The Next Superstar: Meet the Jeremys

The final round of competition in Be The Next Superstar takes place tonight at the Bliss. Four contestants remain and are under a lot of pressure because this is their last chance to convince the audience and judges that are worthy of the ten thousand dollar grand prize. Among the performers that have survived the weeks of competition and eliminations leading up to this day, is the duo, Jeremy Cuthkelvin and Jeremy Vasquez. Their specialty is music, but throughout the competition they have mixed things up on stage; adding comedy and dance to their act. They’ve come a long way, but will they make it as finalists? Or more importantly, will they Be the Next Superstars? Those questions will be answered in tonight’s show and next week’s grand finale. In the meantime, News Five’s Delahnie Bain caught up with the Jeremy’s in Belmopan for the first in a series of features on the shows remaining contenders.

Delahnie Bain, Reporting

Jeremy Cuthkelvin and Jeremy Vasquez or as their fans would say, “the Jeremys”, have used their talents in singing, rapping and acting to make it into the semi-finals of Be The Next Superstar. Cuthkelvin is a past winner of Channel Five’s Duets and he has now teamed up with Vasquez, who looked up to him after seeing his success in that first competition.

Jeremy Vasquez

Jeremy Vasquez, Be The Next Superstar

“In 2010 when my partner Jeremy Cuthkelvin was on Duets, I wanted to start music so bad but I never knew I had talent and every time I used to go by his house and he and Erlin mi di practice, dehn would ah laugh afta me when I mi di try out wid dehn and I dah mi wah short lee fat lee bwai. So den, out of di blues when I meet he back—cause we mi stop talk fi maybe two years and I just start to play basketball and I get big and I si he wah day pan di court and he dah like bwai I noh recognize you. He tell me he mi gwein eena di show solo so it was me and my cousin and my best friend mi gwein een but something mi come up so he end up dah like bwai come si mi and he dah like you want try out fi dis thing. So I dah like alright den and we gone dah auditions together.”

Jeremy Cuthkelvin, Be The Next Superstar Semi-finalist

“I just mi want go fi di fun; I neva know I mi wah get so far cause sometimes you know when you dah wah winner, sometimes dehn just tek you out quick. So I seh well I just gwein and si weh happen and. Mi lee bwai yah so, he grow up and I mi know ah from ih like twelve and I used to always laugh afta ah when ih mi di rap. But I neva know di man dis good and I get fi find out di man good. I mi gwein by myself anyway but I seh mek I give di lee bwai a run cause I know ah long time. Afta dat ih prove something to me and come up fi be hard.”

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

While they have repeatedly delivered high energy and sometimes comedic performances, it’s not as easy they make it look. With Cuthkelvin working varied shifts as a firefighter and Vasquez attending high school, finding time to prepare for performances has been tough. And according to Cuthkelvin, his previous experience with Duets has not made the competition any easier.

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“Noh really, ih kinda hard still, ih noh easy. Well, Ascenthium hard, Mad Skillz mi hard, everybody mi hard so I mi kinda got wah lee fear dat hmm, I noh wah pass dehn people cause dehn badda dan me check, dehn got it out.”

Jeremy Vasquez

“It’s been hectic every week so I would skip maybe a day or two from school to try to practice. When I go to school I tell the principal well, I have to practice for this and the school would tell me okay den go ahead so that’s how we practice. And then we barely have time because he’s at work and when he’s at work I’m at school and when we come home it’s all jumbled up so we never have time to practice.”

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“Sometimes we get together and sometimes we have like five hours to practice but other things come up, calls from other people to go and perform so we have to lef. Sometimes I tell he, on stage I’m going to free style in the comedic style and he just put in something in rap freestyle and I just come with a chorus cause I can freestyle sing and we just come with that.”

Still, the duo has managed to find time to go out and fundraise for votes with the support of family of friends.

Jeremy Vasquez

“I have support from Belmopan, from my barber shop, Prestige, from friends, from family; everyone. My mom just went back to LA today and she helped me a lot in the three weeks she was here. We go out to the bump, we solicit money, we do all we can just to get back in this competition and we know we have fans out there so we want them to keep voting cause we know they like how we do our stuff and we just continue to big up everyone who supports us.”

