wavWRLD's Weekly Wavs 🌊🌐🎶 Issue #24
Your Guide to the Best Emerging Artists & Songs in Music x New Internet
gm and grand rising! Honestly, at this point you have us impressed. You’re showing up every day for a space with limited capital and an enormous amount of competition among hungry, talented artists. Opportunities are few and far between, and we’re still a little cooped up for the next month or two until the weather warms up. If you’re somewhere tropical, we’re jealous.
It doesn’t matter, though—every day the paradigm shifts bit by bit, and our tools and know-how get more sophisticated. At the end of the day, we’re building an ecosystem around the creation and discovery of excellent, independent music. If you can cut your teeth, hone your craft, and build an audience here, chances are you can do it anywhere. Grrrrr.
wavNEWS 📰
Reveel has announced that submissions for The Reveel Creator Grant open up this Monday 2/20 🏁 Join them & Decent in a Twitter space at 1pm EST today, where they will answer any and all questions you may have about this epic opportunity. Listen back to the space here!
Sound.xyz continues its run of shipping innovative and relevant tools by introducing Curator Rewards: an affiliate royalty for curators that successfully introduce songs to new collectors. As Sound continues to scale, the marketplace hopes to make sure the highest-quality music gets exposure as it continues to onboard more and more artists.
This is key to long-term growth—by creating an ecosystem with different levels of success and engagement, Sound creates more space for artists to find their own communities within the larger marketplace. The success of that strategy lies in the ability to find curators who support the Sound team in discovering music to promote. These rewards continue to solidify Sound’s creation and curation infrastructure, but we’re still missing a big piece of the puzzle: a market to sell to. More details here!
Web3 music aggregator Oohlala has taken an important step in connecting music NFT listens with sales by allowing for direct minting right on their platform! Browse Oohlala’s “Available to Mint” page to collect directly from the contract—no third-party fees here. With interoperability one of the biggest questions for how to bridge platforms and even chains, this direct mint option is both creatively and logistically a big step forward for the space. Learn more.
Nifty Music has developed a new release strategy called “Floor Drops”: an artist releases a 500 edition mint and sets the floor price at 0.01 ETH. Collectors must mint in bulk (at least a pack of 5 NFTs at a large discount), but then they can sell at prices more appropriate to the market. It rewards early collectors and still gives the artist up-front liquidity.
For Nifty Sax and WeiZ, the team behind Violetta Zironi’s Moonshot and Rae Isla’s Rocks, the focus is on creating as engaging of a game for collectors as possible. Collectors buy low-cost NFTs in bulk at wholesale, so they can price and sell inventory themselves: the incentives to create a secondary market are bundled into the cost of the NFT.
This is similar to a strategy Dyl has used for his trading cards. The point is essentially that the artist gets their cut on the initial sale and through royalties, then the collectors have the inventory necessary to create return for themselves in the long run. It also balances the risk of minting across a wider range of NFTs, giving more distributed chances for rare mints. Lastly, it enrolls collectors in helping build community. The first “Floor Drop” mint will happen next week with FiFi Rong. Pre-sale on Feb 26th at 12pm EST & public sale at 1pm EST. Join the drop party space!
As you can see, platforms are searching for ways to build collector ecosystems with financial rewards every step of the way. Even if the Music NFT market is not mature enough yet to fully support this infrastructure, Kevin Costner taught us that we need a field before we can play ball ⚾
wavLIST 🎶
Fresh wavs & what we’re listening to this week from the WRLD:
Yesterday, Feb 15th, Pastel dropped his Sound genesis of the song “Oxytocin” with Glasstempo, which was made during Songcamp’s 3rd writing camp/ hackathon Chaos.
Open edition for 0.03 ETH
Jazii’s R&B hit “Rain” ft. Miles Ryan Harris on Sound, which is about give and take, and how the giver needs just as much as the receiver; The rain replenishes both.
