The technology behind the NFT sector continues to be in hot demand. You see, NFT technology is versatile and goes far beyond just being a JPEG image.

Some projects use NFTs as ownership proof, providing them exclusive rights to whatever is contained in the NFT. Other NFTs serve as avatars to gain exclusive access to metaverses, while some give methods on staking to earn an additional income stream.

One industry that is ideally suited for an NFT revolution is the music industry. For the longest time, the music industry has been notorious for not paying artists and providing little benefits to fans.

Well, this is all about to change. The projects on this list all have the ability to completely reshape the future of music by integrating NFTs into the sector. 

5 NFT Projects Shaping Music Future

  1. CockyAn NFT lifestyle club providing holders access to world-class music events
  2. Gala Music – A music-focused NFT and streaming service by Gala Games
  3. NFT Tone – A subscription and NFT-based music library
  4. AirNFTs – A platform to mint music NFTs
  5. Audius – A HQ music streaming service that pays both fans and artists

A Closer Look at the 5 NFT Projects Shaping Music Future

1. Cocky

Cocky is an exclusive NFT lifestyle club that provides its NFT holders access to world-class music events. The project was birthed by the Parasol Group, a platform with a mission to change the definition of utility in the NFT space by providing exclusive real-world experiences to holders. 

 

Cocky intends to host once-in-a-lifetime events for its holders. The events will be experiences money can’t buy – but ownership of the Cocky NFT can. 

The NFT collection consists of 10,000 “Cocky Can” NFTs. These NFTs have 51 different skin variations and come with different colored lids (Silver, Gold, and Black) to represent the benefits holders receive at events. 

Owning one of the Cocky Cans allows holders to attend the once-in-a-lifetime events. They intend to hold two in-person events each year, alongside regular virtual events in the form of live streams. 

Each event will focus on electronic music in prestigious locations to provide an immersive experience for holders. In addition, they will have the opportunity to travel to unconventional places, where the event organizers will pay special attention to the location’s beauty, history, and culture.

Due to the geographical limits and event size of these unique locations, the Cocky team has created a system to benefit Cocky holders. The events will have different sizes, and tickets will be given out based on how many people the venue can hold. As a result, Cocky Can holders need to register their interest in attending the events on the website as soon as possible.

If a holder receives a ticket and is unable to attend, they have the option to list their ticket for sale on their custom-built, second-hand market. Only those that hold a Cocky Token are eligible to purchase tickets from the second-hand market, providing additional utility for the token.

 

 

The NFTs come with a tier-based system that is randomly assigned to holders.

The different tiers unlock a range of benefits that include:

  • Subsidized transport to and from the music events
  • Accommodation at the music events
  • Additional invites to bring along friends to each of the music events
  • Bar tabs to share with friends and family while enjoying the music
  • Exclusive merchandise from the artists and the team.

Furthermore, Cocky has created an entirely unique and novel utility for its NFTs, called Mutations. Holders of NFTs can earn mutations by attending events and participating in the ecosystem. 

The Mutations are presented in the form of a stamp similar to what you would receive on your passport when traveling internationally. In addition, these Mutations are displayed on the background of your NFT. 

As more mutations appear on a specific NFT, it becomes more valuable as it has attended more events and participated in the ecosystem. The Mutations system allows NFT holders to write their own stories on their NFTs and publicly display them for everybody to see. 

Cocky has the vision to continue expanding its community by throwing bigger and better events as time goes on. Eventually, they plan to open their events for general public admission once the brand becomes established. However, exclusive VIP benefits will still only be reserved for Cocky Can NFT holders. 

 

The NFTs are expected to be minted on the Ethereum network at some point in Q4 2022. Cocky is still yet to announce the date of the first event. However, the registration will be open for the first holder’s party after the mint is complete. 

2. Gala Music

Gala Music is a music-focused NFT and streaming service created by Gala Games. Gala Music is seeking to take advantage of the technology behind NFTs by using them to target music streaming.

Homepage Gala Music

Instead of record labels and streaming services owning and hosting music, Gala Music puts the power back into the hands of fans and artists. With music being hosted on the blockchain, artists have complete creative control to mint, drop, and distribute their own music however they want. 

Users of the service can become a streaming service by becoming a Gala Music Node. Node owners are required to host NFT music on their node, which is purchased through the marketplace. Then, the node owner can earn from the streams whenever someone plays that specific song in the node. 

Music lovers can listen to music on Gala through its streaming app. When a user plays a song, the network will search the list of nodes that contain the track. The software will then choose the node with the lowest latency and stream it to the user. 

The system mints $0.1 Gala Music Tokens for each track played. The newly minted tokens are distributed as follows:

  • 45% is split evenly among all the owners of the NFT track
  • 10% to all Music Nodes that are online
  • 5% goes to the specific node that streamed the song.
  • 50% goes to the artist

Gala Music has already attracted superstars onto its platform, such as Snoop Dogg. Snoop released his first NFT album on Gala Music, called Back On Death Row (B.O.D.R). Collectors were able to buy a Stash Box that contained an NFT to one of the 17 songs from the album. 

