Hello, again…or for the first time. Whatever. Just wanna dump a bunch of thoughts on you guys about what I think it takes to be able to see success in the world of NFTs as a rapper in this current arc of the story of the space. I’ll spare you the rant about how bad the laundry list of rappers drops have been thus far — if you follow me on twitter you got that, so let’s just dive right into the reason you’re here. After finishing it (I’m adding this sentence as the last thing I type in the post), I realize this is very long so take your time or take it in doses.
To start, there are a few important things to get out of the way before you even think about what you’re gonna make as an NFT. First, and this will likely be the case for many people reading, you gotta own your music. If you’re in a deal or an agreement or whatever with someone else surrounding the rights to your music, there’s gonna be trouble when you start getting to the bag, so that’s the first thing. The next most important thing, in my opinion in having an understanding of what NFTs are further than it being something that can give you a percentage of secondary sales of the NFT. Rappers especially are so excited about being able to receive continuous royalties from the sales of their work after initial sale but that dream isn’t even fully realized yet. I remember Dame Dash saying that once he heard about the secondaries, he was sold on NFT. There’s a lot more to that than the meets the eye. The last thing in the “first thing” section will get it’s own paragraph, so I’ll jump there now — even though this isn’t really a complete feeling sentence.
To round out the important things to get out of the way before thinking about what NFTs you’ll make, making an effort to learn and be involved in the NFT community at large is MASSIVELY important and potentially the most underrated thing for rappers in the space. We recently saw this happen to a massive effect when Jay-Z purchased a Cryptopunk and changed his profile picture on Twitter to it. If you have the means, spending a little money on an NFT and publicly announcing that is a very very simple way to start building up the current that will be the wave of your entry into the space. I always say that in order to be successful in NFT, you should think about three things:
Authenticity to yourself and what you do.
Authenticity when it comes to the NFT space. We can spot a fake or cash-grabber.
Respect to the technology, even if you aren’t initially taking advantage of it.
Make sure you’re keeping this and the previous paragraph in mind before you even begin.
The next thing, and the truly exciting thing for many, is thinking about what NFTs to make. First thing, for those just joining NFT, you are allowed to release a song on streaming platforms as well as have the NFT out. The NFT is a signifier on the blockchain that whoever collects your token got it directly from you and THAT is what’s valuable about the token. When someone plays your song on Spotify, they receive it from Spotify…or if they download it on Amazon or iTunes or whatever, they receive it from the platform, but NFT is directly from you, the creator, to the collector. Now I’ll go ahead and save you the consulting fee (unless you wanna pay it) and throw out a bunch of ideas for artists, especially rappers in the space. The obvious first one is something audiovisual. This can be something as simple as a loop in collaboration with someone who does motion graphics or 3D visuals or 2D animation or whatever, all the way up to a music video. If you’re creating a music video, I think it would be really cool to create NFTs of things that appear in the video, sort of like Easter eggs. You know how in every music video these days, there’s that random Beats Pill? Of course that’s them paying in order to be in the video, but imagine instead of that, you place something strategically in the video, either to be seen or in the background, and you minted those, allowing people to sort of participate in the music video experience as someone who has collected an item in the video. A poorly executed (because he didn’t follow the previous paragraphs) example of this is when A$AP Rocky released the series of cars he was taking around with him during tour for his album Testing and dropped them on Nifty Gateway. Speaking of going on tour, if we start to take advantage of the technology, we can use NFTs to grant people special access to experiences, or even to you at concerts. Allowing there to be a “Golden Ticket” style NFT to a sold out concert that grants the highest bidder backstage access and some time with you, the artist, could go for a lot. The best example of this is when Citizen Cope auctioned off 4 tickets to a sold out show in NYC in May as his return to the stage after the pandemic for 7.7777 ETH ($16,712.72 at the time of writing but was over $20K at time of sale [ETH is on a lil vacation right now]). It also came with a download link that only the token holder could see that was to an early version of a then yet to be released song. Taking the tour concept one step further, there’s something known as a POAP, (we say it as poh-ap), which stands for Proof of Attendance Protocol, which is an NFT serves as sort of a ticket stub that you attended or participated in something. We often see this in relation to metaverse experiences, but these are so low cost that they can be minted at no cost to you or a very low cost, and there’s an app that allows you to view them directly on your phone without need for a wallet. Granting someone with a certain amount of your POAP tokens, let’s say having attended 4 of your concerts on this specific tour, then can receive a reward, whether physical or digital. This is also really awesome because people are able to buy sell and trade your POAP tokens on Opensea, the NFT marketplace, after a simple migration process. This creates a new life for tickets to shows that have already happened and could be really cool. The guys over there are super nice and you should hit them up. I have a POAP with the founder’s face on it. If you do decide to mint the music directly, doing it as part of the whole NFT experience is a much more sound way to do it then just releasing the song and saying “buy it on the blockchain.” I would also like to propose that while I am in full support of releasing on both streaming services and through NFT, I think there’s something to be said about releasing a work to the NFT holders first and allowing them to enjoy having the file on their device before everyone else. I released a song as NFT in April and I think I’ll be releasing it sometime in July. You want to make sure that you’re offering the fans who went the extra mile for you an opportunity to feel special and supported reciprocally.
Great, so you did all of the things I said and now you’ve gone and sold your first couple of NFTs, but now the pressure is on because we’re all watching you. The ominous “we.” Another one of my phrases I use when talking about NFTs and people with pre-existing platforms especially is “what you do in between drops is arguably more important than the drop itself.” Making sure that you’re continuing to be involved in the NFT space by either sharing work or buying NFTs or participating conversations about it as you continue to learn and grow in the area will be pivotal to the success of your follow-up drops. I think this will be true until NFT hits mass adoption. It’s very small here so we can sort of see everyone and what they’re doing at once.
I think that’s it. I think comments will be on so we can chat in those. I love chatting on Twitter so let’s do that so other people can join in.
OH! Last thing, if a company hits you up and wants to help you release something on their platform but isn’t involved further than building the platform and taking their percentage, walk away! AND if anyone calls themselves a master in the space that’s false, too! Things are constantly changing, we’re all students!
Okay THAT is it. Sorry this is so long I hope it helps someone.
Amazing piece man truly
This is a great article, dead on and well written!