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“We go to schools; we go to Compre and Baptist and we go to the bump to collect money. Some people are broke so they can’t give you all that but every dollar counts. Sometimes we get dollar, two dollars, things like that and we make up, send some votes and we depend on people to bring us back. So that’s it, everyday grind.”

Since the start of the show, the duo has also been getting gigs to perform at various events, but the public feedback has not always been positive.

Jeremy Vasquez

“We’ve done about three to four performances already since the show started and we have some already lined up for maybe two weeks from now after the show is finished, some bigger shows to perform at. So everyone is just giving us a little call because they say they like how we do our thing and stuff so we just continue doing our thing. And it makes us a little money and plus you get a little more fame and it feels good to entertain people.  Seventy-five percent of the time it’s good people like “hey you’re Jeremy from Be The Next Superstar”, girls hissing, all kind of stuff happening and then we have the people who would, “oh bwai you dah nothing, you dah dis, dat, somebody else wah win dis thing, you and your partner flap” so I just get over those hurdles and I continue pushing because everywhere you go they will have haters. I put up posters sometimes and they tear my picture out. It doesn’t bother me, it makes me stronger.”

Cuthkelvin says that if even he doesn’t take home the ten thousand dollar grand prize, he’s definitely walking away with something… a new nickname.

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“Everybody know—well, me dehn know me as Jeremy Cuthkelvin but I have to change mi name cause everybody call me Shaggy, I can’t seh I noh name Shaggy; dehn stick dah name pan me. So dehn si me pan street da Shaggy, Shaggy, Shaggy, we want hear Shaggy. We noh care weh di crowd seh, we want Shaggy, we like Shaggy so every time you go pan stage you have to give we wah Shaggy or else we noh di vote fi you. So dehn done know me as dat so I can’t change that.”

Delahnie Bain

“Well, this year yoh bring out Terry G.”

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“Yeah, well yoh know every year dah something different but next year ah no gwein back, I wah retire afta dis year, give somebody else wah break.”

But Vasquez is only sixteen years old and has no intention to quit. In fact, he’s got big plans for a career in music.

Jeremy Vasquez

“I won’t stop cause I’m too young and I feel like this is my calling. I plan to have a studio in the future, my own studio cause I worked on—I know how to do recordings, I’m practicing how to make instrumentals and beats right now. So I’m very versatile in what I do, I have a lot of stuff that I can do; I play basketball also, I play the drums, I do spoken word, I write poetry and so I do a lot of stuff you know. So everyone knows that I’m very talented and people who are with me always support me and push me to go more like my parents, they support me a hundred and fifty percent.”

In the immediate future, however, Cuthkelvin’s priority is his family while Vasquez is focused on school.

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“I dah wah poor person, I noh got money; I still di work fi mek a living. I got three pickney, wife. Pickney di go dah school; school bill, wata bill, light bill like everybody else and ih hard fi mek it so I just seh well I just wah go try win di show fi mek wah lee money and try invest it eena something else and maybe get wah lee business going fi myself, small business cause I do artwork.”

Jeremy Vasquez

“If we win, we need to give back so we plan to have a party, throw a nice party for the people who supported us and stuff and we enjoy ourselves and after that, well I have schooling and it’s a burden on my parents so I would put something towards my schooling and myself.”

And if they make as a finalist, they’re ready to rock the audience at the Bliss tonight and earn their votes.

Jeremy Cuthkelvin

“Tonight we wah do some remix, we wah come back wid old school and—two ah dehn dah old school but some old school soul and old school dancehall fi get di crowd going cause you  know how we do it Belizean style, we noh play.”

Jeremy Vasquez

“We’re really working hard and we bring five hundred percent originality. As you can see, we do everything; we act, we rap, we sing. We’re also bringing a band so look out tonight.”

Tune in to Be The Next Superstar tonight to find out if the Jeremy’s will be in top three. Delahnie Bain for News Five.

Look out for more features on the Be The Next Superstar contenders on Wednesday’s newscast. The finalists, which will be announced at tonight’s show will also be guests on Open Your Eyes in the morning.