Why Sonu Nigam is embracing NFTs

Over a Zoom call on a rainy day in Chennai, I flaunt my 1999 cassette cover of Deewana, one of Sonu Nigam’s hit albums. Sitting across a few thousand miles, inside a London suite, the singer flashes a grin that changes into a big smile very quickly.

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“The business of music was very one-dimensional back then,” he says, referring to the beginning stages of his career, “But so many things have changed since then. I have been witness to sweeping changes in the music industry — from cassettes, disks and CDs to digital platforms.”

He is part of another huge trend currently: venturing into non-fungible tokens (NFTs), thanks to a partnership with Jet Synthesys. “It’s something precious, either from the past or a future prospect,” he says, “It is especially for people who value the artiste or content, and for those who treat it as an investment.”

Sonu’s debut in this space will feature a special track titled ‘Hall of Fame’, which he worked on with composer-lyricist Jim Beanz a couple of years ago. “I have sung thousands of songs in the last few decades, but this was among the toughest to sing,” he reveals, “The reason I like legends like Mohammad Rafi and Kishore Kumar is not because of their evergreen hits, but because they have attempted some songs that are very difficult to sing. ‘Hall of Fame’ is my attempt to do something like that.”

Looking ahead

After ‘Hall of Fame’, the singer plans to release some other creative work of his as NFTs; that includes some hand-written papers that he personally wrote before recording some of his hit numbers. “I have this habit since I debuted as a singer; I always write the place, time and date and team working on it, when I record my songs, apart from marking my comments with respect to the scale and pronunciation. For any music lover or collector, to possess that sheet written by a singer is precious, because it is a memory only he or she can share.”

In the future, he even hopes to work on albums exclusively for the NFT world. “I was mulling about doing something exclusively, probably on the works of Mir Taqi Mir or Faiz Ahmad Faiz. A musical project for an audio label is familiar among audiences, but a project exclusively as an NFT would be niche and sought after.”

If he does that, it will be a flashback for him. For, Sonu Nigam is well known for his non-filmi musical outings in the Nineties. What gave him the confidence back then? “I realised that a lot of art could be created beyond it through independent projects. I was open to trying newer things.”

It was probably that urge to break boundaries that led Sonu to the South. He is no stranger to Tamil music, having debuted with AR Rahman’s ‘Varayo Thozhi’ from Jeans (1998) and also subsequently singing for GV Prakash and many other composers. “I am lucky to have got the opportunity to work with the likes of Ilaiyaraaja and AR Rahman,” he says. “Late singer SPB was one of my special musical gurus; in fact, I sang ‘Aasman Kehta Hai Rab Se’ (Mast) keeping his delivery style in mind. We have done an entire US tour together, and he would love my imitation of various singers.”