T-Pain‘s dubstep pivot reached a poignant new milestone over the weekend at Electric Forest, where he debuted an unreleased collaboration with the late Oliver Tree, who tragically died in a mid-June helicopter crash.Ad 0:00 Click for sound 0:00 / 0:00 The track surfaced during T-Pain’s b2b set with DJ Diesel, the electronic music alias of Shaquille O’Neal, on the festival’s Tripolee Stage during its annual Bassrush takeover.
The all-day stage takeover has long served as Electric Forest’s dedicated hub for dubstep and bass music, making it a fitting setting for one of the weekend’s most unexpected crossover moments.T-Pain had paid homage to Tree in the wake of his shocking death, posting a moving tribute on Instagram.
“Thanks for sharing your art and for always being different in the best way possible,” he wrote.“See you on the brighter side.” The unreleased collaboration, which T-Pain said has been sitting on his hard drive for two years, hung heavy in the air at the Forest.
Built around Tree’s unmistakable vocals, the track built into a soaring, colorful house drop that brought an uplifting close to the set.“It’s time to celebrate life, baby,” he said before the drop.
For T-Pain, who has recently been performing electronic sets under his Teddy Pain moniker, the debut added another significant chapter to a fast-moving entrance into the bass music world.Known primarily as one of the defining voices of late-2000s and 2010s pop, R&B and rap, he has recently adopted dubstep production and performance, turning what initially felt like a left-field experiment into a serious new creative lane.
His first official dubstep track, a collaboration with Sullivan King and Zoey808 called ‘Push Up,’ dropped two weeks ago.Prior to the release, he DJed at Excision’s Lost Lands festival in 2025 before headlining his first bass show in Atlanta in December.
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