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Jwalt holding his first top 100 charting plaque for his song “Love Myself.” (Jwalt)<\/p>\n
OAKLAND, Calif. – A young rising Oakland rap artist is up for possible GRAMMY nominations set to be announced on Friday for the 2026 awards.<\/p>\n
Justin Walton, known as Jwalt<\/a>, is being considered in two GRAMMY categories: best new artist and best rap album.<\/p>\n Over the summer, the 23-year-old rapper-songwriter released his latest album, “Every Version of Me<\/a>,” with executive producer and prominent voice in the hip hop world, Oakland native Sway Calloway.<\/p>\n The album has been well received as a raw and vulnerable display of Walton\u2019s many facets and his journey shaped by his time in New York City, where he attended college, performing overseas, and his Oakland roots.\u00a0<\/p>\n “I’m really excited about this album,” the artist told KTVU in an interview on Thursday. “There’s so many different elements of me on this project and obviously, you know, being born and raised in Oakland, there’s a lot of Bay Area and West Coast influence on the album.”\u00a0<\/p>\n He added that his exposure out East was also represented. “I was definitely inspired by that classic traditional New York hip-hop sound, classic storytelling, hip-hop roots on there as well. There’s also a little bit of neo-soul vibes, R&B vibes and so many different aspects of what make up Jwalt.”<\/p>\n Dig deeper:<\/p>\n On the new album, the fourth track, “Love Myself,” marked Walton’s first top 100 charted song.<\/p>\n “A lot of different stations and different TV shows, national TV stations, started picking it up, and it just meant the world to me. Often times in hip-hop, we get this message to where we have to talk about something that’s not always positive. Often times we look at mainstream music, you know, degrading women,” the rap artist said. “I wanted to just write a song about loving myself.”<\/p>\n He said the song came during a tumultuous time in his life as he tried to get through his senior year in college while advancing his career. He was traveling a lot and neglecting self-care.<\/p>\n “I’d have to be in LA for a day, then I’ll come back, and I have to do a test the next day, then I’ll go to Miami,” he recalled. “I wasn’t necessarily slowing down, so I wrote ‘Love Myself’ ’cause I was like, ‘You know what? I need to take a pause real quick I’m not necessarily loving myself.’ Even though I was living out my dreams, doing everything that I love, I wasn’t taking care of myself.”<\/p>\n He wrote an honest piece that resonated deeply with others, a song he said, that ended up being his favorite on the album.\u00a0<\/p>\n “To see the reaction that it did, from the music video of the song and the day it came out, hitting the charts,” Walton said, “Meant the world to me and also shows that being authentic, putting out positive music, it still reaches the masses, and it still reaches people and that’s something that everyone can relate to.”<\/p>\n The 13-track album is Jwalt\u2019s second. It follows an extended play (EP) called “2.2.2″<\/a> that came out in 2021, after his debut album in 2020 titled “Yours Truly<\/a>.”\u00a0<\/p>\n His Oakland Roots <\/p>\n Walton\u2019s music often makes reference to his Oakland roots, shining a light on the city that shaped who he is today.<\/p>\n “Growing up, Oakland poured a lot into me. When I first started getting into music, l would go to open mics in downtown Oakland. I would participate in different organizations, in Youth Speaks and Youth Radio, within Oakland,” Walton shared. “So for me, when I started to get some momentum with my career and then when I moved to New York, I was like, you know, I’m always gonna represent Oakland to the fullest, ’cause that’s what gave me so much.”<\/p>\n Walton attended high school at the Oakland School for the Arts<\/a> and graduated from New York University\u2019s prestigious Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music<\/a> last year.<\/p>\n After college and a short stint in Los Angeles, in May, the musician returned to Oakland, where he has heavily invested in his community, joining the large team of part-owners for both the soccer team Oakland Roots SC<\/a> and the Pioneer League baseball team, the Oakland Ballers<\/a>.<\/p>\n Jwalt wrote and performed the Ballers\u2019 theme song for its championship<\/a> 2025 season.<\/p>\n “Ballers Ballad<\/a>” celebrates the resilient spirit of the city captured in the team, even referring to its community-driven emergence after the Oakland A\u2019s departure.<\/p>\n “They try to take baseball away from us but she know how we do. We bring it back,” he raps. “You can never take a baller out the Bay, they going to leave with the beast, we going to stay game time when we step up to the play.”