Photo Credit: Cooper Turley Instagram
Cryptocurrency influencer Cooper Turley is starting Coop Records with $10 million in funding.
Coop Records is backed by crypto brokers like Audius and OpenSea. Turley says he seeks to solve the power imbalance in the music industry that’s weighted towards labels and streaming services. He believes NFTs are the right vehicle to shake up the space.
“The biggest word I think of when it comes to web3 is ownership,” Turley told CoinDesk. “So if you create value for a network, you should be able to capture that value in the form of a token or some sort of NFT,” he explained.
Turley says Coop Records will act as an incubator, venture capital firm, and record label all wrapped into one.
He believes that web3 creates new monetization models for music, with NFTs being just one avenue. “Coop Records invests in platforms, artists, and tokens uniquely enabled by web3. Think of it as a hybrid between a venture fund, a record label, and an incubator. We work with founders to create new revenue streams for music,” he tweeted.
“We should be able to invest in our favorite artists. What if an artist raised capital to build an ecosystem for their fans? This is the focus of what we’re calling ‘Artist Seed Rounds.’ Coop Records is excited to invest in artists,” Turley continues.
“The biggest artists on Spotify should have equity in the company. This is why Coop Records is bringing on a select batch of trusted artists as investors. Coop Records makes investing in music companies more exciting,” Turley continues. Turley is a Co-Founder and promoter of the online social club Friends With Benefits DAO. He was removed from the organization following racist tweets from years ago resurfacing.
Now it appears he’ll be focusing on trying to bring (yet another) web3 approach to the music industry.