August 20, 2025 • 17 mins
JoJo Wright Takes Us Inside His Radio Journey
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
One of the first times I cracked the mic, and
this story just sticks in my head. I'm so nervous.
I had a drink sitting on the counter, you know,
headphones right there, and I go to reach for the
headphones and knock the drink over. Of course, water goes everywhere.
Pick up the headphones. I'm in a rush, you know,
I have to be on like now, the little foam,
(00:20):
the sponges on the headphones soaked up all the water
so squish on the Yeah, water's driven everywhere. I'm trying
to act you know, normal on the radio, and that's
one of my first breaks is squishy headphones, which is
not comfortable. The biggest high point of my radio career,
or you know, this has got to be right up
there is. I got a chance to host a charity
event at Neverland where Michael Jackson was and I'm a
(00:44):
big Michael fan, and I didn't think he was going
to be there. I really didn't. I thought, maybe, you know,
way from a distance, maybe you know, but I didn't
think he would actually show up. And we arrive at Neverland,
there's the big tents everything they had these tents set
up looked like giant circus tents, fans you know that
paid money to be there for the charity. We're in
(01:05):
there and I jump on the stage and they said, hey, Jojo,
can you page Mike Tyson to the stage. Mike Tyson? Okay,
can Mike Tyson? I never never said that before. And
of course Nick and Aaron Carter, Nick from the Backstreet Boys,
Aaron Carter, they were there, you know, and I've known them.
But then it came time. They said, okay, Jojo, Michael's
gonna come up on the stage if he needs the mic,
(01:27):
just you know, handing the mic. I'm like, wait, Michael's
coming here, Yeah he is. Oh my god. So Michael
comes on stage, would you like the mic? No? No, I'm fine.
You know, everybody's going crazy. We bring a birthday cake
up on stage because it was Michael's birthday a couple
of days after that, I believe, and we start saying
Happy Birthday to Michael. Once again, the fans are going crazy.
(01:48):
Michael reaches and hands a piece of cake. He grabs
a piece of cake and hands it to somebody in
the audience. And I'd heard about these cake fights at Neverland,
and I have the mic and I'm standing kind of
in the back, and there's video of this somewhere. I
said something to the effect of, oh no, we're gonna
have a cake fight. And then Michael turns to Nick
and Aaron Carter. They said something. I'm not sure what
(02:09):
they said. I've even talked to Nick and Aaron. Of course,
rest in peace, Aaron, but I've talked to them since then,
and they kind of forget how that conversation went too
that they start talking one thing at least or another
cake between them. Ever, it's going crazy. Then Michael Jackson turns,
looks directly at me with a handful of cake, and
he pauses, and my guess is he's like, maybe I
(02:29):
shouldn't throw cake on this guy, because I don't know.
So what I said to him was something to the
effect of hit me, Michael, and then Michael hits me
with cake and then I cack. It was just it
was such a moment, and my wife was in the audience.
She knew what that meant, you know to me, and
I got I was in a I didn't throw cake
on him because I'm not dumb, but uh, in a
(02:52):
cake fight with Michael Jackson. One of the most and
unforgettable guest. I mean, there's a lot to come to mind,
but one that really sticks in there for you know,
a variety of reasons is Kobe Bryant. Kobe years ago
when he first you know, joined the Lakers, and that
was my early days, in my early days of Kiss FM,
(03:13):
Kobe invited me to host what he called his Kobe Bowl.
It was a charity bowling tournament at Jerry's Deli in
Studio City. So he comes in and he, you know,
is promoting the the his Kobe Bowl, and he was
super nice, and I recall we took a picture and
if you ever find this picture, I guess we had
you know, we had dinner, you know, some food served
(03:35):
you ready for him to eat if you wanted, and
it was shish kebob. So there's a picture of me
standing next to Kobe and I'm looking up by him
because he obviously he's taller than me. And there he is,
and if you look in his other hand, you see
a shish kebob in his hand, and that's it's if
you don't know the context of it, it's like so random,
like why is Kobe standing there with the shish kabob
That's the reason why, because it's what we were serving
(03:56):
that day. But he came in, he was super nice.
He signed a basketball for me in a jersey and
all that, and then I hosted a couple of years
of his bowling tournament. I met Jay Leno over there
and Cindy Crawford, some of the big stars of that
of that day, and we had a great time and
I will never forget. Of course, what happened since was
(04:18):
just tragic and gut wrenching for anyone who lives in
LA or just anyone in general. But he has to
be one of the most, if not the most unforgettable
guest I've ever had. Among many my favorite listener interact,
this is This is not my favorite, but this one
is memorable for sure. This is what you should not do.
