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Most fans of the Wu-Tang Clan probably assumed they’d never get the chance to hear Once Upon a Time in Shaolin based on the unique nature of the one-of-a-kind album, but the collective that purchased it has decided to give the world the chance to listen to a five-minute snippet—as long as you’re willing to drop $1 on an NFT.
In 2015, the one and only copy of Once Upon a Time in Shaolin was auctioned off for $2 million to infamous “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli, who was eventually forced to hand it over to the federal government due to the restitution he was ordered to pay after he was sent to prison a few years later.
The album already had a complex history prior to that point, as it was marketed as an official Wu-Tang Clan record even though the majority of the members who laid down verses weren’t actually aware of what they’d gotten involved with.
However, fans of the group were nonetheless intrigued by the mysterious project that was accompanied by a contract that stated it couldn’t released commercially until 2103, and the saga only continued to get more complicated once it ended up in the hands of the authorities.
We were treated to another twist in 2021 when Once Upon a Time in Shaolin was sold to a collective of digital artists and NFT evangelists known as PleasrDAO, who managed to secure it after forking over $4 million.
It was initially unclear what they planned to do with it, but we got an answer last month when they announced they were planning to play certain selections at an installation at an art museum in Tasmania (which was revealed a couple of weeks before they filed a lawsuit against Shkreli that asserts he illegally made a copy to keep for himself).
That didn’t do much to satisfy anyone who’s unwilling to travel to an island off the coast of Australia to listen to some unreleased Wu-Tang songs, but on Thursday, things took another turn when PleasrDAO launched a website that gives visitors the opportunity to spend $1 on an NFT (yes, they’re still a thing) to gain access to a five-minute snippet featuring never-before-heard verses from Ghostface Killah, Raekwon, and Redman.
The platform is part of a larger initiative to expedite the release of the entire album. For every dollar that’s collected, PleasrDAO plans to remove 88 seconds from a countdown clock that was initially set to expire on October 8, 2103—the day the aforementioned contract ends—as part of an agreement it struck with the album’s producers (it has only secure the rights to 16 of the 31 tracks as of this writing but is engaged in ongoing negotiations for the rest).
It may leave a bit to be desired, but something is better than nothing.