Central Pennsylvania might as well be Central America to someone who has spent his entire life in Queens, New York. For local hip-hop artist Justin Staley (senior-psychology), the complete absence of an urban culture amounted to what can be described as jolting experience.

"I hadn't been out of New York my whole life," Staley said. "It's nice and quiet [here], but definitely a culture shock."

Although he is happy with his choice to attend Penn State, it's not the comparatively calm atmosphere of State College that has served as his creative inspiration, but rather his experiences growing up in New York's most populated borough.

"The album comes from that [place]," said Staley, referring to his just completed self-produced album Moods of a Maestro. "The experiences I talk about [on the album] come from that."

Staley has been rapping and producing his own material since he was 12 years old, having first been directed to music by his father.

"He played a lot of Quincy Jones and jazz," Staley said. "I like to say my three main influences are the three Joneses: Quincy, Norah and Nas."

Staley's varied taste in music isn't his only distinctive characteristic.

It's his musical content that sets him apart from much of what is popular in hip-hop today, including other Queens-born rappers like 50 Cent.

"In terms of content, I do a lot of commenting," Staley said. "But I try to walk a line that's not on the extreme side of revolutionary and not on the extreme side of outrageous. I just try to make positive music."

Staley is working hard to build a positive image for a genre that is constantly criticized for its glamorizing of misogyny and flashy lifestyles.

"He doesn't rap for ordinary cliché things," said longtime friend and collaborator Quincy Sims. "He's about empowerment. His music is for a generation and he's really speaking up about things other people don't speak about, like slavery and treating black women with respect."

Another of Staley's cohorts, Elijah "The Prophet" McKinley (senior-psychology), said Staley "brings a real down-to-earth edge. His heart is cold as ice but deep down he's a compassionate dude. One track on his album specifically apologizes to women for all the grimy deeds done by men."

Staley agrees it isn't his style to act like the rappers on MTV.

"It's not reality," he said. "It's not a true perspective of what's going on. [Kids] romanticize things like cars and jewelry and don't focus on getting things like education."

Part of presenting a positive image is getting back to the basics, and that's one of the reasons Staley doesn't go by his high school nickname, "Juice."

"I didn't want there to be any gimmick," he said. "I wanted the album to be genuine and straightforward."

But as honorable as his intentions are, Staley and his peers know he's chosen a difficult path.

"What he's doing has been done before," Sims said. "It has just never seen the day of light like a Puffy."

Staley believes there's room for his music to achieve popularity and he points to the success of the recent Nas singles. But even if the rest of the world remains ignorant to his music, Staley still has the respect of his peers.

"Juice represents Queens to the fullest," Sims said. "He has all the type of influence to not do his style of hip-hop, but he's a leader and that's why he chooses to go back to his own style."