GRIMES - THE SEQUEL

My son Jayden, who has been hanging around the radio station sine he was born, got his first On-Air Shift on XL1067 this week... It's been quite a ride!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Since my son jumped behind the mic for the first
time officially last night as an air talent on XL
one O six seven, I thought it would be a
good idea. I have to jump on here and maybe
do a little podcast. Here's the podcast, just a bit
upper contrasts from what I'm used to. I usually have
to talk fast because there's far people sharing the mic,

(00:22):
but this is just me, so I say whatever i'd like.
It might be serious, sometimes it might be funny. Sometimes
to scratch your hand and said, Bryan, it's such a dummy, Bud.
It just me. I ain't got no help. This is
Prie Grimes, and I'm talking to myself. I was up
and as Brian Grimes. It is my podcast and I'm
talking to myself. Pretty uh, pretty cool day yesterday, my son.

(00:47):
If you listen to Johnny's House, if you listen for
any extended period time, you know I've been here for
a long time. I've been here since about two thousand
in some capacity. I interned before XL one O six
seven even came into the building when it was your
channel back in the day, and they had bought Excel
from another company and they were in the process of
moving over and then I went away for a little

(01:07):
bit and tried to do this. Well, I mean I
didn't try to do it. We were successful at it
this internet radio company. Streaming radio just wasn't a thing yet,
so there was no place to monetize it, so the
company shut it down. But then I came back over
here to clear Channel at the time after they had
moved Excel into the building and I started working in
the XL one of sixty seven. At the time, they

(01:27):
called it the Fun and Games Department, which is the
promotions department. Basically, they do all the hard work out
on the front lines to get everything to look right
for the radio station, all the events, they do, all
the setup planning, everything, a lot of work work without
a lot of glory that comes along with it. But

(01:47):
it's usually the way that you get in. You start
as an intern, and then you jump into promotions because
that's like kind of the entry level thing, and then
you get your feet wet all over the radio station.
And now that they've kind of done away with.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Interns, emotions is really the only way that you can
can really really get in unless you kind of slide
in through the back door someway so that's how I
started at XCEL.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
And so long long ago. It was Doc and Johnny
in the morning, and I was a call screener and
then eventually a producer, but I wasn't really like the
full on extent of part of the show that I
am now. In Johnny's house, there was Doc, Johnny Grace,
and then myself and I was more of a technical

(02:31):
guy that kind of threw in a haha he every
now and then. And so that's when my son, Jaden
was born. This was in two thousand and five. I
had been with the show for two years, but full
time for just over a year and a half on
the show, and I remember leaving the show one morning
to go to the hospital so my son could be born,

(02:53):
because it was a scheduled pregnancies, I mean a schedule
like delivery, so we knew it was going to happen,
knew what time it was going to happen. So I
went to the hospital with my wife that morning and
we got ready for Jaden to be born, and he
was born before the show ended at ten am. So
I called in from the waiting room and told Doc
and Johnny on the air on the radio that my

(03:15):
son was born, and he was Jaden, and he was
happy and he was healthy, and basically everything about my
life change from that point on. If you've ever had
a kid, you know, it's basically a life changing thing,
and not just for eighteen years, but like for the
rest of your life. It is a life altering event.
I mean, obviously there is somebody now relying on you
for the rest of your life. Even if they've become

(03:35):
a successful adult, they still rely on you as a parent.
So it was pretty overwhelming, and it was cool because
I got to tell everybody about it on the radio.
I mean, over the years, Jaden has come to a
lot of my events. I mean as a kid, he
walked around the radio station. When he was a baby,
well I used to wheel him around the radio station
before that, so everybody could see him here in his

(03:57):
little stroller. And then obviously he even learned how to walk,
and he was walking around the radio station. He used
to have a huge crush on Jana, who does afternoons
at X one to six seven. Used to bring her
flowers and everything all the time. He was a great kid.
Everybody in the station, you know, loved him, treated him
like their own He's met tons of artists over the
years while I worked here. He's got to do a
lot of cool things. Sound check parties with the Jonas Brothers,

(04:20):
he got to hang out on the bus with Big
Time Rush. He was a big fan of the show
and sing with the script. Katie Perry picked him up,
lifted up his shirt and did the like Zerbert thing,
the raspberry on his belly. He's got to do a
lot of really really cool things. It's just wild. I
always want to ask him, do you remember any of
these things? Maybe we'll do a podcast where we kind
of run down his things that he's done through you know,

(04:44):
me working at the radio station, and see if he
even remembers any of them. Often to wonder that. But anyway,
he's kind of grown up through that. I've talked about
him on the air lot, the good stuff, the bad
stuff that make me want to jump off a cliff stuff.
You guys have heard all of it, and so a
lot of people feel like they've kind of watched my
son grow up. Well. He never really showed a lot
of interest in radio, and then he started working on

