Big Dreams, Tiny Package
Don’t let her size fool you, Detroit rapper Tiny Jag has a big voice, a big heart, and even bigger ambitions.
Tiny Jag, born Jillian Graham, derived her MC moniker from an old boyfriend. This ex-boyfriend would say “small” or “tiny” in front of everything. He didn’t stick, but his naming practices did. With “Tiny” in place, she added the “Jag” to her name because she identifies and admires the jaguar. As she says, “I can only aspire to be a small, tiny version of that graceful, vicious animal.”
Jag is fiercely loyal and fearless. Both traits are directly tied to her relationship with her mother. Jag says “my mom is my bestie, we’re road dawgs.” As her co-conspirator and #1 fan, Jag’s mom is thrilled and supportive of everything she’s doing. In fact, she counseled Jag to stop everything that didn’t make her happy. It’s this support and their incredible mother/daughter bond that Jag credits for allowing her to be fearless.
“Are we famous yet, I don’t want to go to work,” her mom often asks. Not yet, but Tiny Jag is working on it.
East and More East
For her first eleven years, Jag lived in Hamtramck on Detroit’s east side. By the time she matriculated to middle school, her mom moved them to Grosse Pointe. Jag said that it was great living in the suburbs but that “you take the kid out of the hood, but not the hood out of the kid.”
If she wasn’t in school or at home, she was most likely hanging out with her friends on Detroit’s east side. As soon as she was old enough to drive and got herself a car, “it was over.”
Her move to Grosse Pointe also threw life in Detroit’s east side into greater relief. When she was living in Detroit, she says there was a lot of things that she didn’t even think of as a problem, until she moved to Grosse Pointe. It was mostly superficial things that became “problems” in Grosse Pointe. “There was a lot of stuff we didn’t think to even look at as a problem,” she recalls, “like what type of shoes I was wearing I didn’t even know was a problem until I moved to the suburbs.”
Her perennial eastward movements were interrupted by her undergraduate studies at Western Michigan University. Jag studied criminal justice and sociology as an undergrad because her mom is in law enforcement so it “made sense.” However, as soon as she graduated, she realized she hated working in law enforcement. This compelled her back east to Detroit and Wayne State where she earned her master’s in social work. She decided to pursue social work because she’s very empathetic.
“I have a problem,” she confesses, “I want to reach people.” Even though she traded social work for her music, she says she’s still “reaching people, but not from a different place from my music.”
Going With the Flow
Jag is quick to describe her personal style as “spontaneous.” When it comes to her look, she doesn’t like to plan things out or limit herself to any one style. Depending on the day, or the time of day, Jag is bringing a variety of looks and vibes: “happy, hippy, tomboy, or goth,” she says. She admits to being “very easily influenced,” she laughs, “I keep it spontaneous, I’m influenced by the song I was listening to, whatever.”
Her path back to music was the direct result of her finally going with the flow. Throughout her life, Jag has always been thinking about music. It didn’t matter if she was “washing dishes or doing [her] hair,” songs would just pop into her head. She tried to ignore her musical urges but eventually started singing and she made her way back to music. As she puts it, “everything was about getting back to music and finding out how to get happy.”
Now that she’s fully in the music mode, the melodies continue to pop up no matter what she’s doing. Now instead of ignoring the melodies, she’ll stop whatever she’s doing and finish the song.
She’s just as fluid with her approach to getting her art out to people. She loves Instagram and Twitter; she loves Apple Music, Spotify, and Soundcloud. But her true passion is performing. Since March she’s had about 30 shows and she’s “ready to do shows and be a rolling stone, and have no home.” She smiles, “I want to do all types of stuff, stay moving. I’m ready for that. I’m hungry for that.”
No Boundaries
Jag gravitated to hip-hop for a variety of reasons, but the most important reason is that hip-hop has always felt “very welcoming” to her. When discussing hip-hop, Jag likes to reference the “Howard Stern” of hip-hop, Joe Budden. Jag gets serious: “Joe Budden said, ‘with hip-hop you can,’” she continues, “you could have gone to college, you could have been a drug dealer, you could have been a wife beater, hip-hop will take you.”
This lack of boundaries is part and parcel of Jag’s approach to hip-hop. “I’m not your typical hip-hop person,” she continues, “I’m a health nut, I’m not into lean or Xan[ax].” The whole point of hip-hop, according to Tiny Jag, is that any boundaries in hip-hop are fake. “I want people to understand,” she exclaims, “you can do both! You don’t have to choose a lane.”
“You can be a healthy hoodrat in hip-hop,” she says flashing a grin.
Success to Invest
All her ambitions and hard work are geared toward making some long-term artistic and financial investments. Jag wants “lots of cheese to make those Kelly Capital investments.” But her drive to earn and invest is not solely limited to personal gain. As a successful musician pursuing her artistic and financial dreams, she hopes to reach people. This is what she wants: “to inspire the weirdos, those that don’t fit.” And if she can do this and make a living to support her family, that’s what she calls success.
With a grin Tiny Jag boils it all down: “peace first, all that other shit later.”
