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MICHAEL GRIMM
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MICHAEL GRIMM
With his soulful voice and earthy Southern charm, Mississippi-bred Michael Grimm charmed millions of viewers as a contestant on Season Five of NBC’s America’s Got Talent, parlaying his substantial singer-songwriter appeal into a first-place finish, a one-million-dollar prize, and the headline spot on the first-ever national “America’s Got Talent Tour,” which visited major cities throughout the U.S. in the fall of 2010.
He also earned himself a devoted fan base eager to hear what he will do when he releases his own album. Grimm has signed to Epic Records, which will release his major-label debut in the spring. “The album will include both original songs I’ve written, as well as covers of classic songs that I love,” Grimm says. “We’re still recording it, but if I had to sum up the direction, I’d have to say ‘soulful Americana.’ That’s exactly where we’re going with it.”
Grimm comes by his rootsy bonafides the authentic way as a true son of the South. From the age of five, he grew up in Waveland, a small Gulf town in Mississippi that sits between New Orleans and Biloxi. “It’s a very humble, charming town. I loved growing up there,” he says. Grimm’s father was in the military and Grimm was born in Colorado on the Fort Carson base. After his father was discharged, the family moved to Slidell, Louisiana. “My dad was not making any money,” Grimm says, “so my mother cleaned churches to try to pay the bills. We lived in a little camper that had holes in the floor. I remember if you looked straight through the hole in my bedroom floor, you could see the ground underneath. The funny thing is, I thought I had everything in the world. Looking back, all I owned were a few hand-me-down toys, but it didn’t bother me at the time.”
When it became too difficult from Grimm’s parents to support him and his younger sister, Grimm’s grandparents took the kids to live with them in Waveland. Grimm’s grandmother played piano in a church and taught Michael and his sister her favorite gospel hymns. “That’s what first inspired me to sing,” Grimm recalls. “My grandmother took a liking to our voices. She said, ‘Both of you kids are very talented, you should sing.’ In a blue-collar family, she wasn’t really looking to me being an attorney. But she loved music and I think a light went off in her head that encouraging us to enjoy music would keep us out of trouble.”
Grimm grew up listening to the country artists his grandmother favored, classics like Ernest Tubb, Hank Williams, George Jones, and Ray Price. When he was 11, Grimm sang at a wedding. One of the guests heard him and made him an offer. “This guy owned a bar, and he said, ‘I know you’re going on 12, but if you bring a legal guardian and you want to sing a karaoke set here … we can’t pay you anything, but you can put a tip jar down.’” Grimm accepted and wound up performing there for the next several years. At age 15, he began writing songs. Figuring he needed some instrumental accompaniment, he picked up a guitar and taught himself to play. “Just being a singer won’t put bread on the table,” he says. “You’ve got to have something else going. I needed to be a musician.” A few years later, he was hired as a guitarist and back-up vocalist for the live celebrity impersonation show “Legends in Concert” in Biloxi.
One night, a woman named Cookie Watkins, who played Tina Turner, came to Biloxi to do her act. “I was amazed at her voice,” he says. “I fell in love with soul because of Aretha Franklin, but Cookie Watkins is the real reason I sing the way I do. That’s when I switched from country to diving into all these R&B greats, like Otis Redding, Sam Cooke, Al Green, and Etta James, as well as the blue-eyed soul guys, like the Righteous Brothers, Joe Cocker, Michael McDonald, and Daryl Hall.”
At age 21, Grimm was offered a job performing at the “Legends in Concert” show in Las Vegas and made the move out west where he has lived for the past decade. Then, in 2005, Grimm’s life was changed forever when his grandparents’ hometown of Waveland was decimated by Hurricane Katrina. “Their house was demolished,” he says. “The whole town was flattened by the tidal surge. My grandparents had to move into a FEMA trailer, but they couldn’t take it for too long, so they moved into another mobile home in the woods. All I wanted to do was find a way to help.”
Enter America’s Got Talent. In the spring of 2010, Grimm auditioned for the show, which debuted in June. Grimm’s obvious talent and genuine emotion about his family’s situation resonated with viewers, who voted him the winner after the 31-year-old performed a roof-raising rendition of “When A Man Loves A Woman.” A fedora-wearing star was born.
“Winning was not in my plan,” Grimm says. “I was just hoping to get some attention from the record labels so I could sign a deal, make some money, and buy my grandparents a house. I was shocked when I won. There were so many wonderful acts, especially Jackie Evancho and Taylor Matthews. I still can’t believe it turned out the way it did. I was very humbled by it.”
Grimm’s humility was no act. “What you saw on that show was real,” he says. “I went on there thinking, ‘I’m just going to be myself and see what happens.’ I knew if I did something that wasn’t me, the audience would see through it. The only way I can be truthful is through the music that I make. I’m a traditionalist.”
Grimm is currently working with Grammy-award winning producer Don Was (The Rolling Stones, Elton John, B.B.King) and plans to bring that sense of tradition to the songs he’s working on for his debut album for Epic Records. “Oh, it’s going to be swampy,” he says. “It’s going to be Michael Grimm leaving his hat on. This is me. It’s the way I’ve always been since I was a teenager, wearing hats and singing the music that I love to sing.”
The album features some legendary talent including Ann Wilson (Heart), Ian McLagan (Faces and work with Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, John Mayer), Davey Faragher (Elvis Costello, Cracker) and Greg Leisz (Avenged Sevenfold, The Eagles). Having played on over 30 Grammy-nominated albums, Kenny Aronoff provides drums on the album and the famous Waddy Wachtel on guitar.
