In a building next to New Hope Christian Church in Newport on 10th and Central, Darren Jones and his two team members work under the name Fruit of the Spirits (FOTS) to start their first production house.

FOTS objective is to go into inner city communities to develop a recreation center or a production house for kids in the community to express themselves through music and arts said Jones, a senior Journalism major. He is developing this out of a spiritual component as a believer in Jesus.

“I want to have an outlet for them because there’s other alternatives that kids at that age are taking that aren’t good ones,” Jones said.

The non-profit group is working to get the place nice and polished so that kids will be able to have an art studio and performance studio according to Jones.

Growing Up

“For me growing up I was a band kid and there was like a lot of recreation centers for sports kids and I never fit in. so I want to establish a building for kids that are artsy or geeky or weird or whatever to come in and have an outlet,” Jones said.

It would have made all the difference in the world to him as a kid if someone he thought was cool would have told him that it was alright to bring his trombone home said Jones.

“He doesn’t want anyone to be ashamed of what their art or their craft is,” said Dustin Munday, a senior marketing major.

Munday stopped putting his efforts in creative aspects as a kid because of other kids and he ended up playing sports.

“He was from the perspective of actually being the creative type and I was coming from the desire to be that artistic type,” Munday said.

Group Members and Starting the Group

Jones is the CEO, leader, and visionary of the group according to Munday; while he handles the advertising and marketing.

Chryssy Payne is the organizer and scheduling guru Munday explained.

Payne said she will be putting out her third mixtape next month and is the member who is the most in the forefront of making music. She added that she wants her lyrics to not just be song lyrics, but for her to also be doing them.

“You can be yourself and represent the kingdom,” Payne said.

She met Jones in 2009 during her freshman year through a program called NKU Rocks. The program brought minorities and African Americans to school a week early to show them around the campus and the two began to talk about music.

“I made it known that I could rap and he made it known that he could rap,” Payne said.

Jones started Kingdom Builder Productions last year which works as an umbrella organization for other projects the group has started such as Fruit of the Spirits that was started at the end of 2013.

Turning to Jesus

This conversation between Jones and Payne had happened before all the group members had rededicated themselves to Christ.

Jones was on high octane drugs sitting in the backseat of a car. While sitting in that spot he believes that God spoke to him and told him to take a look at himself.

“For the first time in my life I didn’t like what I saw,” Jones said. “So I got out of that car man and I went upstairs and my Aunt, my Aunt Sharra, she taught me The Lord’s Prayer when I was a kid and I said the Lord’s Prayer in my room. I remember it. And the next day I quit the narcotics and I quit drinking and life just progressed.”

Plans for the Future

The group holds weekly meetings to discuss its moves in the upcoming months. In the future they hope to expand their team and the communities that Fruit of the Spirits works with.

Jones said they are looking into starting a kickstarter campaign for fundraising and possibly selling t-shirts as well. They are also considering a campus tour next semester he added.

Munday said they are even looking into putting on a haircut drive in June.

“I think a lot of people should consider the youth of their community and the influence that they have on them,” Jones said.

More information can be found online atwww.kbpros.com

You can find Payne’s mixtapes online athttp://www.reverbnation.com/chryssypayne