Mouth of the River

Footsteps. Silence. Lights. Anticipation fills the small room, as the background track to “Coming Home” By Leon Bridges plays. A deep low voice shakes the room as Cullen Nesbitt, reaches for the microphone.

Cullen Nesbitt (‘26), a.k.a. “KidCull” is a passionate senior at Oyster River High School (ORHS) who found solace in songwriting, and with encouragement from his parents, peers, and siblings, he is determined to make a name for himself in the everchanging music scene. 

On November 20th, 2024, Nesbitt’s career started when his sister’s boyfriend, Ian Carrion, helped begin his career. “He was the one that told me that I had a good voice,” Nesbitt said. From there, Nesbitt and Carrion worked together in producing music, creating songs, and even collaborated on a song together.

Nesbitt, creating music begins with finding a sample beat on YouTube, or one that he creates from scratch. Next, he’ll hum on the beat as a way to figure it out, then create the words to match that flow he established. Then finally, he’ll touch up on the song by editing lyrics to match or cut out any parts to finalize the song. “And then you get a song,” Nesbitt states. However, many revisions come over the song before Nesbitt finally decides that it’s “finished.”

One example would be his newest single, Five. “It was done for like a week, but I listened to it once and figured out, hey, maybe I should say something different in this part.”

Nesbitt’s musical direction comes from big influential artists, such as Brent Faiyaz, Leon Thomas, and Drake. However, he is currently working on developing a new sound, similar to that of Jack Johnson. “I really like making [songs and music,] as it’s more genuine to me. I do have a couple of songs right now that are complete. I got an album coming around January 1st, about 12-14 songs. I have a lot of singing on the album, a lot of R&B.”

Even with this coming style change, he wants to stick to the name KidCull. “I had a couple midnight talks about changing my name. I was going to change it to CULLTURE, but was quickly told that that’s terrible.”

Although he finds making music fun, he receives constant criticism from his fellow classmates. “I understand it’s easy to make fun of a kid that’s making music at school, but I do it because it’s fun. I do it because I’m interested in it,” Nesbitt says. “I’ve always found it cruel or just disrespectful to make fun of me for trying to make something out of myself. People bring up my first song Consistency, and I’m like, yeah, I understand. My first song sucked. And my second. And guess what? My third song sucked,” he continued. “You make mistakes, but you learn from them, and you build that up over time. I mean, Yeat released 500 songs before he had one hit.”

Nesbitt has also performed live, F performing during Coffee House on 33 SPORTS & CULTURE 11/06, singing “Coming Home” (Leon Bridges), “Tennessee Whiskey” (Chris Stapleton), and an original song. Nesbitt expressed how Coffee House is an important step for him in his career. Noting that he’ll need to be able to perform live and that starting from such a familiar place really helps.

“It’s hard to perform in front of a crowd. Looking out on the stage and just seeing even 40 people is crazy.”

And as luck would have it, Nesbitt seems to have found his new home. Out The Vault (OTV) is a new record label that initially began as a project for Carrion and Nesbitt but grew to become something bigger than they imagined. “It’s coming together. I got a lot more people interested in my gigs. People work years in this industry to get to this kind of place. I’m really excited because this is the future for me.” 

All of his time, energy, work and dedication finally comes to a head on January 30th, the day Nesbitt finally gets his chance to shine. Nesbitt debuts live at Big Night Live in Boston, MA, and was invited to join Rob49 on stage as an opener. He thanks Carrion for giving him this chance. Rob49, most famously know for his song, “WTHELLY” has also been featured on Travis Scott’s “TOPIA TWINS” which has been streamed nearly 300 million times across streaming platforms.

Carrion connected Nesbitt to Project X, a famous producer who created hits such as Just Wanna Rock (Lil Uzi Vert), and It’s Getting Hot (NLE Choppa), who then connected Nesbitt to another DJ. This DJ worked closely with Rob49, and contacted who works closely in with Rob49, and contacted him about Nesbitt, who approved of him opening.

“Every drop of my money is going to music right now, I’m working nonstop, I don’t even have heat in my car. We’re advertising, making flyers, merch, CDs and records,” says Nesbitt.

“There’s going to be a lot of cool stuff coming up.” As Nesbitt’s chapter at ORHS closes, a new chapter opens up. One where his biggest dreams can become reality, and where he’ll face challenges bigger than before.

“I’m really interested in creating [music] and I want to learn from it and get better at it.” He comments, “the future is very, very bright so, stick with me because I’m going all the way. And I’m bringing the Grammy home to Oyster River, I swear to God.” “I’m really excited because this is the future for me.” 

-Jimmy Kim