CEDAR FALLS - Jon Voigt came of age during the height of hip-hop.

The 31-year-old remembers being taken by the wordplay and solid beats of groups like the Beastie Boys and NWA in the '90s.

"From that point on, I stopped listening to the Top 40 station and went strictly to rap," said the Cedar Falls man. "Everyone has their genre of choice. I liked hip-hop."

About 10 years ago, he started rapping his own tracks. For the past decade, Voigt, who performs under the name Skylar Johnson, has produced music in his basement studio. This spring he will release his first album, "Killinesses," through the underground hip-hop label A+9 Records.

Johnson's imaginative rhymes and unusual beats harken back to rap's early days, but the content is his and his alone. In one song, he raps about his mother's death, with samples from a local bluegrass musician's rendition of "Let the Circle Be Unbroken." On another track, he waxes poetic about the daily grind and his job pouring cement with a local construction company.

"People hear rap and they get the wrong idea about me," Johnson said. "I'm not from the ghetto, I don't know about the ghetto, so I don't rap about the ghetto. … I've got three kids, a wife and a house with a mortgage payment."

Still, listening to Johnson's pieces is both engrossing and amusing. The artist has a gift for language, serving up fresh metaphors on every track. Plus, the rapper exercises total control over his work, producing the music, writing and recording the lyrics and adding scratches.

"They hear what I want them to hear," Johnson said. "I'm one of the few guys who does it all."

"Killinesses" is in the process of being mastered by a Des Moines musician and will later be available on cdbaby.com, an online retailer that distributes independent albums. Johnson will share some of his songs in June at the Sturgis Falls festival in Cedar Falls. He'll be the first rapper to perform in Overman Park.

"I think that will give me a chance to show people who I am and what I sing about," said Johnson, who tries to devote at least an hour each night to his craft. "I'm different, and I want to let people know that."

The artist is working on incorporating a riff from AC/DC's "Back in Black" into one of his songs and would like to sample Sinatra in another. He also plays the harmonica and hopes to integrate the instrument into live performances.

Aaron Wherry, owner/operator of A+9 Records, said Johnson "pushes the envelope to make the genre better."

"He's as much an individual as an artist as anyone," Wherry said. "I think his stuff stands far and above the mainstream, and as a label, that's what we look for."

For his part, Johnson is focusing on writing new material and finding ways to share his sound with the Cedar Valley.

"My stuff is different," he said. "But that's what makes it fun."

Contact Mary Stegmeir at (319) 291-1482 or mary.stegmeir@wcfcourier.com.