This week’s spotlight is on Vernon Gilbert, you might know him as J.R. Gilbert who was born in Colleton County in the Ruffin area with his two sisters and parents. He has other family in Smoaks. He attended Ruffin High School during the transition to Colleton County High School. Gilbert explains, “I went to Ruffin, it was at the time where it was about to close, and I actually had to go through the part of watching the parents and all the ones that really wanted that school to actually stay open. It was like an emotional time during that time period, because all the parents were like, this was where we graduated from, and we would love to see our next kids graduate as well. It was a really big thing. I remember my mom got really sad about the school closing. The part that made me more upset was that, I was doing sports, and all my sports were at Ruffin, So with the transfer, we had to transfer to the new Colleton County High School and merge everything together, basketball, football, everything merged. It was a tough transition.”
Gilbert still enjoys participating in the yearly Bonfire that is held as a reunion of all of the Ruffin high school Graduating Classes. Hundreds come out to the old High School property to celebrate, enjoy reminiscing with friends, and eating amazing food.
After graduation Gilbert did not immediately go into DJing and Podcasting, He explains, “When I graduated, I felt like my pops wanted me to pursue some type of construction career, and I was being stubborn and trying to do everything different than what he was doing. I even wanted to be a clown in the circus like my uncle because I had an interest in juggling and would get to travel all over the world. My dad was not really onboard with that. I decided to jump into a truck and start switching gears. I went over the road for a little while, but when you go west, they got real mountains over there and if you ever saw a sign that says, 6% grade for next 10 miles, I just promise you that you are looking at driving differently with 80,000 pounds behind you.”
After working on the road, Gilbert decided to embrace his true passion, performing. Gilbert who goes under the stage name JR says, “I wanted to try something that I thought was bigger than myself. I had a love for music, I started in church with drums before I started DJing and at that time, I was doing church, DJing, and club life. It was a real battle because trying to do two things, it was very difficult.
Gilbert developed his podcast as a way to unite three of his passions; the love for radio, DJing, and club life. He worked at Z93 in Charleston, hosting a mix show at 11:00 at night. Displaying the excitement of club DJing and his love for mixing music allowed the Podcast to give him a forum to talk about and expose his listeners to a variety of topics. He explains, “I wanted to try to get into not just a DJ show for an hour, but 30 minutes of content then maybe go into DJing and talking about music. I feel like the podcast was my reboot to get not just into radio but talking about other topics and music as well.”
Gilbert credits his success to one of his mentors, “I want to give a shout out to Roman Elliot. He coached at the high school, and he introduced me to the JAG program where they bring in entrepreneurs and people for the kids to meet so they can hear about other trades, other than going to the military or college. It’s good to see the people of the community, come out a speak with the students. It makes a difference, because if you can spark the interest in a kid, you can make a difference in their lives.” He has also received advice from other media representatives on style and presentation on-air as well Facebook.
Gilbert has branched out into doing live shows around the area. He has set up at Blocker Boys, for their Cars and Coffee. He did interviews with the participants and was able to highlight their event. From there he was invited to participate in the Bair-ly Pulling Tractor Pull in St. George, interviewing drivers and exposing his audience to the world of tractor pulling. He also has a weekly gig at Bucky’s Seafood where he display his DJing abilities to the patrons of the restaurant. He explains, “I do it Friday nights and that actually came from a sit down with the owners. I told them about my podcast, and that I would like to bring this to Bucky’s with music. They were initially not sure, but saw my videos and like what we were doing. Everybody was vouching for me. He basically said, Well, I’m gonna just let you do it and see what happens. We did the first night, that first night, everybody was liked, it’s not a party, it’s a vibe. It’s just a nice experience with nice music and you can eat your food with your family. One night, I had a drum up there, and we were doing a DJ and drummer situation. I was DJing it, but he was playing it live, and I was manipulating the beat where it could kind of give him some more room to play. People thought it was cool.”
Gilbert wants to expand his audience, “In five years, I would love to see this turn into a network channel or be a part of a network channel where we’re streaming multiple shows on one location, with multiple performers on the channel. I would love to probably make a movie and publish mixes. I finally started to tap into doing more video mixes, and they’re actually starting to work where we’re gaining a lot of following YouTube. I’m over 200,000 views on YouTube at the moment, and a lot of that came from my musical skill with DJing. I would like to do more talking, because feel like I got something to say.”
I asked Gilbert what he would say to the youth of Colleton County, “What I would tell them is, if you’re in school take it seriously, don’t play with school. You’re your elementary, middle school, high school education, because you got a chance to do something that maybe your parents didn’t get to do. When you get out in this real world, the real world isn’t going to treat you the same way as your school years. Get a mentor if you don’t feel comfortable talking to your parents. Some kids might not feel like they can find somebody that you can talk to, because you can’t always trust your peers to raise you or give you that information. School is the most important time of your life.”
