The music industry is notoriously centralized, with major record labels often controlling nearly every aspect of an artist’s career.
The rise of streaming platforms like SoundCloud and Spotify has helped democratize the industry and made it much easier to get your music to a wider audience, but building a devoted fanbase and surviving has been a challenge. Generating enough revenue for is still an uphill battle.
Enter Music NFT. For those in the blockchain space, non-fungible tokens are an opportunity for fans to directly support their favorite artists, an opportunity for musicians to build stronger communities with listeners, and an opportunity for content creators to become more substantial and sustainable. It represents an opportunity to build an income stream.
Cointelegraph’s new podcast for a better understanding of the topic agenda sat down with Adam Levy, host of mint — a podcast exploring the Web3 creator economy — and Mumbai-based crypto-native rapper Jay Kila, who founded OTP India, a digital collection and fan engagement platform for Indian hip-hop artists.
What exactly are music NFTs?
Levi said agenda Co-hosts Jonathan DeYoung and Ray Salmond say NFTs in music generally fall into two categories. The first is his NFT, which is ownership-based and is “essentially tied to IP. [intellectual property] Rights and Fees. Therefore, when you purchase NFTs, you receive the revenue generated by Web2 audio streaming platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music. ”
The second is a sponsorship-based NFT that “collects to support the artist” rather than granting ownership to the holder. According to Levy, “NFT benefits come from valuing secondary sales.”
“You can tokenize an audio file, put it on the open market, and find collectors who can buy it, get involved, and join you and your journey as creators in the music industry.”
How music NFTs are helping musicians
Jay Kira said agenda He first became interested in music NFTs in early 2020 after most of his performance opportunities were lost due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. He was struck by how this new technology offers artists a new way to make a living that replaces the traditional model. At that time he founded his OTP India with a friend.
“I thought it would be really cool to be able to sell an NFT. Even if you sell it for $300, it’s more money than the average artist could make from Spotify in 10 years or so,” he said. . “Unless you get millions of streams, it’s almost impossible to make a living streaming.”
Spotify says it paid out $7 billion in royalties in 2021 alone. This is “the largest amount ever paid to the music industry by a single retailer in one year in history,” the company claims. But most of that money goes directly to record labels and publishers, collecting huge percentages before handing over what’s left to the artist. Additionally, Spotify reportedly pays him as little as $0.003 to $0.005 per stream, with major record labels negotiating higher payouts than indie artists receive.
1.85 ETH (~$5.7k) in royalties per week.
It was produced by 36 people.
Spotify needs 1.4 million plays to generate this.
The primary sale of 10 ETH (approximately $31,000), equivalent to 7.75 million plays, does not count.
136 produced over 9.1 million. pic.twitter.com/cmwyI0yMa1
— rac.eth ⌐◨-◨ (@RAC) April 20, 2022
According to Jay Kira:
“I think NFTs are sort of the last hope for independent artists to move to this model where they can actually make money with their music in a more direct way. would confuse the
Building relationships between artists and fans
One thing both Levy and Jay Kila wholeheartedly agree is that music NFTs have the power to connect creators and fans directly.of mint The podcasts themselves are doing what they advertise and issuing free NFTs to their fans as a way to reward loyal listeners, grow their audience, and generate excitement.
“Publishing these free NFTs has had a ripple effect and I see thousands of hits on my website,” says Levy. “I’m getting so many new subscribers, I’m getting new listeners, and the ecosystem is growing every season.”
Related: NFT is a game changer for independent artists and musicians.
Meanwhile, Jay Kila’s OTP project aims to build a Web3 community for the Indian hip-hop scene around collectible digital trading cards, and it’s important to him that this community is accessible to everyone. “He priced each artist card at $27 because he wanted it to be affordable for the average person,” he said. “It’s not about making money, it’s about building a bond and community between fans and artists.”
In Levi’s words:
“There was no way we could tailor incentives to support artists directly through music NFTs, buy collectibles, and watch them grow as artists over time.”
To learn more about NFTs in music and how Levy and Jay Kila use blockchain to build communities and monetize their content, watch the full episode below. agenda On Cointelegraph’s new Podcasts page, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or TuneIn.
agenda is Cointelegraph’s new podcast exploring the possibilities of cryptocurrencies, blockchain, Web3 and how ordinary people can use technology to level up and improve their lives. Head over to the New Cointelegraph Podcasts section to check out Cointelegraph’s other new shows.