(05:05):
a podcast and it's actually doing pretty well. If you
haven't checked out it's called Dude Problems. So he started
working on his podcast, and that's when he started really thinking,
you know, i'd like to get a job at the
radio station. I'd like to, you know, see what that's
all about. And I said, well, you know, I can't
just snap my fingers and you get on the radio.
That's that's just not how it works. I don't have
that kind of juice around here, although one could argue

(05:27):
that I probably should, considering, you know, all the water
that I carry. But anyway, that's a whole other conversation
for a whole other day, and that's going in a
direction I don't want to go here. So I told him,
I said, you can't just like show up and start
talking on the radio. That's just not how it works.
So I told him this is how I did it.
You know, back in the day, I started as an intern.
But they don't have interns anymore. So promotions is the

(05:48):
way to go. And so you're gonna have to do that.
You're gonna have to start out in promotions. You're going
to have to you know, grind it out, see what
it's all about. I want you to learn everything you can.
And I told him, I said, I don't want you
just coming in and shadowing me. I want you to
shadow everybody. I want you to to see how everybody
does it. That's what I did. I had a lot
of help from you know, great guys like Daniel Dennis

(06:10):
back in the day. He taught me how to run
the board at all, like not necessarily like sat down
and said this is how you do this is how
to do this. But he allowed me to sit and
watch him and absorb and answer any questions I had,
and so, you know, you got to learn from a
lot of people. You got to see the different ways
to do things. I told him, I want you to
bounce around to everybody. To his credit, when he first

(06:30):
started working here, he never introduced himself as Jade and
Bryan's son. Sorry, I needed to take a drink from
my fancy circle water bottle, which my son bought me.
By the way, he never introduced himself as my son,
always just as Jayden and then as people found out,
they're like, oh, you're Brian's son. But he never really
wanted any sort of leg up for that, which is
pretty cool. He asked me questions along the way, mostly

(06:53):
you know, kind of like personal dynamic questions. Not how
to put up tents, because he could figure that out
for himself, but a lot of it as navigate the
you know, the personal waters when it comes to a
business like this. So he did ask me some questions
along the way, which I thought was cool. And he
worked and he kept his job at Public's and he
still doubles up and does both jobs. So I mean
he's a hard working kid. I will say I did

(07:15):
give him that. Now, the boy has an aversion to
being on time. He's never super late, but he's always
cutting it close, which just makes me crazy because I'm like,
why would you cut it close? All you gotta do
is do everything a little bit earlier. But it makes
me nuts, but I'm gonna go with that's the generation.
So that party didn't give from me, but the work
ethic and the fact that he busses. But and I

(07:36):
told him from the beginning, look, when you get into radio,
this isn't a everyday job as far as paying your
bills goes. It's just not like you got to work
your way in and while you do that, you're gonna
have to have another job. I did my first three years,
I had another job when I was in radio. Even
when I was you know, doing cool stuff here, I

(07:56):
still had to have another job. It just it that's
not how radio works. You don't generally just walk in
and get a you know, a regular salaried, high paying position.
You got to work your way up. And so I
told him you got to keep your other job, which
at first he was kind of like looking at me crooked,
but he had no problem doing He did it. He
kept his other job, still working at publics, and he

(08:17):
said he wanted to learn how to do on air stuff.
So I'm like, all right, cool, bounce around, learn from everybody,
and so we make air checks. That's what they call,
you know, kind of like a scope of your show.
So if you're doing a music show, like you know,
Johnny's House is more of a talk show format, so
we talk long form for you know, five six, seven
minutes at a time. But if you're doing a music show,
generally speaking, you know, you talk over the intros of songs,

(08:40):
and you gotta do the flow of the music, and
you gotta you know, kind of feel the vibe. And
then there's once or twice an hour where you might
get a little bit of extra time to maybe throw
some personality stuff in there, but it's a different vibe.
So an air check is basically a scope of an
hour of all your talk time, and really when you
bring it down, it's about two and a half minutes
long max. It shows what you would sound like, you know,

(09:02):
to a program director if you're on the air, and
if you're not on the air yet. The only way
to do that is to make fake air checks, which
is actually harder to do technically than it is actually
the technical part of just being live on the radio.
So he asked me to help him with that. So
I started making air checks with him and working with
him on you know, not what to say, because the

(09:24):
whole idea is he's nineteen, right and I'm not. So
he knows what nineteen year olds talk about, he knows
how nineteen year olds talk, he knows how nineteen year
olds think, and that's kind of important to our business.
So I'm like, you be you, but here's what you
need to do, like you know, formatically speaking and technically speaking.
And so I didn't stop him too much. I wouldn't,

(09:44):
you know, edit him too much, because our boss JJ Rice,
the Rice Man, it's kind of his job to have
these aircheck sessions with Jaden after he's on the air
or after he hears his fake air check and kind
of critique him and tell him what he hears that
he needs to work on and not I'll give him
some tips. But again, I want him to be himself,
and I want him to go through the same process
that people go through when they're getting in this business

(10:06):
because I won't always be here. And I think, honestly,
I can't preach the way I do about work ethic
and earning what you get and not being average if
I am gonna help him anymore than I would help
the next person. And I know he's my son, but
I just don't feel like that's the way to do it.
So I made him go through the same process that
I went through, and he made a few fake air checks.