(04:38):
I'm backstage at some concert. I'll keep this as vague
as I can, but I'm backstage at some concert and
it's actually before the show, but roaming around backstage and whatnot,
and the security guard, one of the security guards comes
up with a listener or a fan, I guess you
could say, and she said, Hey, Jojo, this person's here
(05:01):
to meet you. I'm like, oh, cool, and the girl
she comes up and she's like, you're Jojo. I'm like, yep,
and she starts to get excited, which, oh my god,
I felt. Really, you know, who doesn't love that you're Jojo? Yeah?
You're joj Yeah. And then she slaps the holy hell
out of me. But she still has this smile on
her face. And I never met this girl in my life,
(05:22):
and I'm like, what did you do that for? And
she goes, I just wanted you to remember me, true story,
and then they took her ound. I never never found
any kind of charges or anything like that, but that
was the most bizarre thing. And ever since then, you know,
I'm kind of you know, that one not my favorite,
(05:47):
but certainly memorable. My toughest on air moment. Had a
couple of tough on air moments when it comes to,
you know, real sensitive topics. You know, somebody passing away,
when Michael Jackson pass talking about Michael. Again, I wasn't
actually on air when he passed, but people knew that
I was such a big fan, and a lot of
outlets started calling me asking me for, you know, my
(06:09):
thoughts on Michael and memories with him. And I only
met him at one time with the cake fight. If
you missed the cake fight story, you know, search that.
But to talk about someone who was such a big
impact on me it just as a fan, was was
pretty rough, you know, more recent when Liam Payne passed
(06:32):
and I didn't really know. I mean, I've met Liam before,
but it just you know, on kiss you know, we're
usually talking about, you know, nine times out of ten,
something great, something fun, and then you hear about Liam
from one direction, who is young passing away. It just
you know, once again enough that that was not that
(06:53):
I knew him super well, but talk about a gut punch,
and you never never want to hear uh that happening
to anyone, and certainly someone that you know, you you
they were bigger than life. It was part of one direction,
and it's it's just tough to talk about on the air,
you know, and and uh, but you have to do it,
(07:16):
you know. I mean the format you normally follow having
a good time taking phone calls, everybody's wanting to win
some prizes, that just goes out the window. And I
don't think I think those are always really tough live
on air Oops moments. One that comes to mind. I
had Lady Gaga in the studio and uh, and in
the studio with us. We're a bunch of fans. They
won tickets and one passes to be there and watch
(07:37):
the interview. I meet Lady Gaga and Uh. All of
a sudden, alarms start going off in the studio. Off air,
we're off air, and engineer runs in, Yeah, hey we're
all air. Okay, okay, we're all fair. Everybody's going crazy.
We're all fair. So I'd say, I still have my
headphones on. She still had her headphones on. Listeners were
(07:58):
still there. So we just kept talking and I was
still I'm always recording, you know, in situations like that.
So we just kept talking, kept chatting, and luckily she
didn't curse. Nobody in the studio. I didn't curse. But
I get a call about five or six minutes into
it from my boss John and he's like, hey, jackass.
(08:19):
I'm like, what he goes, You're still on the air.
I don't know how much. I mean, the alarm is
like off air, engineers panicked off air off, everything up
and somehow somebody is still hearing what we're saying. I mean,
maybe it was I don't know that story still haven't
(08:40):
quite figured that one out. An interview I would love
to redo I think, you know what years ago and
the interview went great, but and I've talked to Janet
since then. But I talked to Janet Jackson. And when
an artist comes in and they have a famous sibling,
(09:00):
famous family member, you typically, you know, I stay away
from that, or I'll touch just a little bit on it,
but not much, because you want the interview to be
about them and not their famous brother. Now Janet's that's
a weird case because she's super famous too, obviously, But
I chose not to ask her about Michael because I
wanted to focus on Jannet, which was still the right
move in hindsight. But after Michael passed, I always wish
(09:22):
that I would have had a chance to say, God,
just so you know, your brother meant you know, you
mean a bunch to me, and your brother just changed
my life, you know, because he really did. Later, I
guess I did have a chance to redo it to
a degree. I did tell Janet my Michael Jackson cake
fight story, and the only thing she said she smiled.
