Swedish House Mafia‘s Steve Angello is among a group of investors in a new blockchain platform, anotherblock.
Based in Stockholm, anotherblock is launching a blockchain-based marketplace for music rights, which the company says will “support music creators and increase the value of their work by launching a marketplace for music rights which will use blockchain to democratize music ownership.” The platform will allow artists and labels to sell parts of songs to investors, with the project intending to create greater ease around music rights management.
“anotherblock’s initial goal is to make it easy for anyone to buy a part of their favorite song,” Angello tells Billboard. “By allowing labels and artists like me to easily sell parts of our songs on anotherblock’s marketplace, we can invite our fans to share the success. However, their vision is far larger than that. The technology makes it possible to store music rights on blockchain and simplifies music rights management, bypassing many of the middlemen in the industry today.”
Set to launch in the first half of 2022, anotherblock intends to make it possible for investors to access prominent asset-classes, open music rights ownership to a broader market and create more value of the music itself.
The platform raised $1.2 million in a pre-seed funding round, with investments coming from Angello, Sebastian Knutsson, the founder of King, the company that makes Candy Crush, Stardoll Media CEO and co-founder Mattias Miksche and angel investor Mathias Ackermand. Project advisors include music producer Doc McKinney, who won a Grammy for his work on The Weeknd’s Starboy.
Anotherblock will initially focus on NFTs, NFTs by introducing tokens connected to royalty rights. These NFTs will generate royalties corresponding to ownership. The company will also mint NFTs where the buyer is the sole individual who can acces sthe art, either in-person or inside the metaverse. Artists who put their rights on the blockchain will receive a transaction payment or trade-royalty every time the NFT is traded, in perpetuity.
“Unless profound changes are implemented in the way that artists can monetize their creativity, the music industry is in a race to the bottom,” anotherblock CEO Michel D. Traore says in a statement. “anotherblock is the solution: harnessing the latest technology and industry expertise, our platform will protect the creators, and support them as they continue enriching society and our culture.”
With his investment, Angello joins the rapidly expanding group of electronic music artists getting into the web3 space, following others like deadmau5, Steve Aoki, Richie Hawtin, Claude VonStroke, Blond:ish and more.
“To me,” Angello says of the web3 space, “understanding new tech and business models is always advantageous.”