<\/p>\n Using his platform <\/p>\n Walton has also used his platform to advance social justice issues and has taken part in a campaign to denounce hate crimes and acts of discrimination in his community.<\/p>\n Last month, he helped unveil a new mural as part of the California vs Hate<\/a> program helping to promote its mission to report hate crimes, offering support to victims of such acts.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n “A new mural in Chinatown celebrating Oakland\u2019s strength, love, and unity,” he shared<\/a> on social media.\u00a0<\/p>\n From child poet to hip-hop artist <\/p>\n As a songwriter, Walton\u2019s writing abilities go back to his early grade school days as a young poet. His poetry soon evolved into a musical expression.<\/p>\n The backstory:<\/p>\n “Jwalt began writing poetry at 8 years old, later finding his passion for hip-hop when he was 11 years old,” his bio states.<\/p>\n The young artist has shared the stage with a long list of superstars, many from the Bay Area, including Too short, Sheila E, E-40<\/a>,\u00a0Saweetie, G-Eazy, Kamaiyah, and Daveed Diggs.<\/p>\n His music has been used by the NBA and ESPN, and in 2019 Jwalt was a featured performer celebrating Stephen Curry<\/a>\u2019s 10th year in Oakland at the Fox Theater.<\/p>\n Featured in nationwide COVID graduation\u00a0 <\/p>\n In 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the then-teenager and high school graduate was featured in a nationwide virtual event celebrating the 3 million high school seniors in the U.S. who lost out on graduation ceremonies due to social distancing and the cancellation of in-person events.\u00a0<\/p>\n The star-studded televised celebration was hosted by NBA star LeBron James with former President Barack Obama delivering a commencement speech.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n KTVU featured Walton in an article<\/a> in which he spoke about how his musical talents were what caught the attention of the graduation show\u2019s producers, after he posted a rap he wrote about being in quarantine and finishing high school virtually.<\/p>\n In his music video, he made sure to represent his hometown, wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “Oakland is proud,” as he rapped about the experience felt by so many graduates during that time.<\/p>\n “Who would\u2019ve known my last day of school would\u2019ve been in March? Last day in the classrooms and the busy halls\u2026 I know this new way of living isn\u2019t ideal, but this is what we gotta do if we\u2019re trying to heal. You see, it\u2019s bigger than ourselves\u2026 The class of 2020 we’re gonna make it still.”<\/p>\n And he has made it.<\/p>\n Seeing the world through music \u00a0 <\/p>\n While attending NYU, as he juggled school while working on his career, he toured around the country as well as overseas to places like the West African country of Ghana, and major cities in Europe including Paris, London, and Berlin.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n “I\u2019ve been able to see a lot of places off of music, which is something that I don\u2019t take for granted, and it’s something that really has inspired me,” Walton shared, noting he has spent about four months in Berlin taking in and being a part of its vibrant arts scene.\u00a0<\/p>\n “I feel really blessed,” he said. “I get to do what I love and take it globally. It’s definitely special.”<\/p>\n Local perspective:<\/p>\n After the worldly experiences he’s had so far, in the end, he said his heart is in Oakland.<\/p>\n “That’s where I learned and got a lot of the game from. It was from Oakland and being in Oakland,” he said. “Which is also one of the biggest reasons why I wanted to come back here and be back to Oakland.”<\/p>\n Walton said he is extremely honored\u00a0just having his name in the conversation as a possible GRAMMY nominee.<\/p>\n KTVU asked what it would mean to him and to his city if he could ultimately bring home a GRAMMY. And as he frequently does, he brought it back to his hometown and his roots.<\/p>\n “Often times, Oakland is a city that gets overlooked. It’s a city that is often known for negativity and doesn\u2019t always get to be seen as a nice place, as a beautiful spotlight,” the young artist said. “This community means so much to me. So any opportunity that I can to really try to represent Oakland and put Oakland on my back is something that would really mean the world to me.”<\/p>\n It\u2019s a message he shared with his fans on social media, saying, “Regardless of the outcome I\u2019m honored. THIS FOR THE TOWN!”\u00a0<\/p>\n The GRAMMY nominees will be announced at 8 a.m. on Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n The 68th annual Grammy Awards<\/a> will be held on February 1, 2026, at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n Oakland<\/a>Entertainment<\/a>Good News<\/a>Instanews<\/a>New York<\/a> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/jwalt.png\")
Ballers’ theme song <\/p>\n