Streaming music giant Spotify has rolled out a new token-gated playlist pilot as its latest Web3 experiment.
Included in the pilot are a handful of NFT projects, including Overlord and Kingship, allowing holders from each project to test out a unique crypto integration with the streaming platform. Essentially, the feature allows members of the special communities to connect to a crypto wallet that holds one of the Ethereum NFTs and gain access to an exclusive Spotify playlist.
Overlord does more than just NFT collectibles, calling itself a “gaming and entertainment brand” with an animation deal already inked with Seth Green to use the Creepz NFTs. Kingship, meanwhile, is a virtual band from Universal Music Group’s 22:22 label. It is related to Gorillaz and consists of fictional band members inspired by Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs.
Currently, the new token-gated service is only available on Android and in the US, UK, Denmark, Australia and New Zealand.
“The user simply clicks on the playlist. It takes you out to your preferred wallets, be it MetaMask or Ledger; it depends on how you store your assets,” Overlord co-founder Joe Carnell told me Decrypt. “It will ask you to sign and then it will give you access to the playlist.”
For Overlord, holders of their Creepz NFTs will have exclusive access to the playlist. The playlist includes songs like “Vitamin C” by CAN, “Shimmy Shimmy Ya” by Ol’ Dirty Bastard, “Rocket Man” by Elton John and more than 100 other tracks.
“The playlist is built around our internal narrative of invasion,” Carnell said, citing the project’s titular “mega-mutant lizard” Overlord, “who is known for invading various planets.”
It’s not just about the music either, Carnell said.
“Spotify has been notorious for championing good UX principles in the way they develop their methodology and product principles,” he said Decrypt. “We were really excited to align ourselves with a brand that thinks UX first.”
The music streaming platform can already benefit from the piece as well. The Overlord founder said he’s already seen members of his community download Spotify for the first time, or upgrade to a premium subscription to enjoy an uninterrupted, ad-free version of the invasion playlist.
“The opportunity for us to change user behavior and drive the kind of KPIs that Spotify wants, because we can put it in a context that [users] love, is really powerful,” Carnell said.
This user behavior can be further tweaked with this token gate as it allows for additional benefits, co-founder Dominic Smith said, pointing to potential benefits such as album releases or “behind-the-scenes exclusive interviews with certain musicians.”
Spotify began testing Web3 integrations last year, a company representative confirmed to the publication Music Ally in May that some musicians were testing a feature to promote NFTs on their artist profiles. The company had previously published job advertisements that referred to Web3 earlier in 2022.
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