see and then he comes
back in the room in a different outfit and he's ready to work. Okay, well great, great.
But then sometimes he's like look, this is what it is. It needs to be this, it needs
to be that, it needs to feel like this. And it needs to feel like that and this is the
color, this is the this is what the sound needs to be. It should make people say this
when I'm done. So no, and I've learned a lot from him, you know what I mean? That
was my first opportunity to creatively direct, you know he knew that I was new at that, so
he helped me come up through the ranks as far as understanding moving parts. GALEN: I mean
you also are such a good performer in addition to being a good choreographer and…AJ:Thanks.
I mean you you played Little Albert in Dream Girls and you have specific things probably
in your mind you're thinking about that would make you actually want to step foot in front
of a camera again. Are there things that are kind of on your performance bucket list? AJ: This
is one of 'em. GALEN: This? AJ: Absolutely. GALEN: Wow. AJ: To sit
down and have a conversation like this is
one of 'em. So check. GALEN: Aw yay. Bam. AJ: Word. Thank you for that one. And then also there
is some work for me in theater, in the Broadway world that I haven't tapped into quite yet.
Do you sing? You whistle a lot. AJ: Let me tell you something. If it was
about selling records and people are whistling on them. GALEN: You. AJ: I might not be sitting
here actually. We'd be somewhere, I'd be on tour whistling. GALEN: Will you whistle something
right now? AJ: What do you wanna hear? Pick something easy. GALEN: Oh Gosh.
That's impressive.
Sorry. That wasn't on this, was it? GALEN: Of course it was. AJ: Damn it. GALEN: Last but not
least we've talked about you as a creative director, a choreographer. You are still one
of the best dancers around, whether you... whether you wanna acknowledge that or not.
Yeah, you know how I feel about that. GALEN: You are one of the best dancers around.
What does dance mean to you? AJ: Dance to me, beyond my personal experience with it, I feel
like I'm connected to each and every person on this planet. I can communicate with someone
through dance. Sign language is dance, if you wanna look at it in that way. Percussion,
there like I see dance in percussion. You know when I see drummers play or when I when
I see the fingers moving on a guitar and and just like whether you re playing upright bass
or whether you're like all of piano, like all of that is choreography. Like those are
all methodical, it's movement to music, whether you're creating the music or whether someone
is doing it and you're just moving along with it, that's all dance and that's all choreography
on certain on some level. And it connects us all. I mean I can't imagine, and I've tried,
I've tried to imagine not a world without dance and music or a world where I personally
had no rhythm. You know, I don't know. I have two nephews and a niece, right?
If I put 'em in my lap I can just do like something random like (SINGS) and they'll just start
bouncing. The fact that at that young age you can't stop drool from coming down your
mouth, you can't speak, you can't even crawl, but you can bounce because you heard music.
That's pretty sick, you know what I mean? So music means everything. Cool. Thank you
so much, AJ. This has been fantastic. Thank you guys for watching. That was such an enlightening
conversation. I'm sure you guys have comments and questions for AJ. You can post things
on this video, post questions, comments, post things on Facebook, Twitter, we will make
sure to get back to you, get you some answers. You can stay up to date with AJ and our other
top choreographers here as well as all of us at DS2DIO. Thanks for watching. Bye.