She goes, yeah, that sounds like Michael something like that.
(09:45):
But I guess looking back, I would like to redo
that interview, but I do understand why I think I
chose wisely and how I handled that. But I still
would like part of me, part of me, would like
to go back and you know, and do that one
again and just have a nice and by the way,
in the future, I would love to do a two
(10:05):
part Janet Jackson interview. I would love to have one
hour just Janet get it. In the second hour, Michael
tell me everything about Michael, because I think I've just
you know, he was my he was the one everybody
has an artist as a kid that really changed him
and I think he changed a lot of people, and
he changed a lot of artists today. Like I do
(10:25):
a lot of work in the kpop world, and I
think everybody in the K pop space just he influenced
so many and not just K pop pop, R and
B hip hop. I mean, he changed the game. So
I would love to do a piece with Janet going
in depth about Michael and then a full hour just
go nuts on the world of Janet Jackson. I wonder
(10:47):
if that will ever happen. We'll see a challenge that
radio people don't always see. I think I would like
to think most of us get this at this point
in time, you know, But anybody who's just on the
radio and not doing all the other social platforms and
this and that, you got to be everywhere. You can't
(11:09):
do one thing anymore. But the same rules still apply.
You got to capture someone's soul, and the way to
do that is to give them your soul. And I
think if you just follow that simple, you know strategy,
things will work out. You got to give something to
(11:30):
get something, give your soul, give a piece of you
to get people to really invest in you as well.
But you can't do it just on the radio. You
got to be on the radio. That's a big one.
All the other platforms as well. I hope that's good advice.
If not, just erase that one segment. I love doing,
and anybody who knows me knows that I do this
(11:50):
just about every single interview. I am obsessed with the paranormal, ghost,
haunted houses, all that stuff. I've been like this since
I was a kid. My mom used to take me
my sister on picnics to graveyards, graveyards where we didn't
know anybody there. I would run around there and something
must have happened to me that it turned into this obsession.
(12:10):
I've got a podcast called Paranormalist. I talked to people
who've had a real paranormal encounter. So every interview I
asked the artist, have you ever had a paranormal encounter?
And the reason is I ask them because well, they're
just a human for starters, but too, they do a
lot of traveling. They stay in a lot of hotels.
Most of these hotels have, believe it or not, a
little dark side, a haunted room, don't walk on the
(12:33):
seventh floor, don't look in the mirror in the ladies room.
And with all the traveling they do, turns out they
have quite a few stories. Now, I don't just ask celebrities.
I ask everyday people like me and you. But that's
a segment that I love. It's f if I had
to take away everything else, that would suck, but don't
(12:54):
take away the paranormal segment. Just don't do it. It's
my absolute So have you had a paranormal encounter? Let
me know in the comments. If I could relive one
radio moment years ago, I'm in the studio with the
actor Woman Valderrama, big shelt to Wolmer. Great dude. We
(13:17):
get a call from on the request line, not set
up through a publicist or whatever. We get a call
from Britney Spears on the request line and she wants
to comment on something that I did on the air.
And what I used to do back in the day
was I would take one of the artist's songs and
I would do a jojo rap in the song. Well,
(13:38):
she was calling because I did something over one of
her tracks. I forget which song it was, and I thought,
oh my god, this is going to go great or terrible,
one of the two. She's gonna love it or hate it.
And luckily at the time she loved it. So I
think I would love to go back relive that. One
another thing, here's a moment I would love to relive.
(13:59):
My first day on Kiss FM in Los Angeles. I'm just,
you know, it's I'm not even doing my official airshift.
I'm doing like a weekend thing or whatever it was.
I could just to get used to the control board.
And as I'm testing out the control board, we get
this call. These these girls call up, Hey, jojo play
whatever song and she goes, by the way, my friend,
(14:21):
you probably know my friend she's in a couple of
TV shows. She's an actress, and I'm like, oh, sure, okay, cool.
