Anthrax’s Charlie Benante Launches First ‘Monsters’ Series NFT
Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante has partnered with new digital platform neonARKade to release the first NFT in his "Monsters Art Series."
Benante detailed the NFT, which dropped Friday, in an Instagram video last week. “The NFTs are a series of Monsters that I created with neonARKade,” he said. “The series consists of four Monsters. I won’t tell you which ones they are. You gotta get ‘em on Friday.”
The first NFT in the Monsters series is a cartoonish vampire named Drabula, on sale for $666. You can see it here.
Benante created all of the artwork for the Monsters series as well as the accompanying musical soundscapes. The four NFTs are limited to 15 apiece, and buyers will be entered into a raffle to have coffee with Benante, either over Zoom or in person. "We can get together, have coffee, talk about music, art, movies, politics, the weather, whatever you wanna talk about," he said.
"In the future, I'll be announcing certain incentives to only NFT holders," Benante added. "Fun things, you know what I mean? If I'm in your area, let's get together. You wanna come backstage? You gotta be in it."
NeonARKade, which launched on Aug. 10, is a curated NFT platform that connects high-profile content creators, such as musicians and athletes, with their fans. The platform accepts both cryptocurrency and U.S. dollar payments and features a learning center to educate even the least experienced users about what NFTs are and how to purchase them. Other neonARKade partners include Five Finger Death Punch guitarist Jason Hook and NBA player Langston Galloway.
Other metal musicians to cash in on the NFT trend include Rammstein’s Till Lindemann, who partnered with digital brokers twelve x twelve to offer a limited series of four different NFTs. The offerings include visual art pieces, an unreleased music video and the opportunity to have dinner with Lindemann in Moscow, and they range in price from €299 to €100,000 (approximately $117,000).
In more strictly musical news, Benante recently promised that Anthrax would release the follow-up to 2016’s For All Kings in 2022.