Kings of Leon, Mike Shinoda (Linkin Park), Grimes: the musicians get in tune with the “NFT”, virtual objects with popular sales but which raise questions, especially in terms of rights.
It’s an acronym you have to get used to. “NFT” is a “non-fungible token”, or non-fungible token: a digital work with DNA in theory non-piratable, thanks to “blockchain” technology, popularized by cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin. The art world is already losing its Latin: an entirely digital work by the American artist Beeple was sold on March 11 for 69.3 million dollars by the auction house Christie’s.
A week earlier, without causing such a uproar, the American rock group Kings of Leon was also heard by selling their last album, “When you see yourself” in “NFT” version, at the same time that they offered it. via traditional platforms such as Spotify or Apple.
Fans could also acquire at auction “NFT” around the visuals of the group (with the paw of Matthew Followill, guitarist of the group and photographer in his spare time). The auctions could also lead to concrete / physical things such as collectors’ vinyls or “golden tickets” offering lifetime seats in the front row for all the group’s shows around the world.
More than $ 2 million – including 600,000 donated to a solidarity fund of the turner Live Nation for its unemployed musical technicians, Covid-19 obliges – were collected, according to the American musical bible Rolling Stone.
– Infatuation –
A craze that testifies “to the appetite of fans for more ways to connect to the musicians they love”, told AFP Josh Katz, boss and founder of YellowHeart, a launching platform used by the Kings of Leon for the operation.
The rockers of Tennessee are not the first musicians to make their range in the “NFT”. Mike Shinoda, figure of US rap / metal band Linkin Park, had previously sold a single in “NFT” mode, with an animated visual created alongside contemporary English artist Cain Caser. The press also echoed the auctions which brought in 12 million dollars for the American DJ 3Lau (with “NFT” to celebrate the 3 years of her album “Ultraviolet”) and 6 million dollars for the Canadian singer. Grimes (partner of Elon Musk) with audiovisual creation / unpublished title packages.
Are the “NFTs” then the new promised land? “The NFTs are ushering in a new era for music,” assures Josh Katz. “We are starting to see the music industry moving towards a decentralized model” with artists who “will monetize content again”. The ideal of “direct to fans”, “directly with the fans”, is not far off.
– Moral rights and ecological balance –
Maxime Thibault, Innovation and Ecological Transition Expertise Manager at the National Music Center (CNM) in France, is more nuanced. “There are positive aspects, we can finance his projects, even without being very well known, and we can take care of the relations with his fans, even his super-fans”, he describes for AFP before highlighting “caveats”. “Will ask the question of the rights collected: who touches what between composer, performer, producer, especially if the NFT are then resold?”, Summarizes the specialist.
The circumspection turns to alarmism in Emily Gonneau, author of “The Artist, the Digital and the Music”. “If this technology is put at the service of artists, that is very good, but if there is no safeguard, artists risk being dispossessed of their moral rights”, points out the expert.
“Anyone can call themselves a creator and sample anything with NFTs,” she insists. And to warn against a temptation of “speculation of people having nothing to do with creation, nor the creators, and having access to this technology; there we are in a gold rush in a Wild West where nothing is not framed “.
Maxime Thibault also asks the question of the “ecological balance”: “blockchain technology is enormously energy intensive, Ethereum (cryptocurrency network) thus represents the energy consumption of a country like Ecuador according to certain projections, it can be a brake “.
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