(REVAMPED) Resurfacing articles and interviews from past issues.
In May of 2015, I had the opportunity to sit down with the hosts of 2BELTZ podcast, Jameel Raeburn and Carlos Reyes. The two had just finished recording their twelfth episode for the podcast with Music Producer and Rapper, Nazdaq of the Bronx. Jameel currently resides in Brooklyn – Carlos currently lives in Manhattan. Here’s 2BELTZ responses from that evening’s interview.
Q: What was your reasoning for creating the podcast 2BELTZ?
Carlos: I thought a need for Jameel to get his personality out, because I feel like his writing doesn’t get all of the funny quirky shit he says down. So its like, if you speak a long format, people will get all the things you’re saying and all of the points you want to get across.
Jameel: I did it because Carlos wanted to do it! We were sitting on this podcast for a really long time, because we wanted to do it. Initially it was supposed to be a three man booth, with myself, Carlos, and Jimmy! But Jimmy graduated and didn’t want to do it. We eventually procrastinated enough to the point where we decided to be like, “Hey! Let’s finally get this podcast off the ground and poppin’,” and let’s build something from it.
Q: What are your general topics on 2BELTZ? Can you give examples?
Carlos: Um, Bitches, Bitches, and more Bitches… No that’s horrible! We talk about music, life…
Jameel: We talk a lot about music and a lot of different shit in our lives. We’re just trying to get shit off our chest. We’re both some pretty funny dudes, some cool dudes! Trying to get our personalities out there. We talk about music, and we’re both very knowledgable about it. Carlos produces, and I write and analyze music myself. So, we’re just giving our opinion on shit and we have our own take on music.
Carlos: I think our taste compliment each other, because he like completely different shit that I’m not even aware of.
Jameel: Yeah! And vice versa.
Q: Why do you call it 2BELTZ?
Carlos: That’s funny! Because me and Jameel started it as a hashtag, and we will use it when we’re watching wrestling.
Jameel: We call ourselves the Tag Team Champions! We both like 2Chainz!
Carlos: And it came from one copious meme.
Jameel: Yeah, I have this meme of 2Chainz on the phone saying “Tell ‘em!”, because that’s one of his great ad libs. So we both love 2Chainz, we both are the Tag Team Champions, and the Tag Team Champions have 2 belts, thus far 2BELTZ is…
Carlos: Algebra my nigga! Algebra!
Q: How many 2BELTZ podcasts do you have, thus far?
Carlos: We just finish like what, 12?
Jameel: We just finished episode number twelve! Thirteen if you want to count that missing one.
Carlos: Yeah, that one that never got recorded. It’s so funny how history works. Because we were able to figure out the format from not having the first episode ever to upload.
Jameel: Right! I’m not even sure how bad that first episode was.
Carlos: It was probably decent!
Jameel: It was probably decent, but it’s just like, we didn’t get the recording right so it never came out. And you know, it happens, but it was a great way to kick shit off in a such format. Sort of to feel, PAUSE, feel each other out on the mic.
(BOTH LAUGH)
Carlos: Got Emmm!
Jameel: And just understand how our chemistry works together.
Q: Where can you find 2BELTZ at?
Carlos and Jameel: SoundCloud and iTunes!
Jameel: soundcloud.com/2beltzpodcast and iTunes search 2BELTZ!
Q: What do you guys do aside from 2BELTZ?
Carlos: Well, he’s a writer. He’s got published work on Vibes, Billboard, other sources and outlets.
Jameel: I wrote a bit for WrassleRap, that’s actually where I’ve been getting contact with a lot of cool people who noticed my work. You know, I have a job, I have a 9 to 5. I do that shit daily. But I write on the side because I like writing.
Carlos: Um, I just got into producing like, I wanna say 4 or 5 months ago seriously. Because I had like the applications on my computer to do so, but it took me a while to want to do it. It’s a lot of work, but sometimes it’s really not and I figured that out by fucking around a lot.
Q: How long do you plan on recording 2BELTZ for your listeners?
Carlos: FOREVER!
Jameel: For-Fucking-Ever!
Carlos: Eventually, we will be like those Futurama jar-heads with like the microphones dipped in the water.
Q: What benefits do you reap from doing the podcast?
Carlos: People tell us we’re funny more often.
Jameel: I think it gets our personality out there. It builds a personality for both me and Carlos online. It gets a lot of our opinion about music and it gets our outlook on it. I think a lot of people aren’t aware how hilarious and great we are. This is sort of an avenue of getting that across. The podcast itself gets a lot of listens on SoundCloud. A lot of great people listen. It feels good.
Q: What’s up with the tags? Why do you tag 2BELTZ podcasts the way you do? Like why do you tag 2BELTZ podcast?
Jameel: Because it’s hashtag-able! That’s the way shit goes now!
Carlos: The easier something is to hashtag or tweet you’re making it easier for people to find it. And it’s a short fucking name!
Jameel: Initially, we wanted a name that was hashtag-able. I didn’t want something that wasn’t hashtag-able. I didn’t want any long form podcast, I didn’t want any super hella ironic name that was kinda cool but ironic. I wanted something that was hashtag-able and easy to search.
Q: What are some helpful tips you want to give to aspiring podcast host/hostess?
Carlos: Be yourself and try to be as entertaining as possible. Because you’re talking in a long fucking format and the average human attention span is 18 minutes. So, talk about shit people care about.
Jameel: Definitely, talk about shit people care about. I don’t know, have something interesting to say and make sure you’re good with speaking or have someone that is good at speaking. A lot of people suffer from not having a really good chemistry just talking to other people and with themselves. They don’t really possess, not great knowledge, but in terms of experience and speaking on the mic and speaking towards people. So I would definitely say, work on that. And come up with a lot of interesting notes. People want to hear about something they can relate to or something they can feel.
You can follow 2BELTZ on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com/2beltzpodcast. You can even look for their podcast on iTunes by typing in 2BELTZ.
Ebony Anderson-Brown, Editor in Chief & Publisher