Who Is PUTE?

The latest project from Denver, CO’s Neon Brown is a collaboration of sorts with an off-the-radar artist, PUTE. Brown, who DJs and produces, is known for his laid-back and heady style of production, which caught the attention of PUTE a few years ago. This being the digital age, DMs were exchanged, and an unlikely chance put them together where PUTE had an odd verse on the Brown-produced “The Donner Party” by NYC artist Deca in 2019. After the collabo, more messages, some quite off-kilter and bizarre, added to the mystery. Elusive and very private, little was known about PUTE then, As the barrage of messages came through to Brown’s socials on the regular, things would come to a halt when his TikTok got hacked. Unrelated and inappropriate content followed, leading Brown to suspect this former collaborator. However, in a weird change of events, a full album (using Brown’s production) would show up, complete with questionable and strange album art. In a conundrum as to whether to take legal action to stop the use of his work, Brown eventually became fascinated with the project, enlisting a list of his own collaborators to join in and layer this already weird project even further. Artists like Detroit’s Guilty Simpson and Quelle Chris along with NYC’s JScienide and Daniel David (formerly Trailor Limon) contributed to this new project that Brown became excited about.

PUTE is unlike anyone I’ve ever worked with and I don’t understand fully who PUTE is.

As the project grew, his original production now rearranged and assembled by PUTE had him trying to uncover exactly who this person was. By now, due to several samples uncovered by Brown, signs were pointing to a collective or a possibility of something nonhuman. Was it a group of people, or perhaps advanced software, or even AI that had a hand in this? He didn’t know, and this intrigued Brown even more. He had to put this project out. Not only does he encourage the listener to dive deep into the music, but also delve deeper into who PUTE really is. This project will be released digitally on July 23rd with a vinyl drop in mid-August.

Check out PUTE featuring Guilty Simpson “Nothing” below: