Muse tops UK charts with NFT album, sets trends for Web 3.0 in the music industry by DailyCoin

The music scene is known for keeping up with the times, but who would have thought we’d see a #1 NFT album in the UK charts as early as 2022? English rock band Muse already have six number one albums to their name, but what makes their latest release ‘Will of the People’ so special is that it’s officially the first ever NFT record to climb to the top place in the lists.

Exciting for the world of music and web 3! Cool to see this release count in the music charts. https://t.co/5vjM38O2AG

— Sparky (@NFTSaraBaumann) September 5, 2022

‘Will Of The People’ limited to 1000 NFTs

The NFT version of the album accounts for less than 2% of total UK sales, selling 51,500 copies in its first week. The NFT music album format is called “digital pressing” and is already trending in the US, with Hip Hop supergroup Mount Westmore releasing their own NFT album, limited to just 505 copies.

NFT albums have the advantage of coming with exclusive benefits, such as:

• High resolution FLAC files,
• Limited edition album art,
• Inclusion in NFT fan club,
• Unlockable rewards and discounts.

Adding to the significance of the momentous event, the success of Muse’s ‘Will of the People’ album comes just months after the UK gave the green light for NFT album sales to be counted in the official music charts. The distributor of the album, Serenade, confirms that NFTs are seen as an innovation in the music scene: “It is a new way of experiencing music that unites artists and fans through a collectible.”

Sold out! Grab a piece of map history via the Opensea secondary market: pic.twitter.com/yMUyiORIX0

— Serenade (@serenade__co) August 26, 2022

While blockchain integration in the music industry is inevitable, Serenade emphasizes the importance of remaining environmentally friendly while creating NFTs for music albums. To this end, the distributor chose the Polygon network for the task⁠—a carbon-neutral blockchain that has been on the rise due to critical acclaim from Disney & Coca-Cola (NYSE: ). With Polygon working to become carbon negative by the end of 2022, the music industry is inching ever closer to the self-imposed metaverse.

British rock band Muse have become the first band to top the UK charts with an album sold in NFT format. Not using crypto is a significant disadvantage going forward.

— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) September 5, 2022

On the other side

• Currently, the highly centralized music scene revolves around large companies such as Spotify (NYSE: ) and Apple (NASDAQ: ). Consequently, the world of music seeks a decentralized solution; however, blockchain music platforms like Audius have their own problems, as the Audius platform recently suffered a major hack.

Why you should care

Blockchain technology has the potential to solve the music industry’s centralization problems. Legendary artists such as Paul McCartney, Kate Bush and 156 others signed a petition to the UK Prime Minister a year ago, urging them to “fix streaming” due to the prevalence of many independent artists who claim they are being ripped off by major music streaming services. Ultimately, such services control as much as a third of the distribution process.

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