Music NFTs Part 4: Artist Profile 2
This NFT artist is a bit niche, but insanely sticky. And I'll prove it with the data. If you're into nostalgia, this the music NFT for you.
If you missed Artist Profile 1, it was Ayotemi. You can catch up here. This one is totally different. What's funny is I'm actually not a huge fan of 80's music. My wife is though. So when I heard this track I bounced it off her to see if it was as good as my intuition indicated. Needless to say, she thought it was good. Nostalgia is all the rage right now. I mean Pokémon cards are an investment asset again (maybe). Sealed Super Mario games are pulling in 7 figures at auction. If you've been following me for longer than a few months, you've probably noticed the alternative investment coverage that I've given to sports memorabilia, rare books, VHS tapes, and yes, video games. I've rolled all of these ideas up into what I'm calling "The Culture Trade."
A massive component of the "Culture Trade" thesis, is nostalgia. We love nostalgia. Especially in music. Look at Bruno Mars. The guy has essentially risen to Super Bowl halftime performer because his entire creative approach for the last decade has been retro. From his music down to his look. I mean look at this picture for God's sake. He's currently the 11th most streamed artist on Spotify with 55 million monthly listeners. Now, to be clear, I'm not saying that anything retro is a guaranteed hit just because Bruno Mars is a genius. But what Bruno Mars is good at is creating retro sounds that are stylistically authentic. You could play "Locked Out of Heaven" right after "Roxanne." You could play "Finesse" right after "Poison." You could play "Leave the Door Open" after "Me and Mrs. Jones." All of it fits perfectly.
The point is, authenticity is the key to good retro. And if you're looking for authentic 80's synthpop, YATTE is terrific.
Bio and Style
Here's how YATTE is described on Mint Songs:
YATTE (pronounced YAH-tay) craft the soundtracks for top-down drives home from your next technically illegal all-nighter. Operating out of Austin, Texas, YATTE is a collaborative enterprise piloted by vocalist, synth player and producer Alex Chod. YATTE’s Yacht Rock tinged debut single Time Wasted was released at the end of 2019, as the project quickly gained a passionate, nostalgic fanbase within Synthwave and Retrowave communities. The following two years saw three albums (Shadow Work, Sweet Shelter and yecco emecco), release in quick succession.
via Mint Songs
So there you have it. If you want a Synth play, YATTE might be right up your alley.
Spotify Metrics
YATTE's Spotify numbers aren't nearly as robust as Ayotemi's. And that's okay. It's a completely different audience and YATTE's genre is a bit more niche, for now. The important thing is the trend is strong.
Monthly listeners: 5,979
Followers: 5,294
What's interesting about that follower number is despite how small it is it's almost identical to the monthly listeners. If we create our own gauge on "stickiness" by taking followers and dividing by listeners, we can really get a sense for how YATTE's fan loyalty compares with peers in the 80's synth community. Check this out:
I did my best to identify what I felt were 80's synth acts. If we can agree that the artists in the table above are YATTE's peers, we can see just how mind bogglingly high YATTE's stickiness ratio is. At 88.5%, people who like YATTE, really like YATTE. Though the fanbase is small, it is ridiculously engaged. And I was careful to compare the stickiness ratio for both acts with similar follower numbers and acts with much bigger follower numbers. It didn't matter. Big audience or small, YATTE's fan loyalty crushes everyone else's. So what's with the lack of reach? YATTE's fans aren't putting tracks in playlists, they're listening to full albums. "Time Wasted" is YATTE's only playlisted track. That one song accounts for all of the playlist reach in Spotify. The other factor to consider is years active. It's a variable I thought might have an impact on stickiness, but it really doesn't. We can confirm from the bubble plot below:
Can you find YATTE on the chart? Top left. A very clear outlier. What we see from this trend is the longer you've been in the game, the stickier you become. YATTE is already bonkers level sticky. Especially when compared to someone like Cassetter who has been active the same amount of time and has a very similar follower number.
There's only 1 NFT
That's right. There's only 1 NFT of YATTE on Mint Songs. It's the single "Time Wasted" from 2019. Right now there are 27 of 50 editions remaining. And one edition will set you back $1.69 in ETH. I mean... cmon.
Risks
This section is going to be almost word for word the same as yesterday, but I'm going to repeat it. There's always risk with NFTs and digital assets. But when you add the risk derivative that is subjective appreciation of art on top of it, you really have to be careful in this space. I'm taking this very seriously because I don't want to lead anyone into a worthless investment. That's why I said in Part 1 that one of the reasons why one might buy music NFTs is specifically to support the artist as opposed to making an investment return. NFTs that offer a royalty, are much better as investments. Mint Songs doesn't offer that (currently). These are speculations for now. Pure and simple. And a lot of them are going to wind up completely worthless. The key is finding the right ones to take fliers on if you view music NFTs as speculative bets worth making, as I do.
At this point, I've supported dozens of artists on Mint Songs. Most of those who I've supported are pretty good. I'd go see a show if they were here. But most of them are never going to be huge, and that's totally okay. One of the big themes of Web3 and music NFTs is how we reallocate the value rewarded to creators. Demand for some of these NFTs on secondary sales will be minimal if it even exists. However, there are artists on the platform that I think will really excel in this environment. YATTE is one of them. As is Ayotemi. That said, there are other risks in music NFTs beyond just artist success. There's a dilution risk. We have no guarantees that songs can't end up on multiple platforms. We have no idea which crypto networks will still exist in 10 years. Maybe YATTE becomes a household name in music but the Polygon network where the NFTs are minted falls apart. These are all things to consider.
Conclusion
I'll admit, I'm not a huge fan of 80's synth or yacht rock. That said, I know when I hear something if I like it or not. And I like YATTE. $1.69 is slightly more than what the track would cost on iTunes. But on Mint Songs you get it as an NFT that could potentially be worth much more down the line. No brainer to me. Easy buy. I'm going to re-share the details about how to buy from yesterday. Remember you need a Metamask wallet just to take custody of the NFT. So download one. From there, you'll probably want to use Moonpay to get the ETH that you'll need onto the Polygon network. If you start with ETH on the Ethereum network you'll get massacred in gas fees trying to bridge it over.
With Moonpay, you can buy Ethereum with a debit card and have it sent to your Metamask wallet. This is important: you must have the ETH sent to the Polygon (MATIC) network, not the Ethereum network. Mint Songs uses Polygon for minting, not Etheruem. Trust me, that's a good thing. Even though I hate KYC and it goes against the ethos of crypto, it's worth setting up the Moonpay account if you're serious about doing NFTs going forward. Any legitimate crypto on-ramp is going to hit you with KYC regs at this point anyway. What's another one, right?
Coming up tomorrow I'll share over a dozen additional Mint Songs NFTs that I've purchased. I'll share audience metrics for each song. And I'll detail my process when deciding whether to buy a track or not.
Disclaimer: none of this is investment advice. I have no music expertise. I was an NPR-affiliated radio show producer for four years. My primary shows were Hip-Hop/R&B and Jazz. After college, I produced and hosted a nationally syndicated Jazz program for 3 years. I do have experience finding and selectively highlighting independent musicians and artists.