IN MEMORIAM
JUSTO FAISON
FOUNDER, JUSTO’S MIXTAPE AWARDS · DIED MAY 2005, AGE 36
THE ADVOCATE
Before anyone in the industry would say it out loud, Justo Faison said mixtape DJs mattered. In 1995, working out of his own pocket and leaning on relationships he'd built as a label executive, he founded Justo's Mixtape Awards — the first and only national awards honoring the DJs who were breaking records from their bedrooms while the industry tried to shut them down.
He didn't do it for a cut. He did it because the DJ is the backbone of the culture and nobody was saying so.
WHAT HE BUILT
Justo's Mixtape Awards ran for a decade and became a staple of hip-hop culture. Clue, Kay Slay, Green Lantern, Envy, Ron G, Tony Touch, Doo Wop, Mister Cee — the roll call of DJs he recognized reads like the history of the mixtape era itself. Careers turned on that recognition. Record deals followed it.
He held positions at Nervous, Atlantic, and Epic, and used that leverage to open doors for the people he called hip-hop's underdogs. In March 2005, he released *Justo Presents: The Mixtape Documentary* on DVD — mixtape culture, documented on physical media, by the man who championed it.
Two months later, he was gone.
THE ROLL CALL
1995
Working with his own money and his label contacts, Justo starts Justo’s Mixtape Awards to honor the DJs the industry was trying to shut down.
1997 – 1998
That year’s winners include DJ Iroc, Craig G, Lazy K, Action Pac, Ron G, DJ Clue, DJ Juice, Mister Cee, Kool Mike Ski and DJ S&S. Their sets come out together as the tape Justo’s Mix-Tape All-Stars.
THE DECADE
The awards become the one night a year the mixtape DJs are honored as artists. DJ Kay Slay later said Justo paid for them out of his own pocket, and other DJs called him the link between all of them.
MARCH 2005
Justo Presents: The Mixtape Documentary comes out on DVD.
MAY 2005
Justo dies at 36, two months after the DVD. At the 2005 awards, DJ Vlad salutes him (clip below).
THE LOSS
On Friday night, May 13, 2005, Justo Faison died when the SUV he was in flipped and hit a tree near Richmond, Virginia. He was 36. The mixtape community lost the one person who had spent a decade insisting it deserved to be taken seriously.
WHY THIS ARCHIVE EXISTS
This archive preserves the physical artifacts of the mixtape and DVD era — the tapes, the discs, the artwork, the documentation — from the last generation of hip-hop that lived on physical media and could actually be lost.
That mission started with Justo. He was the first person to say this culture was worth honoring while it was still happening. Everything preserved here stands on what he built.
*We're not collecting memorabilia. We're preserving history.
HIS LEGACY CONTINUES
The Mixtape Museum, founded by Regan Sommer McCoy, continues Justo's work as a research and archival institution. Learn more at mixtapemuseum.org.
PUBLIC CLIPS
These clips were posted on YouTube by the people who filmed the Mixtape Awards and the shows that remember Justo. They are embedded here from those posts, for the record.
DJ Vlad salutes the late Justo Faison at the 2005 Mixtape Awards (VladTV)
Common and Consequence at Justo’s Mixtape Awards 2005
The Game at Justo’s Mixtape Awards 2005
The drops: Justo’s Mixtape Awards 2005
Justo’s Mixtape Awards 2005
Pitbull at Justo’s Mixtape Awards, 2004 (from Pitbull’s channel)
Remembering Justo Faison and hip-hop’s debt to the mixtape
LEGAL DISCLAIMER
This is an independent historical archive documenting the mixtape era. This page is a tribute and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the estate of Justo Faison, Justo's Mixtape Awards, or the Mixtape Museum. All names are used for historical identification purposes only.