Is Kanye West Warming to NFTs and the Metaverse? French Montana Thinks So

Rapper Kanye West, who when asked about non-fungible tokens (NFTs) once said, “Do not ask me to do a f**king NFT,” may slowly be coming around on the subject, at least in part, thanks to fellow rap star French Montana.

Montana’s comments came during an appearance at NFT Miami (April 1-3) in promotion of his latest album, Montega, which will include a 10,000 strong NFT release of playable GameFi NFTs in collaboration with Radio Caca. 

According to the French-Moroccan rapper, who has fully embraced crypto, interest, and understanding in NFTs is a generational thing.

“You tell somebody NFTs, their first answer back, ‘I live in the real world. I don’t live in the metaverse, I live in the universe.’ So it’s like, how can you even have a conversation with somebody, you know. But when I speak to my little brothers and I speak to the young guys, they have more of an idea about it, my son and everybody like that. So I gotta follow the new generation,” he said.

Kanye and Montana collaboration

French Montana recently collaborated with West on his most recent album Donda 2, which has only been released on STEM player, an MP3 player and remix device created by West and Kano Computing, retailing at $200.

Montana is now in discussions to incorporate his new album on STEM, and when talking with West he’s been making the case for NFTs and the metaverse.

“So me and him [West] still going back-and-forth cause he’s one of the people that talks about ‘the universe not the metaverse.’ So we’re going back and forth. Shoutout to Kanye cause he definitely supports the idea, he’s open-minded to it,” said Montana before adding, “And me and Radio Caca is this close to bringing the STEM player to the metaverse.”

Montana sets sights on “biggest NFT album”

Plans for French Montana’s fifth studio album, Montega, are his most ambitious to date. Montana clearly has big hopes for the upcoming release which he claims will combine music, NFTs, gaming, and the metaverse for the first time.

“I definitely want to make sure that I have the biggest NFT album to come out this year,” he said.

Montega will be supported by a 10,000 strong NFT release called “2D Montana” which will include 2D playable game characters and metaverse integration. Radio Caca will also incorporate Montega NFTs into their existing play-to-earn gamefi product Metamon. 

To further sweeten the deal, fans who purchase Montega will enjoy a slew of other benefits including exclusive access to Montana through his Discord server.

Montana believes that if the album is the success he hopes for, it will encourage other big artists, like Kanye, to follow in his footsteps.

“I just feel like with this, me taking the leap of faith here and tryna start a new wave and tryna show my A-list friends and everybody that’s making music that this marriage can happen, it can be successful,” said Montana. 

While French Montana has become somewhat of an NFT evangelist, he’s not the only rapper diving headlong into NFTs. Snoop Dogg has been making waves in the industry, even going as far as to re-imagine himself as the superhero “Supercuzz” in a recent NFT collection.

Rappers have never been shy about being business-savvy. Should like Montana and Dogg demonstrate that they are shrewd operators in the space, it can’t be long before skeptics like West follow them down the NFT rabbit hole.