This week, both John Lennon and Kurt Cobain have become the latest to have their work, and items associated with them, sold in NFT form.
Julian Lennon, the eldest son of the late Beatle John Lennon, has announced plans to sell a range of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) celebrating his father and the Beatles. Taking place on the coincidentally-named Julien’s Auctions, fans have an opportunity to “own a piece of music history.”
Except they don’t, do they? Not really. Perhaps a piece of rewritten, repurposed, digitised music history, but it’s not the real stuff. For Julian is keeping all of the physical items in his collection, and selling copies of them. However, fear not prospective buyers! You will be delighted to know that Julian is bundling each of the NFTs as “audio-visual” collectibles. They will consist of his own narration, as well as the imagery.
Despite my cynicism, the sums of money are huge. For a cool $8,000 you can join the bidding (yes, I repeat, just join the bidding) for a photo of John Lennon’s Afghan coat. For $50,000, you can get a photo of Paul McCartney’s notes while writing Hey Jude. Photos of John Lennon’s guitars are also up for predictably grand lumps of cash.
A couple of notes in defense of the auction. Most importantly, Julian Lennon announced “a portion” of the proceeds will go to his White Feather Foundation – an organisation which supports “projects across the globe that foster education and good health for young girls in developing nations; protect and preserve indigenous cultures; conserve and sustain our environment; and give access to clean water.”
If selling these photos for vast amounts can aid any of these causes, it should be celebrated.
Secondly, if anybody has the means to throw tens of thousands of dollars at these NFTs, they probably know a bit about making money. It comes back to the very essence of what these non-fungible tokens are: investments. It’s a gamble. And the buyers are gambling the prices of their digital copies will only go up. I suppose they probably will…
Julian Lennon is not alone in looking to cash in now. Stan Lee’s estate has done so, hijacking the late comic book writer’s Twitter account to plug NFTs. Quentin Tarantino is currently doing so, too, selling digital Pulp Fiction memorabilia, and embroiling himself in a legal dispute with Miramax.
And this week Kurt Cobain and Nirvana joined the fray as well, with news that never-before-seen concert photos, taken from the band’s gig on Oct. 1, 1991 will be made available as NFTs. They will launch next month, on February 20th, to coincide with the late frontman Kurt Cobain’s birthday. Depending on the kind of NFT purchased, a press release explained the prices will range from $99 to $250,000.
It has prompted an angry backlash from many of Cobain’s still diehard fans, though that seems to have been quelled slightly by the photographer of the show, Faith West, announcing profits from the sales will be divided between two charities: The Trevor Project and Grid Alternatives.