She was in she was on Er like what on No,
I'll stop it. And she was also in the movie
Interview with the Vampire. This is when I first started
though years ago, like wait, and I'm a big fan
of that movie Interview with the Vampire. I'm like, show
what Yeah, her name's Kirsten, Like stop it. She goes, yeah,
(14:42):
we'll come by the station if you want. Hey, mom,
can you I'm like, wait, oh, you're gonna what yeah,
let me see if my mom will take us by
the station and we'll have you We'll say hello, like okay,
well I had, you know, my producer there and you know,
make sure. I thought maybe I'm gonna get robbed. I
don't know, but sure enough, these girls show up and
ones young Kirsten Dunst and that was so now in
(15:06):
my head, I'm like it was so surreal, like did
that really happen? But yeah, she came up said a
quick KILLO. I have no picks to prove it. One
of these days I would like to revisit, have her
come in and revisit that moment with her, But that
was so crazy. My first day on Kiss, Kirsten Dunst
stopped by just requesting a song with her best friend.
(15:27):
My own personal radio tradition, if this is even a tradition,
at the end of every interview, and this started so accidentally,
you know, random, but at the end of every interview,
this bump to make it official bam. And I've done
that for years now. I didn't realize it was a
(15:48):
thing until I went to KTLA. There's a station in
Los Angeles TV station called KTLA, and I was filling
in for a guy at that time named Sam Rubin
rest in p. Sam started doing the interviews and I
would fis bump to make it official, and the the anchor,
Frank says, JoJo's that your thing. I'm like, oh my god,
I think maybe it is my thing. Yeah, So that's
(16:10):
my own little tradition that I'm gonna keep, I think forever.
Fis bumped to make it official. Radio in twenty twenty
five is just basically media because if you come to
a radio station, at least the ones you know I'm
familiar with here, the radio is just one of the
(16:32):
many things you do. Yes, you're gonna be filmed. Yes,
there's photos gonna be taken. Yes, we're gonna have audio,
We're gonna have video. It's gonna be It's a one
stop everything. Pick a social platform or on it. Radio
in twenty twenty five is basically a content creation service.
Just one of the outlets happens to be on the radio.
(16:55):
So that's kind of it. I mean, it's not just
radio anymore. It is a content hub and that's what
we do. My favorite part of being part of the
iHeart family is just, I'll keep it simple, it's just family.
We're super tight here in LA and the Kiss FM
(17:15):
family I've been with forever now we are about as
tight as you can get. My personal family knows everybody's
families and vice versa. Is just it is a real
Nobs family kind of a situation. And we have extended
family all throughout the country, you know, with the iHeart
families and coworkers and all that. But I think the
(17:37):
key word there is is family, without a doubt.
One of the first times I cracked the mic, and
this story just sticks in my head. I'm so nervous.
I had a drink sitting on the counter, you know,
headphones right there, and I go to reach for the
headphones and knock the drink over. Of course, water goes everywhere.
Pick up the headphones. I'm in a rush, you know,
I have to be on like now, the little foam,
(00:20):
the sponges on the headphones soaked up all the water
so squish on the Yeah, water's driven everywhere. I'm trying
to act you know, normal on the radio, and that's
one of my first breaks is squishy headphones, which is
not comfortable. The biggest high point of my radio career,
or you know, this has got to be right up
there is. I got a chance to host a charity
event at Neverland where Michael Jackson was and I'm a
(00:44):
big Michael fan, and I didn't think he was going
to be there. I really didn't. I thought, maybe, you know,
way from a distance, maybe you know, but I didn't
think he would actually show up. And we arrive at Neverland,
there's the big tents everything they had these tents set
up looked like giant circus tents, fans you know that
paid money to be there for the charity. We're in
(01:05):
there and I jump on the stage and they said, hey, Jojo,
can you page Mike Tyson to the stage. Mike Tyson? Okay,
can Mike Tyson? I never never said that before. And
of course Nick and Aaron Carter, Nick from the Backstreet Boys,
Aaron Carter, they were there, you know, and I've known them.
But then it came time. They said, okay, Jojo, Michael's
gonna come up on the stage if he needs the mic,
(01:27):
just you know, handing the mic. I'm like, wait, Michael's
coming here, Yeah he is. Oh my god. So Michael
comes on stage, would you like the mic? No? No, I'm fine.
You know, everybody's going crazy. We bring a birthday cake
up on stage because it was Michael's birthday a couple
of days after that, I believe, and we start saying
Happy Birthday to Michael. Once again, the fans are going crazy.