(10:26):
I think he got through three of them before you know,
he finally was maybe I can do this to where
I'm to the point where I can get on the air.
And I was joking JJ Rice all the time, but hey, man,
when you can put my son on man? When he
put my son on a man, but I really didn't
think it was gonna happen. And then last week, JJ
Rice the Rice Man kind of hits me out of
nowhere and he said, Hey, I'm gonna put Jayden on

(10:51):
Monday night into Tuesday morning. And I'm like, what that
was really excited for him. He's like, but do you
guys want to tell him on the show? And you know,
it is Johnny's house, and so I don't ever assume anything.
I know, I've been here a long time and I
put a few nails in the wall building the house,
but I don't want assume anything. So I hit Johnny
up and I'm like, hey, man, Jeremy's gonna give Jaden

(11:13):
a night shift, you know, one night a week, and
he hasn't told him yet. Would you like to tell
him on the show? I think it'd be really cool.
Was considering that I called in the day he was
born to tell, you know, Central Florida that I had
a son. It'd be cool to tell him now nineteen
years later that hey, you get to be on the
air for the first time. And Johnny was like, absolutely,
dudelet's do that. And so I let JJ Rice the

(11:34):
Rice Man do it, just like a boss would do it.
If you haven't heard it, you can check out the
podcast from a Monday morning show on the iHeartRadio app
and Jade and I told him to come in early
and hang out on the show for a little bit,
just to watch and to kind of learn things, and
then when we'd work on another air check after the show.
But I already knew it was coming all week and long.
I knew it was coming. I just couldn't tell him that.

(11:55):
And so he came in, and JJ Rice the Rice
Man came in. And the good thing about this is
JJ Rice the Rice Man. That's a lot to say
every time I say his name, JJ Rice the Rice Man.
If you don't know him, he's already yeah, quirky, and
you know, got this weird sense of humor, and you
never really know what's gonna come out from JJ Rice
the Rice Man anyway, So him being in here didn't

(12:17):
seem off at all while my son was in here.
So Jeremy's JJ Rice the Rice Man. Jeremy just hanging
around the studio, my son's watching, and then you know,
into the show comes and JJ Rice the Rice Man
jumps on the microphone and starts talking to Jaden, and
I bring Jaden over in front of the mic and
he broke the news to him that hey, man, needed
to get your butt on the radio tonight because you
got your first ever air shift. And if you watch

(12:39):
the video, I am smiling, huge smile. A lot of
people say, why didn't you cry? Look, I'm weird, like
I cry at Titanic still, But I'm very robotic with
my personal emotions, like very robotic about it. I mean,
I think maybe it's because I've been through a whole
lot of stuff. I just compartmentalize it. So I'm very

(13:00):
robotic about that. I mean, I was beaming on the inside.
I was super happy for him at the same time.
I just it wasn't like that.

Speaker 2 (13:07):
Now.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
I did cheer up a little bit when I was
listening on the way in this morning and I turned
the radio on in the car and I actually heard
him over the airwaves. It's just it's different. It's different
when you're in the room doing it. Like I don't
even feel like I'm doing radio sometimes I'm just kind
of hanging out with my friends and talking. So it's
different when you're in the room. But like when I
was in the car this morning on the way in
and I heard him, I was like, oh, that's my

(13:28):
what that's my dog. I can't believe night seeing. Almost
twenty years ago, I called this place to tell them, hey,
you know, I got a son. His name is Jaden.
And now fast forward to now, I'm listening to that
same kid talk on the radio the same way I did,
because my first shifts were overnights as well. And he

(13:50):
did it himself like he did it the right way.
He got his job in promotions, he busted his buddy,
made everyone around here go, hey, that's a good dude.
That kid's a hard worker, he's funny, he's witty. I
like him a lot. Then he did the fake air checks,
and then he didn't ask me to pressure anybody to
get him on the air. He just kept doing his thing,
grinding it out with Jeremy. And it moves a lot

(14:10):
faster these days than it did back in my day.
There was a lot of live radio back in my day,
so there was a lot of people logjammed, there was interns,
a lot more people on this staff, and a lot more
people trying to get on the air. So it did
fast forward to him. He didn't have to go through
a couple of years that I went through, but he
did it the right way. He started, you know, outside

(14:31):
the door, and then got his job and worked his
way you know, into the door. So no matter how
it goes from here, like you can't not respect that,
like that can't be disrespected. He did what he was
supposed to do. He did not get an airshift last
night because he's my kid. He did the airshift last
night because he worked his way up and showed the

(14:51):
initiative and grinded it out. And that was that was
a pretty solid feeling to know that. So anyway, it
was pretty cool. Well, I appreciate all the well wishous.
I appreciate all the people sending me messages that they
feel like they kind of grew up with Jaden or
that they kind of helped raise Jaden because they were
adults already and they heard me talking about it all

(15:13):
the time, people that were seriously invested in this kid's success.
And you never really know, you know, what direction people
are going to go. Like I said, he never really
said he wanted to be in radio, And I'm not
sure that it's the radio part that he loves. I
think he just loves the talking to the people and
trying to make people laugh and smile, and that's that's
kind of what I do. Even though sometimes y'all say

(15:33):
I'm mean and whatnot, it's all from a place of
trying to be, you know, humorous. Sometimes a little bit
on the satirical, darker side, but still it's from a
place of trying to be humorous. So I hope he
does great things. I hope he does really well. People
joked maybe you guys will have a show together someday,
and maybe we will. We're thirty years apart, you know,

(15:55):
in age, so I don't know who knows where he'll
end up from all this, But he's enjoying it. He's
having a good time, he's working hard, he's making his
mom smile, he's making me smile. He's smiling, and that's
really all you can ask for. So again, I appreciate
all you guys that were hitting me up. I appreciate
some of you that said you set your alarm to
stay up all night and listen to him. I appreciate

(16:16):
the text of the XL mobile from the uber drivers
around town that had him on last night listening to him.
Make sure you show him some love. I'm at v
Brian Grimes on Instagram and I think he's the Jaden
Grimes on Instagram, so throw him a little follow. Check
out his podcast, Dude Problems, and I guess, at least
for the foreseeable future, you can catch him on XL

(16:37):
one A sixty seven Monday overnights into Tuesday morning until
he hustles Jeremy JJ Rice the Rice Man into giving
him another day of the week as well, so he'll
try to stack those up. But it's pretty cool. And hey,
you know what critique the man, y'all ain't got no
problem telling me when y'all don't like me. I'm not

(16:57):
saying beat him up or anything. I'm just saying, you know,
a little tough love. You know, if you have some positive,
constructive type criticism, I'm sure he would appreciate it. He
does appreciate all the feedback, so I'm sure he would
do that. So at the Jaden Grimes is him on Instagram.
I'm at dee Brian Grimes. Check out his podcast which

(17:17):
is due Problems. I got some other stuff to talk about,
but I ain't gonna do it today because this is
a positive one. But the irs and me we ain't
getting along. That's why I'm glad that they're gonna say
to the eighty eight thousand true IRS agents that they
were by gonna call him troops because that's what I
feel like. They attacking me, eighty eight thousand IRS agents.
Maybe reposition them somewhere else. I got letters from the

(17:41):
IRS talking all kinds of crazy noise, and I pay
y'all taxes. It comes out of my check, so it
ain't like you ain't getting no money from me. We
got problems, me and the IRS. I ain't gonna talk
about it, he because I ain't gonna ruin the harmonious
vibe I got going on with my son getting his
first air shift. But me and the IRS, we got problems.
And I'm hoping to stall y'all out long enough to

(18:02):
get y'all dissolved or something like that with the Department
of Government efficiency, because I promise y'all y'all a inefficient
y'all know that y'all even pay your own taxes. That's
the crazy thing. Y'all even pay your own taxes, and
you hounded me to pay tax you know what again,
Not gonna let this ruin my harmonious vibe. My son
had his first airship on x I one to sixty seven.
Pretty cool thing. Make sure you follow him at the

(18:24):
j and Grimes follow me at the Brian Grimes. Check
out Due Problems podcast on the iHeartRadio app. We will
do another episode someday of Relationship Wrecked, which you can
also find on the iHeartRadio app. If you want to
catch up, make sure you to hang out with me
Monday through Friday Johnny's House on XL one to sixty
seven Afternoon's Magic one O seven seven here in Central Florida,
or you could punch up the free iHeartRadio app. I'm

(18:47):
on the Throwbacks Channel, which is from three to seven
every day. It's nationwide, so it's on a bunch of
different stations, or the Throwbacks Channel on the iHeart Radio app.
And while you're there, presets Hello. I got a whole
list of presets for you. You can make Exit one
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A preset Johnny's House, a preset Dude Problems, the preset

(19:09):
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