Puntin's success without a record label
19th Jan 2020
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Music
News
Puntin
Rap
Anyone who’s been grooving to the tracks 'On My Own' and 'Stronger' on xRhythms may have wondered how the artist, Texas-based rapper Puntin, got his strange name.
He explained to Cross Rhythms how his recording name came about.
"My mother gave me a nickname; she called me 'Punkin'. As I grew up one of my friends, an older guy, started calling me 'Puntin', then everybody started calling me Puntin.
[The name] Puntin; it was different, nobody has it.
"When I began to do music and was looking for a stage name I used G Dog, G Style, G this and G that. Then I decided to use Puntin; it was different, nobody has it."
The rapper did make a stab at recording under his real name. In 2017 he released the album ‘The Paragon’ under the name Greg Cooks. But it flopped.
He explained, "It was hard getting everyone to follow the transition. I found that not too many of my followers/supporters even knew that I released an album under Greg Cooks. My team and I even went as far as taking the album down. We plan to re-release it in the near future under the name Puntin."
He’s succeeded in building a considerable following.
The “team” to whom the rapper refers to are a highly dedicated set of volunteers who support his work. Without record label help he’s succeeded in building a considerable following.
Down the years, Puntin has recorded a series of albums like ‘The Rap’n Rev’ (2009), ‘The Reverse’ (2010), ‘Pinnacle’ (2012) and ‘Back To The Basics’ (2014) as well as a series of mixtapes, ‘Bananas’.
In fact, it’s ‘Bananas 6’ which has offered his grassroots supporters his radio hits 'On My Own' and 'Stronger'.
Puntin has toured New Zealand and Britain as well as all over the USA.
About his future direction, he told Cross Rhythms, “I'm not only making music that Christians can listen too, but music that unbelievers [people who aren't Christians] can also listen to without feeling a certain type of way. I believe in the end, the unbelievers will understand that I'm a believer, and respect that. And only God knows what else may come from that.
Not a hardcore Christian message.
"I've lost a lot of my Christian-based supporters because a lot of them want the hardcore Christian message. I'm cool with that because I'm living what I'm doing and I'm at peace with it. I plan to continue the path that I'm on and hopefully gain enough devoted supporters and listeners to get to where my team and I can construct our own successful tours."