(01:48):
Michael reaches and hands a piece of cake. He grabs
a piece of cake and hands it to somebody in
the audience. And I'd heard about these cake fights at Neverland,
and I have the mic and I'm standing kind of
in the back, and there's video of this somewhere. I
said something to the effect of, oh no, we're gonna
have a cake fight. And then Michael turns to Nick
and Aaron Carter. They said something. I'm not sure what
(02:09):
they said. I've even talked to Nick and Aaron. Of course,
rest in peace, Aaron, but I've talked to them since then,
and they kind of forget how that conversation went too
that they start talking one thing at least or another
cake between them. Ever, it's going crazy. Then Michael Jackson turns,
looks directly at me with a handful of cake, and
he pauses, and my guess is he's like, maybe I
(02:29):
shouldn't throw cake on this guy, because I don't know.
So what I said to him was something to the
effect of hit me, Michael, and then Michael hits me
with cake and then I cack. It was just it
was such a moment, and my wife was in the audience.
She knew what that meant, you know to me, and
I got I was in a I didn't throw cake
on him because I'm not dumb, but uh, in a
(02:52):
cake fight with Michael Jackson. One of the most and
unforgettable guest. I mean, there's a lot to come to mind,
but one that really sticks in there for you know,
a variety of reasons is Kobe Bryant. Kobe years ago
when he first you know, joined the Lakers, and that
was my early days, in my early days of Kiss FM,
(03:13):
Kobe invited me to host what he called his Kobe Bowl.
It was a charity bowling tournament at Jerry's Deli in
Studio City. So he comes in and he, you know,
is promoting the the his Kobe Bowl, and he was
super nice, and I recall we took a picture and
if you ever find this picture, I guess we had
you know, we had dinner, you know, some food served
(03:35):
you ready for him to eat if you wanted, and
it was shish kebob. So there's a picture of me
standing next to Kobe and I'm looking up by him
because he obviously he's taller than me. And there he is,
and if you look in his other hand, you see
a shish kebob in his hand, and that's it's if
you don't know the context of it, it's like so random,
like why is Kobe standing there with the shish kabob
That's the reason why, because it's what we were serving
(03:56):
that day. But he came in, he was super nice.
He signed a basketball for me in a jersey and
all that, and then I hosted a couple of years
of his bowling tournament. I met Jay Leno over there
and Cindy Crawford, some of the big stars of that
of that day, and we had a great time and
I will never forget. Of course, what happened since was
(04:18):
just tragic and gut wrenching for anyone who lives in
LA or just anyone in general. But he has to
be one of the most, if not the most unforgettable
guest I've ever had. Among many my favorite listener interact,
this is This is not my favorite, but this one
is memorable for sure. This is what you should not do.
(04:38):
I'm backstage at some concert. I'll keep this as vague
as I can, but I'm backstage at some concert and
it's actually before the show, but roaming around backstage and whatnot,
and the security guard, one of the security guards comes
up with a listener or a fan, I guess you
could say, and she said, Hey, Jojo, this person's here
(05:01):
to meet you. I'm like, oh, cool, and the girl
she comes up and she's like, you're Jojo. I'm like, yep,
and she starts to get excited, which, oh my god,
I felt. Really, you know, who doesn't love that you're Jojo? Yeah?
You're joj Yeah. And then she slaps the holy hell
out of me. But she still has this smile on
her face. And I never met this girl in my life,
(05:22):
and I'm like, what did you do that for? And
she goes, I just wanted you to remember me, true story,
and then they took her ound. I never never found
any kind of charges or anything like that, but that
was the most bizarre thing. And ever since then, you know,
I'm kind of you know, that one not my favorite,
(05:47):
but certainly memorable. My toughest on air moment. Had a
couple of tough on air moments when it comes to,
you know, real sensitive topics. You know, somebody passing away,
when Michael Jackson pass talking about Michael. Again, I wasn't
actually on air when he passed, but people knew that
I was such a big fan, and a lot of
outlets started calling me asking me for, you know, my
(06:09):
thoughts on Michael and memories with him. And I only
met him at one time with the cake fight. If
you missed the cake fight story, you know, search that.
