The West Coast hip-hop legend Snoop Dogg, has announced his plans to bring Death Row into the Metaverse.
Fresh from the purchase of the label that brought him international recognition, Snoop Dogg has declared his plans to take Death Row into the next era of its development. The legendary rapper from Long Beach has said that Death Row “will be an NFT label,” and revealed a plan to blend music and tech by releasing artists through the metaverse.
Speaking on social audio app Clubhouse, Snoop said: “We will be putting out artists through the metaverse. Just like we broke the industry when we were the first independent to be major, I want to be the first major in the metaverse.”
Snoop acquired Death Row Records back in early February from Blackstone Group for an undisclosed fee. On his Instagram, he said: “I am thrilled and appreciative of the opportunity to acquire the iconic and culturally significant Death Row Records brand, which has immense untapped future value.
“It feels good to have ownership of the label I was part of at the beginning of my career and as one of the founding members.”
On the same day that the Death Row deal was announced, Snoop released his new album B.O.D.R. (Bacc on Death Row) as a ‘stash box’ of NFTs.
Snoop stash boxes were priced at $5,000 each and only 25,000 were made available on the Gala Games blockchain platform. Each stash box included one of 17 NFTs for each track from the album, and fans that managed to collect all 17 would be in with a chance to party at Snoop’s mansion in LA, amongst other prizes.
Snoop has become one of the most prominent musicians to invest in blockchain technology. Having already amassed a reported $17 million worth of NFT holdings before the stash boxes were released, some sources have claimed Snoop has earned a further $44 million from this new venture.
Another one of his recent NFT projects is a collection of 10,000 programmatically generated Snoop Dogg Avatar NFTs called ‘the Doggies’.
The avatars grant their owners access to virtual events and concerts, and let them play games, “hang out with friends, and explore the metaverse like a boss”. They can be found on OpenSea here.
Snoop Dogg is clearly someone who knows how to capitalise on the lucrative NFT business, and his next move with Death Row will likely be a continuation of that.