Overall, Gala is an NFT project with an ecosystem that can reshape the future of music.

3. NFT Tone

NFT Tone is a subscription and NFT-based music library. The platform allows users to discover songs, claim limited editions, and support their favorite artists. 

It is considered a decentralized NFT marketplace that empowers artists and fans to connect with each other.

Homepage NFT Tone

On the platform, musicians can upload, mint, market, and distribute their albums without going through agents or record labels that take a huge slice of the profit share. Instead, NFT Tone provides a platform where artists can directly market their music to their fans and collaborate by providing exclusive content and limited-edition releases. They can also market concert tickets and provide merchandise through the platform. 

The great thing about the NFTs on NFT Tone is that the artists retain 100% ownership and rights to their music. No record labels will claim the publishing rights, and no streaming service will take 80% of the advertising revenue as the distribution allocation is directly built into the NFTs.

NFT Tone is currently in the process of relaunching its marketplace to fans and artists with new features to complete the platform. They are also creating a metaverse so musicians and fans can congregate to socialize and host concerts.

In the future, NFT Tone intends to host its first NFT Tone concert for its fans in collaboration with some of the most prominent musicians on the platform.

They also intend to create an iOS and Android application for users to stream music from the platform and create partnerships with existing streaming music platforms. 

4. AirNFTs

AirNFTs is an NFT marketplace that allows users to mint, trade, and earn with NFTs. The platform has a specific section for musicians wanting to enter the NFT space. This music NFT marketplace allows musicians to create NFTs with their music.

Homepage AirNFTs

AirNFTs allow artists to create music and music video NFTs for under $1. This is because the platform is interoperable across multiple chains, including the Polygon, Binance Smart Chain, and Fantom networks, which can provide cheaper transaction fees than Ethereum. 

The platform currently supports MP4 and MP3 files for musicians that wish to upload their content to their fans.

So far, the platform has over 260,000 minted NFTs across all of its verticals, with around $16 million in trading volume. Some of the other verticals for AirNFTs include:

  • Art
  • Games
  • Sports
  • Photography
  • Influencer
  • Collectibles
  • Video

The great thing about AirNFTs is that it is incredibly user-friendly for novices. The process of minting an NFT is seamless, with an in-depth onboarding process to make it clear. Combining the ease of use with the low fees, AirNFTs is likely the best choice for musicians starting their journey into the NFT world. 

Using the marketplace, artists can promote their album releases to their audience. They can easily break the album down into tiny pieces and sell it as NFTs to represent fractional ownership on the blockchain. 

The platform isn’t just for top-tier musicians that are creating albums. It can also be used by producers that create beats to sell their instrumentals directly to other musicians in the marketplace. The great thing about selling beats as an NFT is that the end-users who own the beats have the complete right to sell them onward and earn a profit from any eventual royalty streams. 

5. Audius

Audius is a next-generation Web3 streaming platform that allows musicians to upload their music and fans to be paid for listening to music. 

Homepage Audius

Founded in 2018, it is a decentralized music sharing and streaming service similar to Spotify or SoundCloud that completely removes the middleman between artists and fans.

The platform gained popularity amongst venture capitalists after raising $5 million in 2018 from General Catalyst, Lightspeed, and Pantera Capital. In addition, it raised an additional $1.25 million from Binance Labs. 

Audius has already managed to attract many top names to its platform. Some famous superstars that currently host music on Audius include:

  • Deadmau5
  • Katy Perry
  • Nas
  • Jason Derulo
  • Steve Aoki
  • SKRILLEX
  • 3LAU

These artists have uploaded HQ Audio to the platform in 320kps audio files  – the highest quality from streaming services. 

The entire platform is powered by AUDIO, the native token behind the platform. The ecosystem contains a decentralized network of nodes that host the music, content nodes, and a group of discovery nodes to index the content.

90% of the revenue generated from streaming is given directly to the artists, with the other 10% being distributed to the nodes in the network. This is a much higher share than traditional streaming platforms that typically only send around 12% to artists on average. 

The great thing about Audius is that active artists are paid more on the network. Artists that interact with fans and have a higher level of engagement receive more AUDIO tokens. 

In addition, artists earn more rewards if they make it to the top of any of the following leaderboards:

  • Top 5 Weekly Trending Tracks
  • Top 5 Weekly Trending Playlists
  • Top 10 Monthly API App

Overall, Audius is well on the way to creating an entire ecosystem that can reshape the future of music distribution.

Conclusion

As you can see, multiple projects are attempting to revolutionize the music industry that has been dominated by a small handful of players for so long. Putting music on the blockchain puts the rights back into the hands of the artists and provides a method for more personalized interaction between artists and fans.

In our opinion, Cocky is likely to be one of the leading projects in the space. Owning a Cocky Can NFT gives holders real-world utility by providing them access to music events. As these music events become more popular, the value of the Cocky Can NFTs will continue to soar.