But to talk about someone who was such a big
impact on me it just as a fan, was was
pretty rough, you know, more recent when Liam Payne passed
(06:32):
and I didn't really know. I mean, I've met Liam before,
but it just you know, on kiss you know, we're
usually talking about, you know, nine times out of ten,
something great, something fun, and then you hear about Liam
from one direction, who is young passing away. It just
you know, once again enough that that was not that
(06:53):
I knew him super well, but talk about a gut punch,
and you never never want to hear uh that happening
to anyone, and certainly someone that you know, you you
they were bigger than life. It was part of one direction,
and it's it's just tough to talk about on the air,
you know, and and uh, but you have to do it,
(07:16):
you know. I mean the format you normally follow having
a good time taking phone calls, everybody's wanting to win
some prizes, that just goes out the window. And I
don't think I think those are always really tough live
on air Oops moments. One that comes to mind. I
had Lady Gaga in the studio and uh, and in
the studio with us. We're a bunch of fans. They
won tickets and one passes to be there and watch
(07:37):
the interview. I meet Lady Gaga and Uh. All of
a sudden, alarms start going off in the studio. Off air,
we're off air, and engineer runs in, Yeah, hey we're
all air. Okay, okay, we're all fair. Everybody's going crazy.
We're all fair. So I'd say, I still have my
headphones on. She still had her headphones on. Listeners were
(07:58):
still there. So we just kept talking and I was
still I'm always recording, you know, in situations like that.
So we just kept talking, kept chatting, and luckily she
didn't curse. Nobody in the studio. I didn't curse. But
I get a call about five or six minutes into
it from my boss John and he's like, hey, jackass.
(08:19):
I'm like, what he goes, You're still on the air.
I don't know how much. I mean, the alarm is
like off air, engineers panicked off air off, everything up
and somehow somebody is still hearing what we're saying. I mean,
maybe it was I don't know that story still haven't
(08:40):
quite figured that one out. An interview I would love
to redo I think, you know what years ago and
the interview went great, but and I've talked to Janet
since then. But I talked to Janet Jackson. And when
an artist comes in and they have a famous sibling,
(09:00):
famous family member, you typically, you know, I stay away
from that, or I'll touch just a little bit on it,
but not much, because you want the interview to be
about them and not their famous brother. Now Janet's that's
a weird case because she's super famous too, obviously, But
I chose not to ask her about Michael because I
wanted to focus on Jannet, which was still the right
move in hindsight. But after Michael passed, I always wish
(09:22):
that I would have had a chance to say, God,
just so you know, your brother meant you know, you
mean a bunch to me, and your brother just changed
my life, you know, because he really did. Later, I
guess I did have a chance to redo it to
a degree. I did tell Janet my Michael Jackson cake
fight story, and the only thing she said she smiled.
She goes, yeah, that sounds like Michael something like that.
(09:45):
But I guess looking back, I would like to redo
that interview, but I do understand why I think I
chose wisely and how I handled that. But I still
would like part of me, part of me, would like
to go back and you know, and do that one
again and just have a nice and by the way,
in the future, I would love to do a two
(10:05):
part Janet Jackson interview. I would love to have one
hour just Janet get it. In the second hour, Michael
tell me everything about Michael, because I think I've just
you know, he was my he was the one everybody
has an artist as a kid that really changed him
and I think he changed a lot of people, and
he changed a lot of artists today. Like I do
(10:25):
a lot of work in the kpop world, and I
think everybody in the K pop space just he influenced
so many and not just K pop pop, R and
B hip hop. I mean, he changed the game. So
I would love to do a piece with Janet going
in depth about Michael and then a full hour just
go nuts on the world of Janet Jackson. I wonder
(10:47):
if that will ever happen. We'll see a challenge that
radio people don't always see. I think I would like
to think most of us get this at this point
in time, you know, But anybody who's just on the
radio and not doing all the other social platforms and
this and that, you got to be everywhere. You can't
(11:09):
do one thing anymore. But the same rules still apply.
You got to capture someone's soul, and the way to
do that is to give them your soul. And I
think if you just follow that simple, you know strategy,
things will work out. You got to give something to
(11:30):
get something, give your soul, give a piece of you
to get people to really invest in you as well.
But you can't do it just on the radio. You
got to be on the radio. That's a big one.
All the other platforms as well. I hope that's good advice.
If not, just erase that one segment. I love doing,
and anybody who knows me knows that I do this
(11:50):
just about every single interview. I am obsessed with the paranormal, ghost,
haunted houses, all that stuff. I've been like this since
I was a kid. My mom used to take me
my sister on picnics to graveyards, graveyards where we didn't
know anybody there. I would run around there and something
must have happened to me that it turned into this obsession.
(12:10):
I've got a podcast called Paranormalist. I talked to people
who've had a real paranormal encounter. So every interview I
asked the artist, have you ever had a paranormal encounter?
And the reason is I ask them because well, they're
just a human for starters, but too, they do a
lot of traveling. They stay in a lot of hotels.
