March has been an eventful month, make sure to stay tuned on updates by following on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and via Email!
Music Releases
Like many others, I was entranced by the new Tamil independent song "Enjoy Enjaami", which at time of publication is right around ~70MM views. Incredible track. Given that the song has a strong afrobeats vibe, I first tested out a mix of it with "Dumebi" by Rema on TikTok, and then given strong reception, released a full version in Audius, and (due to upload difficulty) a shortened version on Soundcloud. Check them out here: Audius / Soundcloud
April is set to be a big month as I have collaborations with Nachle Deewane, Origins Classical Championship, and an unannounced third competition in the works for the month. Its going to be a whole lot of new music, across some very diverse languages and genres, so make sure your passport is up to date.
NFTs in the last month have gone from a topic of discussion largely limited to crypto-forward circles to a topic used in popular parlance.
Now how did NFTs get on my radar? 2020 lockdowns caused me to (1) get back into the crypto world in general and (2) listen to lots of podcasts. Two podcasts paved the way for my introduction to the intersection of music and blockchain. The first was an episode of the Solana Podcast with RAC a grammy-winning producer and well-known figure in the space at the intersection of blockchain and music. That was the first time I heard about NFTs and the potential for using tokens to crowdfund music as well as monetize a fanbase.
A few weeks later, a good friend recommended I check out “Pod of Jake”, hosted eponymously by an intellectual personality known as Jake. His conversation with the producer and DJ 3LAU, had more gems, including ideas on how artists and fans can have aligned economic incentives where fans can earn $$ from promoting an artist’s work.
Tangentially and in the meantime, I built a profile and started releasing music on Audius, a decentralized music streaming platform, link to my profile here.
Why did I decide to mint an NFT? I thought the concept was cool and wanted to be an early mover in the space.
How did I mint the NFT? First, I chose a platform. @HelloShreyas, author of “Investing as Entertainment” was kind enough to send me a Zora.co invite so I went with Zora. I linked my Ethereum wallet to it and filled out my creator profile to start.
To create the art piece, I took a screen-recording from my DAW of a drop from a completed Future House track and layered it over the audio. I’d largely seen NFTs with either visual or audio-visual content and figured that was a good method.
Uploading and minting with Zora is very easy, as the site has great UI and UX. I waited for ETH price to drop for about a week after creating the NFT, and my gas fees were 70% lower the day I minted it thanks to the quick dip in ETH prices at the beginning of March.
Figure out what Blockchain you are minting on – Ethereum is getting cost prohibitive (See below)
Monitor ETH and Gwei prices – This can vastly change how much it costs both to mint your NFT, and for people to bid (if the platform is built on the Ethereum blockchain)
The market favors big names – the super high value music NFT sales are going to artists like Diplo, 3LAU, RAC, Disclosure, etc.
Better used for targeting your existing fans than expecting the “NFT to the Moon” hype train to fetch you a high selling price
The more engaging the visual content, the more likely your NFT will stand out.
The lower-end NFT market is and will become more saturated as friction is removed from the creation process
What’s next in this space?
Exploring other NFT minting platforms
Collaborating on audiovisual NFTs with talented visual designers
Thinking through how creators (especially in the Desi Dance scene) can utilize Web 3.0 artistic tools such as NFTs, Social Tokens, and Metaverses
February was a month marked by one major release and a few assorted TikTok and Reels snippets released.
The major release of February was the “2021 Telugu Vibes Mixtape” which has gotten some rave reviews! For all the audio links, please check the blogpost for the mixtape release.
Among the TikTok/Reels mixes, the most recent was the Fortnite Song / Bang Bang (TikTok, Reels) mix that combined a viral Fortnite parody of Estelle’s “American Boy” with the Bollywood song “Bang Bang. It was started and ended as a bit of a joke, but those songs go together incredibly well.
Top Tucker x Blockbuster (TikTok, Reels) was a kuthu combo- the new Bollywood/Kollywood banger “Top Tucker” mixes well with the Telugu banger “Blockbuster”. This one inspired some awesome choreo, getting tens of thousands of views. Check Harini’s take (TikTok, Reels) as well as Aaryan Kharel’s (TikTok), with more covers on the TikTok sound.
Last up was a TikTok mashup with the popular song “Beat It” by P. A. Teezy mashed up with “Adhiya” by Karan Aujla and, given that it was TikTok, had to end it with a little Pop Smoke, specifically “Mood Swings”. Check it out here!
