The blockchain industry is leaving no stone unturned. Right from revolutionizing the finance sector to making art more exhilarating, blockchain is the gift that keeps on giving, and the music industry is not one to be late to a party.
Various artists around the world are embracing crypto investment. Some of the big names to be associated with this development are Snoop Dog, Ne-yo and Akon from the United States who are in partnership with companies developing entertainment using NFT (non-fungible technology) assets. Henry Coco-Bassey (a.k.a Hector) is also giving Nigerian artists a platform through NFT trading while South African artists Anatii and Cassper Nyovest are representing from the South.
This year, Snoop, Ne-Yo and David Guetta have partnered with one of the companies bringing the music industry to the Metaverse called Stage 11. Stage 11 is a development company based in Paris, France that innovates music through NFT technology. The company reimagines music for the metaverse (a virtual reality space built on the blockchain) with an aim to “create a new way to experience music by combining gaming, mixed reality and digital collectibles”. Stage 11 aims to explore all the features of the metaverse. One other significant accomplishment made by Stage 11 is having partnered with Paris Fashion Week.
Hector, a music producer from Nigeria, is one of the more notable African artists using the blockchain technology. He was inspired to pursue NFT innovation due to his exasperation with how the business side of music works: which often results in artists making music from which they make little to no income from. While on a brief hiatus from music, he got the idea to launch Unique Sirius, a pioneer record label that publishes music as NFT. Through Unique Sirius, Hector is helping artists from Africa and the world over to gain fair income from their music. He has also founded Soundmeta which is a web3 music service. Hector has reportedly had a successful sell-out of 10 copies of music NFTs in two weeks.
Representing South Africa are Anatii and Cassper Nyovest. Anatii is an investor and promoter of web3 development. His Twitter followers may be familiar with the ‘.eth’ on his Twitter handle associated with Ethereum (ETH) investors and traders. On the other hand, Cassper Nyovest has partnered with Sportsbet.io and Bitcasino.io, the world’s leading crypto sports betting site and casino respectively.
Both Anatii and Cassper Nyovest have been teasing fans on social media with a collaboration with some NFT involvement. Cassper Nyovest recently posted: “this broker can’t stop speaking about NFTs. Will we even get into the studio?”. For now, that is all the tea the artists have spilled, however, due to prior involvement of both artists in the crypto space, it may just be a matter of time…
The integration between the music industry and blockchain is all but assured due to the benefits artists are bound to have as a result. All the artists that have partnered with blockchain have met with measurable success, so it may just be a matter of time before the artist based near you joins the party.