Recording artist Akon has had a very successful music career and has is developing his own cryptocurrency-based city. Now, he will be combining his two loves as he plans on releasing his next album as an NFT (non-fungible token).
In an exclusive interview with Esquire, the Locked Up singer discussed the importance of the crypto world and how NFTs will tremendously help artists in their careers now.
He always believed that recording artists “never really got their fair share of the profits for the work they produced.”
Believing that owning their art digitally, in the form of an NFT, will go a long way to ensure that the creator of the art will benefit more financially for that creation.
Akon also explains why he intends on releasing his next album and all future music via the NFT route.
“My next album is going to be an NFT album. With that, I’ll be able to monetize it from the day it drops on every platform that exists. What that means is that it opens the door to full transparency where your music is being played, who’s playing it, where they’re playing, and how many times it is played. Financially, you get the royalty every time someone shares it, so it makes sense to me, and that’s the route I want to go for all my future music releases.”
Akon may be one of the first artists to have had an interest in the cryptocurrency world. Nearly four years ago, he revealed the details of “Akon Crypto City” while speaking on a panel at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
“I think that blockchain and crypto could be the savior for Africa in many ways because it brings the power back to the people and brings the security back into the currency system and also allows the people to utilize it in ways where they can advance themselves and not allow government to do those things that are keeping them down,” Akon said at the Cannes Festival, according to The New York Post.
