X-Factor | Reggie & Bollie: ‘We’re as famous as N-Dubz in Ghana'

The X Factor’s Reggie & Bollie gave up fame and fortune once – now they want it back

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If you’ve watched a performance by The X Factor’s Reggie and Bollie without smiling, we’re worried about you. Bursting onto our screens as Menn On Point (they changed their name for legal reasons), singing their own track Turn It Up, we fell in love with their chart-worthy music, infectious smiles and crazy dancing (their signature move – which they’ve taught mentor Cheryl F-V – is an African dance called Azonto, they tell us).

On heat’s set, the pair aren’t as bouncy as you’d expect. They’re married, responsible dads – Bollie, 29, has two kids aged five and two months, and Reggie, 31, has three – Ikhon, seven, Nolan, five, and Dior, one. When he goes to pick up Ikhon from school, he says the kids now shout and point at him.

The pair are also very professional as they pose in their suits (“I’m strutting like Simon Cowell, like a money man!” Bollie laughs). That’s probably because these guys aren’t the Jedward-style joke act, as some detractors have said – they are professional. And very likely to be this year’s biggest earners well after the credits have rolled.

“Scandals” about X Factor acts having previous record deals are commonplace, but these two are different, as they’ve had music careers in their home country, Ghana.

And – fair or not fair – anyone who can get Simon dancing is alright by heat…

Tell us how you ended up on The X Factor…

R: The two of us released music in Ghana separately. Then Bollie had the chance to come here to the UK to collaborate with other artists. It didn’t really work but he stayed. I also had to join my wife over here because we were having our second son. That was in 2010. You’re famous in one country, and then…

Was it hard to leave?

R: It was, but we thought it was the right thing to do. Both of us didn’t really grow up around our dads. My dad was travelling when I was two. He was taking care of me, but if the person is not around, it feels different.

How famous were you in Ghana?

R: I would say averagely… Our songs were known.

B: I would say maybe [in UK terms]… like N-Dubz?

Like, recognised in the street? People asking for selfies?

R: Yeah, but then some people would walk past us. The funniest thing is we’ll be walking down the street [in the UK] and you see some Ghanians and they’ll be like, “Reggie! Bollie!”

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