While his teachers know him as Duberli “Dube” Ruvalcaba, this Akins junior is also known from his life out- side of school.

When Ruvalcaba is not busy as the captain of the Boys Varsity Soccer team, what he really enjoys to do is create music. When he started rapping a year ago he didn’t see it as a serious thing. It was just something he did for fun with his friends.

“I ended up asking if I could join for fun. I ended up making a good song, and people kept telling me to keep doing it. I got better as time went on,” he said.

Music has become an important part in Ruvalcaba’s life. Not only did he notice it, but his fans did, too. e impact that music brought to Dube as an artist, made him see the music industry dierent and it showed him how much music can mean to someone and their fans.

“I have not seen him perform, but I’ve seen videos of him performing and I see how he enjoys it, and the crowd, too,” said senior Fabian Vargas.

The main focus on his songs is expressing how he feels or believes in a way that people can relate to things in the real world.

“You hardly hear me talking about drugs,” he said. “I might say some vulgar things but I talk mostly about things that I go through and what I think is going to happen later on in the future, what I want. Basically what people can relate to.”

He has enjoyed the chance to perform with some big name rappers at downtown Austin venues.

“Honestly, it’s fun. I performed for bigger artists like Trill Sammy and Ugly God,” he said. 

When he is writing songs his inspiration is everywhere, of course it takes him time. One example of that is the song “MARIA” that he featured on.

Although the writing process can take a long time, once he has inspiration, it becomes easy, Ruvalcaba said. A friend of his named Solodon asked him to remix a track for him so he could be on the new version.

“I was sitting there for two hours thinking on what to write,” he said. “I didn’t write anything until I was in bed and I actually ended up writing it in like 10 minutes.”

His future plans is recording a set of six new songs soon. He hopes that him and his group can collaborate with more people.

“The group of artists that I’m with, “Cash Gang,”  have plans to do more opening shows soon and collaborate with more artists and get more exposure so we can get more people to listen to our music,” Ruvalcaba said.

His fans enjoy his music, they can connect with the things he talks about in his songs. “He raps about the world or his personal experience, he lets people see the real him. He is not a double faced artist,“ Vargas said.

Ruvalcaba said he believes that if he keeps making the moves that he’s making right now, he will improve and it will take him a step forward to becoming a bigger artist after high school.

“I just hope to take it as far as I can,” Ruvalcaba said. “I know right now I’m not that big or anything serious but if I keep doing what I’m doing I know I’ll be satisfied and get somewhere.”