EXCLUSIVE: The Big Beat Drops with Crystal Method's New Album, Video And NFTs

If you're looking for a drop that's likely to please the NFT community this week, look no further than VeeFriends Series 2, now with a new animation style that looks, well, not as sketchy as the original series. The new series adds 15 new characters and re-imagines the original 236 characters. It also offers some new original cartoon commercials I recently featured on Benzinga's Web3 Anarchy show.

Entrepreneur, author, speaker, creator, and eminent NFT evangelist, Gary Vaynerchuck, has been predicting his hand-drawn characters, including Brave Bison, Amiable Anchovy, and Loyal Lobster, could become a new Disney-style universe of intellectual property. The new VeeFriends series seems to be an incremental step toward making that happen with artwork that looks more polished, like watching a character go from concept to initial character model between the two series. You can learn more about the drop on the VeeFriends website and the sale starts on April 25.

But if you're looking for art that goes a little harder, at the nexus of original animation and music, I turn your attention to Crystal Method's new drop.

If you were hanging out in clubs in the late 1990s, you may have a special place in your heart for Crystal Method, one of the pioneers that brought the U.S. big beat electronic music genre to the world as one of the most successful electronic acts of all time.

Method has lost one of its two founding members, Ken Jordan, who retired from music in 2017, but Scott Kirkland has adopted the band's name and continued the tradition of the band's fusion of techno, rock, and classic rap beats in hard-driving, danceable musical anthems. Now the band is commemorating its 25th anniversary with a new album drop, new video, and its first NFT drop on MakersPlace.

What Are NFTs? • Top Collections • Benzinga Crypto

You may remember MakersPlace is the NFT marketplace that brought us digital artist Beeple's "Everydays: First 5,000 Days", a collection of images taken every day by the artist for 13 years and presented as one piece. The 1/1 NFT associated with "First 5,000 Days" became the "NFT sale heard around the world" when it sold for approximately $69.3 million at Christie's in March of 2021, catching the attention of mainstream media all over the world and garnering what we guess was many more than 5,000 articles.

Billing itself as the home for rare and authentic digital artwork, Marketplace seems to be competing for the niche of highly curated collections of original art of all kinds.

The Crystal Method drop happens at 3:30 p.m. PT on April 26 and will consist of the official video for "Watch Me Now" video followed by an unspecified number of limited edition animation and open edition cels from the music video. The video is from the band's new album "The Trip Out", a post-punk album released under Ultra records.

The "Watch Me Now" video was directed by Micah Monkey (Micah Chambers-Goldberg) a director, animator, and illustrator who has collaborated with Eric Clapton, Interscope, the Philadelphia Orchestra, Shady Records, Jakks Pacific, Rockmafia, and Warner Music and major brands like Coca-Cola.

The original animation matches the band's frenetic music style with a narrative that, according to the press release, is about "a woman, dropped into the harsh Mojave desert in rags by two sinister men-in-black figures piloting a flying saucer. They torment her until she calls upon her crystal ship and takes her rightful seat as an other-worldly queen. She wreaks vengeance on Area 51 before rocketing off, along with The Crystal Method's tour bus to a crystalline Las Vegas."

I took some time to speak with Scott Kirkland and get his perspective on his continuing art and music in a changing world of digital ownership.

Scott Kirkland, Photo Credit: Sam Hodges

Benzinga: You have been making electronic music for 25 years with Crystal Method. Do you still love it?

Crystal Method: Yeah, I love it. It's a different world, obviously, then back when we kicked off in the late 90s. Things were very active in the world of record sales. People actually bought stuff… but the joy of being able to record music and get it out there is something that I've always had and I'm still having fun for sure.

Sometimes it's a grind when you go into a studio and stare at a screen and try to think of what the average Crystal Method fan would like to hear but… I can continue to take people on a journey and still sound like the band, but we're giving something different. So that's a challenge but that's also can be fun – if you get it right.

Image from "Watch Me Now" Cystal Method video by Micah Monkey

When were you first introduced to NFTs?

I became aware of them about eight months ago. There was a lot of chatter and I had people contacting me and sending me information… I find it fascinating. I'm excited. with this being my first NFT drop, and having someone like Micah Monkey create this really cool video to go along with it and working with Makerspace to launch it and get it out there. It's the best of the best opportunity for me to dive in and share some art and the track I love…I'm excited to finally have one out and then see where it goes from there.

Do you think of it like digital merch?

Yeah, having grown up going to rock shows… you'd buy a program… I had a Van Halen program, an AC/DC program, a Judas Priest program... You know, it's the idea of somebody taking something home with them or having something in their possession that is from a show or from a band. So yes, this does have that same quality, but it lives in a different world where everything's digital.

Everything has changed since my old ass was out buying Judas Priest programs but there's an incredible market for it and people that are younger and smarter than me are leading the way in this new community and it's exciting to have something else that benefits the artist… It's another way for people to find art that they love and for the artist to get paid.

Image from "Watch Me Now" Cystal Method video by Micah Monkey

What are users buying if they buy into this NFT drop?

Obviously, having a piece of music is meant to go along with that piece of art. I grew up wanting to see videos so desperately that I would spend hours in front of my TV waiting for them to play the (Mötley Crüe) Looks that Kill video.

I would take pictures of the other screen and have my mom take them and develop them at the local One-Hour Photo, just to be able to take a little bit of some of that with me because I was such a fan. In a way this sort of matches that – you enjoy a song or you enjoy a video and you want a piece of that so now you buy the NFT to add to your digital collection. It's a brave new world.

What does releasing NFTs allow you to do differently?

I'm definitely intrigued with other ways of getting artists compensated for their work directly. I find that a very positive way of going forward, especially now that all these artists, like myself, are releasing music that most of the time gets played on Spotify and somebody else is reaping the benefits of all that hard work while as artists, we're sitting around counting .003% of a cent per play or some nonsense like that. I'm very intrigued and really happy to be able to find my way into NFTs with some quality people helping me along the way.

How did you come to collaborate with MakersPlace?

Through my manager, Richard (Bishop), who has been with us for 25 years. We started talking about the NFT space and we shared some friends that are connected to this world. David Weier (Strategic Partnerships and Music Development for MakersPlace) was someone that we had worked with back when he was working for Fuse TV and VH-1 so we set up a meeting. David and everybody over MakersPlace has helped me facilitate this and figure out the best way to do it. Then we will see where it goes from here.

Image from "Watch Me Now" Cystal Method video by Micah Monkey

Summary

It's always good to see established artists entering the space and Crystal Method's electronic music seems to be a good conceptual fit for this new age of digital ownership. Other recording artists we've spoken with, like Serj Tankian from System of a Down, usually seem to start with a fairly simple drop and then expand to include projects that have more complex ways to interact with the audience.

The "Watch Me Now" drop does include perks auction winners can gain including VIP tickets with backstage passes to shows on the tour, hotel rooms, and dinner with Crystal Method before the show. Those are all good steps toward adding interest to the drop, but I like to look out for the second drop of artists entering the space just to see what very creative people come up with in terms of engaging and involving their audience in the art itself, further blurring the line between creator and audience in a way that approaches the potential of a Web3 world.