5 Web3 / Blockchain Use Cases for Music

Written By Shep Bryan

There's a revolution underway in the music industry, and it’s name is web3.

If you thought STREAMING shook everything up, you’re in for a wild ride in the 2020s.

Web3 and Blockchain technology is rapidly disrupting what we know and understand as best practice for fan engagement.

It’s also disrupting a boat-load of other things, but today’s post focuses on music examples.

What I’m sharing here is the tip of the iceberg on Music x Blockchain.

I know there's a lot to learn here, and many of you may feel like reading this post is like trying to understand magic.

But I wanted to lay this out quickly and call out a few ground-breaking examples that I think everyone in music needs to see and understand.

Here are several ways that artists are using blockchain to engage fans, monetize their audiences, and create a new kind of exclusive and trackable superfan experience.

TRULY EXCLUSIVE MUSIC OWNERSHIP

Hip-hop producer IllMind drops the first NFT-backed sample pack

IllMind is a music producer who has fully embraced the new era of the music industry. He has production credits on some amazing albums, including work for artists like J. Cole.

This is an artist known for live-streaming to his audience on Twitch and engaging directly with them there. He’s created a large base of extremely engaged fans by giving them access to his life, process, and ideas.

Now, IllMind has dropped Alorium, the first ever NFT-backed sample loop/melody pack.

Whoever ends up buying/winning this thing gets exclusive ownership of the samples in the pack.

This opens new opportunities for producers who want something “exclusive” to include in their music. It also opens new doors for !llMind’s super fans to spend their money on his creations.

At the time of posting, Alorium still has roughly 24 hours left before the auction is over. The current bid is almost 1.5Ξ (ether), or ~$2100 USD.

Up next…

3LAU drops the first tokenized album ever

Right now on 3LAU’s website, he’s running an auction for an NFT version of his album Ultraviolet, which includes a huge range of rewards for 33 of the winning bidders.

From his site:

Bid to win 1 of 33 NFTs redeemable for special edition vinyls, unreleased music, and special experiences. Plus receive bonus song NFTs.

As of right now, the bidding is up to a whopping $32,000. Holy cow. This is truly a new tier of super fan engagement.

I can honestly say that before the rise of these NFTs, I think the only way you could spend $32,000 on a music artists work would be paying for your entire family to h oave a VIP meet and greet that lasts maybe an hour or two.

But now? …Sheesh.

This is all still mind-blowing to me, and I keep my finger right on the pulse of these things. The future is arriving quickly.

Lastly for the exclusive ownership segment here, I’m covering one more unique concept.

Jacques Greene sells exclusive publishing rights to new song via nft

In this wild example of Music/Blockchain creativity, Jacques put a 6 second AV loop up for auction.

The rewards for the purchaser? All the riches in Scotland.

Just kidding. The rewards are actually that the auction winner gets exclusive publishing rights to an unreleased Jacques Greene song!

The winner of this auction ended up paying 13Ξ to win those exclusive rights, worth more than $19,000 in USD at the time of the auction.

This is a case where the art itself is really just a sidecar to the actual value of exclusively owning a piece of Jacques’ catalog.

COLLECTIBLE NFT ART DROPS FOR RAP SUPERSTARS

My friend @Tillavision recently dropped a massive NFT in collaboration with Chief Keef called Gotta Glo Up One Day.

And guess what?

It sold for 16Ξ (or roughly $29,000 at the time of the sale).

This all went down on the platform Superrare.co, a curated marketplace where approved digital creators can sell high-ticket cryptoart.

This may seem ludicrous to many of you reading this blog, but there is an entire realm of music and art fans who are frothing at the mouth over the idea of crypto art, digital art, virtual exclusive ownership, etc.

And this is especially so when it comes to owning collectibles associated with an artist.

We’re just at the tip of the iceberg here, so these collectibles are truly the first days of NFT art.

Ultimately I think this makes them very valuable in the long-term, especially once artists lean more heavily into NFTs.

Those early creations will hold a special place in the canon of every artist.

Up next is another Tillavision piece in collaboration with Swae Lee of Rae Sremmurd, called First Sounds on Mars.

And as of right now, the bidding is up to 6Ξ (or approx. $9,000 at the current Ether price).

It’s very cool seeing this new space emerge, and it’s clearly an opportunity that will mint many new stars throughout the 2020s.

I hope you found this read to be thought-provoking. :)

Shep Bryan

Shep Bryan is a revenue-driven technologist and a pioneering innovation leader. He coaches executives and organizations on AI acceleration and the future of work, and is focused on shaping the new paradigm of human-AI collaboration with agentic systems. Shep is an award-winning innovator and creative technologist who has led innovation consulting projects in AI, Metaverse, Web3 and more for billion / trillion dollar brands as well as Grammy-winning artists.

https://shepbryan.com
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