The artists rolled into Miami with a wrapped bus touting their new NFT project. (Eli Tan/CoinDesk)
MIAMI â Electronic music producerdeadmau5and rock bandPortugal. The Manare looking to non-fungible tokens (NFTs), not music streaming services, to sell their next platinum record.
Some 250,000 of these NFTs will be sold at Miamiâs Art Basel festival for $1.29 a piece. The remaining NFTs will be sold as a mix of singles and bundled units and will come with additional rewards that have yet to be announced. A Mintbase representative told CoinDesk it has listed68,000 tokenson its site as of Thursday morning.
In a rarity for a music landscape dominated by platforms like Apple Music and Spotify, the artistsâ election to circumvent streaming services, and the largely unfavorable revenue sharing that accompanies them, is indicative of how musicians have been willing to experiment with blockchain to disrupt industry standards.
Fromconcert ticketingtomusic streamingtoNFT marketplaces, artists have used digital collectibles for utility largely similar to social tokens, where creators can continuously reward their token holders after an initial purchase is made. (Portugal. The Man has already experimented with social tokens, minting its PTM coin onsocial token platform Rallyin January.)
Deadmau5 has been a collaborator in numerous crypto-related projects as of late, having backed amusic-streaming DAOas well as aphysical NFT installationwith artist Gregory Siff at a Colorado music festival in November.
âItâs about adoption. Itâs about adopting this way of doing things for artists, and itâs also about public adoption and companies working together to adopt technology thatâs going to make this easier for everyone,â deadmau5 told CoinDesk in a statement. âItâs not about me working to better my bank account, itâs about all artists working to gain more control of their work.â