Keep It Beautiful: Inside the Funkyverse of Shock G and Digital Underground began as conversations, road trips, interviews, photographs, drawings, stories, laughter, and countless hours of collaboration with Shock G and co-author Alexis Wolfe Mbassa. The book is part memoir, part art book, part scrapbook, and part love letter to one of the most creative minds in hip hop.

The fully illustrated memoir by Gregory “Shock G” Jacobs, as told to Mbassa, captures the eternal vibrance of his style—playful, soulful, colorful, and profound. In Keep It Beautiful, music lovers and ’80s and ’90s nostalgists find a rare lens into the early days of hip-hop when it was an underground urban movement flirting with mainstream culture — bringing new takes on club classics and new style to the nightlife and street scenes. The work offers a never-before-seen glimpse into the genesis of Shock G’s musical group, Digital Underground, which launched the music career of rap icon Tupac Shakur.

Keep It Beautiful – one of Shock G’s well-known sayings – combines traditional memoir, photographs, lyrics, the artist’s own illustrations and storyboards, handwriting, and photography to create an appealing package that is both keepsake book and a deeper look into the mind of an artist.

The book is being released on Shock G’s birthday, August 25th.