Michael Woodrow Jackson was born on November 6, 1978 in Oxnard, California. He grew up in a family that was predominantly focused towards music at a wide spectrum, being the younger brother of hip hop artist Madlib, son of singer Otis Jackson, and nephew of jazz trumpeter Jon Faddis.

Oh No started performing with his group Kali Wild and was featured on his brother’s group Lootpack’s album Soundpieces: Da Antidote. Oh No was signed to Los Angeles-based Stones Throw Records who released his debut album, The Disrupt, in 2004. Around this time he also performed on numerous singles by other artists, and began doing freelance production work for labelmates Wildchild, MED (Nickolas Rodriguez) and others. He has gone on to produce for Juggaknots, De La Soul, Murs and various other artists.

In August 2006, Oh No released the album Exodus Into Unheard Rhythms, exclusively sampling the music of Galt MacDermot and featuring appearances from numerous other rap artists, mostly in the Stones Throw family. The album was well received by critics and established Oh No as one of the leading underground producers in hip-hop. In 2007 he released Dr. No’s Oxperiment to rave reviews. The album was entirely constructed using samples of Turkish, Lebanese, Greek and Italian music.

Oh No remains an avid gamer, even constructing an entire beat out of video game samples for the track “The Ride” off of The Disrupt. Also in 2009 Oh No remixed several songs for the soundtrack of the U.S. Limited Edition version for Arc System Work’s 2D Fighting Game Blazblue. Oh No released an album, Dr. No’s Ethiopium, in 2009, made entirely of samples of Ethiopian music. In 2013, Oh No produced the original score for popular video game Grand Theft Auto V, together with The Alchemist, Tangerine Dream and Woody Jackson.