Most of these hotels have, believe it or not, a
little dark side, a haunted room, don't walk on the
(12:33):
seventh floor, don't look in the mirror in the ladies room.
And with all the traveling they do, turns out they
have quite a few stories. Now, I don't just ask celebrities.
I ask everyday people like me and you. But that's
a segment that I love. It's f if I had
to take away everything else, that would suck, but don't
(12:54):
take away the paranormal segment. Just don't do it. It's
my absolute So have you had a paranormal encounter? Let
me know in the comments. If I could relive one
radio moment years ago, I'm in the studio with the
actor Woman Valderrama, big shelt to Wolmer. Great dude. We
(13:17):
get a call from on the request line, not set
up through a publicist or whatever. We get a call
from Britney Spears on the request line and she wants
to comment on something that I did on the air.
And what I used to do back in the day
was I would take one of the artist's songs and
I would do a jojo rap in the song. Well,
(13:38):
she was calling because I did something over one of
her tracks. I forget which song it was, and I thought,
oh my god, this is going to go great or terrible,
one of the two. She's gonna love it or hate it.
And luckily at the time she loved it. So I
think I would love to go back relive that. One
another thing, here's a moment I would love to relive.
(13:59):
My first day on Kiss FM in Los Angeles. I'm just,
you know, it's I'm not even doing my official airshift.
I'm doing like a weekend thing or whatever it was.
I could just to get used to the control board.
And as I'm testing out the control board, we get
this call. These these girls call up, Hey, jojo play
whatever song and she goes, by the way, my friend,
(14:21):
you probably know my friend she's in a couple of
TV shows. She's an actress, and I'm like, oh, sure, okay, cool.
She was in she was on Er like what on No,
I'll stop it. And she was also in the movie
Interview with the Vampire. This is when I first started
though years ago, like wait, and I'm a big fan
of that movie Interview with the Vampire. I'm like, show
what Yeah, her name's Kirsten, Like stop it. She goes, yeah,
(14:42):
we'll come by the station if you want. Hey, mom,
can you I'm like, wait, oh, you're gonna what yeah,
let me see if my mom will take us by
the station and we'll have you We'll say hello, like okay,
well I had, you know, my producer there and you know,
make sure. I thought maybe I'm gonna get robbed. I
don't know, but sure enough, these girls show up and
ones young Kirsten Dunst and that was so now in
(15:06):
my head, I'm like it was so surreal, like did
that really happen? But yeah, she came up said a
quick KILLO. I have no picks to prove it. One
of these days I would like to revisit, have her
come in and revisit that moment with her, But that
was so crazy. My first day on Kiss, Kirsten Dunst
stopped by just requesting a song with her best friend.
(15:27):
My own personal radio tradition, if this is even a tradition,
at the end of every interview, and this started so accidentally,
you know, random, but at the end of every interview,
this bump to make it official bam. And I've done
that for years now. I didn't realize it was a
(15:48):
thing until I went to KTLA. There's a station in
Los Angeles TV station called KTLA, and I was filling
in for a guy at that time named Sam Rubin
rest in p. Sam started doing the interviews and I
would fis bump to make it official, and the the anchor,
Frank says, JoJo's that your thing. I'm like, oh my god,
I think maybe it is my thing. Yeah, So that's
(16:10):
my own little tradition that I'm gonna keep, I think forever.
Fis bumped to make it official. Radio in twenty twenty
five is just basically media because if you come to
a radio station, at least the ones you know I'm
familiar with here, the radio is just one of the
(16:32):
many things you do. Yes, you're gonna be filmed. Yes,
there's photos gonna be taken. Yes, we're gonna have audio,
We're gonna have video. It's gonna be It's a one
stop everything. Pick a social platform or on it. Radio
in twenty twenty five is basically a content creation service.
Just one of the outlets happens to be on the radio.
(16:55):
So that's kind of it. I mean, it's not just
radio anymore. It is a content hub and that's what
we do. My favorite part of being part of the
iHeart family is just, I'll keep it simple, it's just family.
We're super tight here in LA and the Kiss FM
(17:15):
family I've been with forever now we are about as
tight as you can get. My personal family knows everybody's
families and vice versa. Is just it is a real
Nobs family kind of a situation. And we have extended
family all throughout the country, you know, with the iHeart
families and coworkers and all that. But I think the
(17:37):
key word there is is family, without a doubt.
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