NFTs are the new hotness for music and art collectors. You may not know what an NFT even is at this stage in the game -- but there's almost no escaping them now.
NFTs live within digital mint and wallet systems that function like Bitcoin but instead of holding money, NFT's (non-fungible tokens) hold assets -- like music, art, or concert tickets. Over time, NFTs can be expected to increase in value, and proceeds generated from resale are able to be funneled where the artist decides -- and artists across the musical spectrum are jumping on the bandwagon.
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We already reported on the successful launch of Kings Of Leon's newest release When You See Yourself via NFT, which brought in $2 million in sales, allowing the band to donate $600,000 to Crew Nation in support of live music crew members affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dreamy Alt-pop singer Grimes also got in on the craze early, raking in $6 million in only 20 minutes auctioning off some of her digital artwork.
Rob Thomas and Matchbox Twenty have announced the imminent launch of their own auction for a multimedia, NFT token experience of the band's 2009 hit song “Unwell” -- and have chosen RADical Hope and The Trevor Project as their charities.
The auction drops today, Thursday, April 1 just after 8PM ET on OpenSea.io. Included in the NFT offering are non-commercial rights to this "Unwell" 1 of 1 multimedia experience, non-commercial rights to high-res digital images of the two original lyric sheets to be emailed to the original buyer, and a physical Rob Thomas signed proof of NFT as seen at the end of the "Unwell" NFT, framed and mailed to the buyer.
Slipknot is currently holding their own NFT auction for a one-off piece of digital artwork as well. M. Shawn ‘Clown’ Crahan has teamed up with Zora to offer up the band's original Knotfest Electric Theater logo complete with insects flying from Clown’s mouth. The auction also features an original piece of audio composed by Clown to go along with the looped clip.
It looks like The Weeknd is up next. The "Blinding Lights" singer just announced his own limited NFT sale will take place on Saturday, April 3 at 2PM ET. The collection of new music and limited edition artwork be available exclusively on Nifty Gateway, and starts with the offering of three different visual pieces, each featuring "filtered" clips of a new song.
An "exclusive 1-of-1 piece of art" will be offered in a 24-hour auction following the initial drop featuring the unfiltered new song, which The Weeknd will not be releasing to the public. The auction's winner will be the only owner of the track. In a statement, The Weeknd explained: “I’ve always been looking for ways to innovate for fans and shift this archaic music biz and seeing NFTs allowing creators to be seen and heard more than ever before on their terms is profoundly exciting. I intend to contribute to this movement and can see that very soon it will be weaved into the music industry’s mechanics."
Stay tuned for more NFT drops in the near future as the new form of fandom doesn't seem to be falling by the wayside any time soon.
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