Three 6 Mafia's founding members became musicians at young ages. In 1988,
DJ Paul, at age 11, was taking piano lessons, and his older brother,
[4] Lord Infamous, age 15, was a singer practicing bass and electric guitar. Paul could play piano and drums, Infamous sang and played bass and guitar. With that, the two would compose songs together.
At the same time, in
North Memphis, Tennessee,
Juicy J, at age 13, was learning how to
DJ as well as rap. He had initially wanted to be a singer, but in the late 1980s and early 1990s he fell in love with the
gangsta rap style, and he, like his future founding group members across town, wanted to make music like popular artists at the time such as
N.W.A and
Geto Boys.
[5]
In 1989, DJ Paul and Lord Infamous formed the duo "Da Serial Killaz".
[6] It was at this time they distributed their own mixtapes of popular songs at the time at school, and Lord Infamous had started rapping with his signature triple time flow. Juicy J was also creating his own mixes by this time, but was not putting his raps on tapes just yet.