Ahead of the Grammy Awards on Sunday, Jacob Collier is commemorating his album of the year contender “Djesse Vol. 3” by auctioning off 12 non-fungible tokens (NFTs), one for each song on the record.
Each NFT — a cryptographic digital asset that cannot be replicated — contains a hi-res image of the digital session for one of the 12 songs on “Djesse Vol. 3,” showcasing a breakdown of Collier’s meticulous recording process.Collier’s sessions — which typically contain up to 600 individual instrumental and vocal tracks, just for one song — have long been a source of intrigue to his fan base.
Collier, who is a four-time Grammy winner, often livestreams these session breakdowns, which attract hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube, and has even printed images of the finalized sessions onto his merch before. But now, these NFTs will make it possible for fans to zoom in and see every detail of Collier’s creative process, for the first time ever.
“These are immensely detailed, ultra-hi-resolution images, on epic proportions, ranging from 20 million to 220 million pixels apiece,” Collier tells PvNew. “This enables track names, waveforms, volume levels, track groups, color coding and written-word detail to be explored architecturally, the way I viewed these songs as I created them. As an artist committed to independence and innovation, I’m excited and inspired to be releasing these as NFTs.”
In addition, each NFT holder will gain entry for themselves and one guest to all Jacob Collier headline shows worldwide for as long as they hold the NFT in their digital wallet. If the NFT is resold, show access will pass along to the new owner. And, any individual who simultaneously holds three or more of the digital session NFTs at one time may attend the soundcheck for any Jacob Collier headline show with up to three guests.
NFTs are a craze right now in the music industry, with artists such as Mike Shinoda and Grimes auctioning off their own digital artwork and songs, and Kings of Leon even releasing their new album, “When You See Yourself,” as a NFT. Though NFTs are raking in big bucks for artists, some are also using the money for good, with Shinoda creating an art scholarship, Grimes donating a percentage of her sales to Carbon180 and Kings of Leon giving $600,000 of their proceeds to Live Nation’s Crew Nation initiative.
However, NFTs are also facing backlash for their environmental impact, as most of them exist on the Ethereum blockchain, which burns huge amounts of energy in order to “mine” these tokens. As a result, Collier is hosting the auction on Zora, a marketplace that has recently committed to curbing the carbon emissions created by Ethereum by paying for a 20-ton carbon offset from a wind farm in Hondoruas, and a 30-ton offset from an effort working to sustain and protect the Amazon rainforest. Collier will also donate a portion of the proceeds made from the NFTs to the purchase of carbon offsets and research regarding environmentally-friendly blockchain technology.
“I believe that this technology has the potential to reshape how artists and the general public interact for decades to come,” Collier says of NFTs. “There are immense challenges native to this technology, and a hefty environmental footprint to boot. So, in full commitment to a sustainable future, I will be using proceeds from this experiment to fund carbon offsets and research into sustainable forms of this creative outlet in the future.”
Collier’s auction will be held on Zora from noon PT on March 12 through noon PT on March 13.
