Hutty Wants to Desensitize the Stigma About Addiction

House-rap artist Hutty, aka Robert Hunt, is on a mission to end the stigma around mental illness. He wants people who suffer from various distressed mental states, such as depression or addiction, to connect to his music. His new single, “Diggin in the Mud,” paints a poignant tale of addiction, the struggles that come with it, and the desire to escape its clutches.

“I want people to feel inspired to move away from bad habits and bad experiences after listening to ‘Diggin in the Mud,'” says Hunt.

The song is a reflection of his personal life and people close to him, he says: “I got involved with substances at a young age, and I continue to struggle from time to time. I have close family members who also suffer from alcoholism, so I’ve grown up around the disorders that it causes my entire life. I developed into a person that seemed to always cry for help while drunk — eventually making a fool of myself — which in return made my problem worse.”

The melodious, lo-fi hip-hop/dance track, with its rhythmic club beats and sultry saxophone lines performed by longtime friend Simple Gipsy (Joel Baker), references Hunt’s own battle with addiction and the feeling of being lost.

“The first verse captures the more problematic times of this disease, like getting handcuffed ['Got my hand in cuffs'], not being able to afford anything, and focusing on drugs ['I can’t list the drug / I can’t even afford it / Layin on the doormat / Thinking I'm too lost'],” explains Hunt. “Other lines are hinting toward progressiveness, such as 'Diggin in the mud / Diamond in the rough / I can't keep it up,' where it shows me potentially making it out of this negativity.”

The goal of his music, he says, “is to show everyone that it’s okay to not be okay.”
“Diggin in the Mud'' also touches on the harsh realities that adolescents can face when sent off to certain boot camps and therapeutic (tough-love) boarding schools to combat addiction. “My girlfriend was sent to one of these boarding schools when she was younger, and it was a traumatic experience for her," Hunt explains. "I wanted to include her in the song, as we share that similarity in struggling with past experiences." Halfway through the song, Hunt sings, “All those things that you're going through / Young girl shipped to boarding school / What it do / You ain't had a clue.” Hunt says his hope is that young adults going through a similar experience will relate and cull positivity from their hardships.

He recorded “Diggin in the Mud” with Los Angeles producer and mixing engineer Gabe Rhys, who has collaborated with Mazie, Imad Royal, Sub Urban & Paravi and is currently developing NBC’s The Voice contestant Julia Cooper. “I provided Gabe with ideas for ‘Diggin in the Mud’ such as incorporating a house sound into a melodic rap track, and we went from there,” says Hunt. “I love the specific bell-ring sound he added that runs throughout the entirety of the song. It puts the listener in a trance, and that is a sound I’ve never experienced playing myself or even really hearing in many other songs.”

Hunt, who writes, sings, raps, plays the bass and produces, is drawn to heavy-metal bands from the late 1980s and early 1990s while being influenced by rap music from the early 2000s. He draws inspiration from the late XXXTentacion and Mac Miller, and he's also heavily influenced by Kurt Cobain and Kid Cudi.

Hunt says he formed Hutty in his apartment in 2019 while attending the University of Boulder Colorado. Graduating with a major in mechanical engineering, he decided to move to Denver in 2020 to hone his craft as a musician. To make ends meet, he's held down a part-time job as a server at Pho & Bar in Capitol Hill.

The talented artist and his band, the Rinse Gang, will play the Mercury Cafe on Saturday, April 29. Collur and Niko Ligiuri will open the show.

Joining Hunt on stage will be Rinse Gang saxophonist Simple Gipsy, guitarist/vocalist Glass 40 (Daniel Pawelski), lead guitarist JFly (Jake Fleisig) and drummer TROY (Troy Thomas). The five musicians record under their own independent label, Rinse Records, which Hunt started a few years back.

“I love combining house and melodic hip-hop elements with live instruments,” says Hunt, who uses the acoustic and electric guitars, saxophone, piano and trumpet on some of his tracks. Last November, Hunt released You’re Beautiful, a three-song EP rich in acoustic instrumentation and introspective lyrics, peppered with rap, alt-rock, Americana and house music. He says the sequencing of the trio of songs — “Feelings,” “The Rain” and “Wash Away” — explored the mind being in a dark state and “made the music flow a sort of loop relatable to that of a person with a problem abusing drugs: the hangover, using, (to) overusing, for each of the three tracks.”

Hunt’s candid portrayal of the highs and lows of his life experiences is something he’ll continue to present in his music. “Your words could save people's lives by helping them make sense of something they never understood as important," he says. "Ego needs to be thrown aside. If you can see it, help them.”

BandWagon Presents: Hutty & the Rinse Gang, with Collur and Niko Ligiuri, 7 p.m. Saturday, April 29, Mercury Cafe, 2199 California Street. Tickets are $10.