33 editions at 0.03 ETH
Twenty Duce’s song “Space Jazz” on Sound, which is a collab between him and TailorMade Tyson, who he has onboarded into web3. The song is simply about some of their favorite things..... Lust and Mary Jane.
Open edition for 0.02 ETH
Arama’s genesis music NFT on Decent, which is her creative take on Calvin Harris' song “Feel So Close.”
Open edition for FREE
Jonny October & GRL’s "Damage," which is an audio visual piece on Manifold. Written and performed by GRL and Jonny October, with music production and visuals by Jonny October.
40 editions at 0.02 ETH
wavALPHA 👀
Upcoming drops & projects that you need to know about:
Today, Feb 16th at 12pm EST, AL3C released Spanglish record “Por Tu Barrio” on Sound—A beautiful collaboration with friends Heybela and Pete Rango. Being 2nd gen latino, much of his favorite music combines Spanish & English. The new 🌊 is here and we love to see it!
Open edition at 0.01 ETH
Today, Feb 16th at 3pm EST, Aly fka Lackhoney drops 4 songs from SWEETS 2, an album of 12 songs that are each 30-seconds long, on Sound. It’s the first project under his real name, Aly. Read more about it here.
Each song will be an open edition for 0.01 ETH
Listen + Mint on Sound or at: http://aly.works
Today, Feb 16th at 3pm EST, Elcee the Alchemist releases his music video NFTs on Glass for his song “Netflix,” which sold out on Sound. Shot in his old ends in East London, it’s a flashback to a time when he first began creating music. It reflects his surroundings and the inspiration he found in the mostly overlooked colors, shapes and structures around him 🧱
20+ editions at 0.5 SOL
On Thursday, Feb 23rd at 5pm EST, new and collaborative dance project BOY2K drops their Sound genesis of song “Close Friends (VIP),” a tongue-in-cheek homage to social media culture and the first original single from BOY2K sliding into your DMs.
25 editions for 0.02 ETH
On Thursday, Feb 23rd at 4pm EST, Miles Ryan Harris releases Bars On The Blockchain Vol. 4 video NFTs on Glass for his the series Bars On The Blockchain—A recurring series highlighting Hip-Hop and lyrics within Web3. Each video features a performance that is written, recorded, mixed, mastered, filmed, and edited by Miles Ryan Harris.
10+ editions at 0.5 SOL
Collectors on Glass will receive a free claim for the Music NFT when it's released on Sound.xyz as Bars On The Blockchain Vol. 4 (Stella's Groove).
wavTIPs 💡
What’s hot right now? What’s the “meta?” If you have a drop coming up, chances are you are asking yourself: “What can I do to capture the hype of the moment to help grow my reach?”
It’s a question worth asking for sure. Even in the depths of a bear market, we see NFT projects moon on a regular basis. Imagine what could happen to your project if you caught just a little bit of that magic!
That’s the problem with magic, though—either it’s a human pulling some kind of sleight of hand, or it’s beyond our control. Sometimes these projects are just as surprised as any one of us that they blew up. More often, however, it’s a combination of long-term building and crafty growth marketing that triggers one thing leading to another. That sounds like sleight of hand to me.
So what is it about your project that makes it stand out from everyone else? Is it the music? Is it your persona? Is it your branding? Or is it a broader creative strategy that you’ve built and then iterated with immense attention to detail? Where is the magic?
Join wavWRLD 🤍
Subscribe below!
Follow us: Twitter | Instagram | TikTok | Lens | Discord
Thanks to our contributing writer Fred•Riko & our editor-in-chief & curator Violetta!
It’s all about the wavs we make with friends along the way.
-wavWRLD 🌊🌐🌱
Disclosure: Writer Fred Riko & Editor/ Curator Violetta Hyland may occasionally own the NFTs of certain artists mentioned & certain platforms/ protocols highlighted. Their wallet holdings & activity can be viewed openly on the blockchain. We prioritize featuring wavWRLD members & contributors.