Hipworth, a renowned NFT Artist and founder of Web3 music platform Djenerates has teamed up with Crypto Gibraltar to offer a world-class immersive experience. Combining both the metaverse and the Universe, this promises to be a special event at the Crypto Gibraltar conference.
Hipworth was working as a digital artist and content creator in the music and entertainment industry for over 20 years now. He got involved in the electronic music industry by running warehouse parties in the late 90s.
Wandering around the Djenerates club in Decentral Games land in Decentraland it struck me that this is the kind of environment I could return to again and again. It’s vibrant colors, fun to explore and it’s offering me a club to get my groove on. The Amnesia branding struck me as being perfectly placed. Note to self, book a trip to Ibiza and visit the Amnesia club.
Speaking fondly about the past when he immersed himself in electronic music and hosted gigantic raves in Warehouses in Melbourne, Hipworth tells us how he first joined the electronic music scene.
“I got really absorbed in that. I found an old warehouse, it was 10,000 square feet of abandoned Chocolate Factory out in the west of Melbourne. And so I took the lease on that, and we cleaned it up, it was full of pigeon dung. It took us months to clean it and we painted it up. And then we just started having raves there. That was really exciting, sort of time for me just absorbing myself in electronic music and party life.”
So how does a warehouse raver end up as an NFT artist in the crypto scene? Although he didn’t invest much early on he was intrigued by Bitcoin. He downloaded the Bitcoin Core wallet, and I tried to get SATs, using all these faucets and spending hours just clicking ads and videos. It was this exploration that led him to work full-time by 2017.
“By 2017 I started working in it, I set up a mining factory, we had like 100 miners in there. And that was kind of my first venture into a professional kind of outlet for the space.”
As a digital artist, Hipworth has always been interested in using technology to create art and in 2019 when he heard of people minting art on the blockchain his ears pricked up.
“It wasn’t until probably a year later 2020 that I started minting art on Opensea and after that first sale I was hooked.” I admitted that I was also hooked.
As a music professional with connections to DJs across the globe, I wanted to know what Hipworth thought about how NFTs could transform the music industry.
“I think NF T’s offer a more intimate experience for the collector which can’t be realized through traditional forms of music discovery, like Spotify and, and streaming services.”
“And so collectors and music lovers now have a channel to connect with artists through direct patronage. And then through that, they receive exclusive content and rewards through investment as well, which you don’t get through purchasing music from or subscribing to music on, on places like Spotify.”
“I think what’s interesting is that every 10 to 20 years, we see an innovation in music, like music mediums, from vinyl record to mp3 music streaming. But now we have a format in NF T’s that delivers something else like verification, scarcity, provenance, and that provenance points directly back to the artist.”
Hipworth and teamed up with Crypto Gibraltar to offer attendees a unique metaverse experience and give them a taste of the Djenerates Club. There are interesting plans in motion that may involve a world first when he brings different metaverses to the Universe. Speaking about the upcoming event in September, Hipworth tells us what to expect from this immersive experience.
“We’re aiming to bring all of our Metaverse properties into one overarching experience for the guests, which I can enjoy in a real-life setting. We’ll be broadcasting degenerates, our DJs as a part of the project, they’ll be streaming live directly into Crypto Gibraltar via large-scale projections and screens, while the guests can use their devices, whether the laptops or cell phones, to engage in our virtual properties, where we’re situated in places like Decentraland, Somnium Space, planetary party verse.”
For anyone that plans to be at Crypto Gibraltar, Hipworth is also going to jump on the decks to play a live session after the metaverse event, giving people a taste of virtual and reality.
As we were discussing the details of the conference I was curious to know if somebody who spends some time in various metaverses values real-life events just as much and Hipworth was quick to stress the importance of connecting with the natural world around us.
“I think being in the real world and connecting with nature right now is more important than ever. As we’re moving closer to an AI-powered world and a virtual consciousness, I think the real world remains as our source of grounding.”
He has a natural appreciation for space and is mindful of enjoying it. For Hipworth, the real world “needs to be cared for and given as much attention and detail as we pay to our selfies and food porn photography. And I personally like to watch my in real-life lettuce grow just as much as I enjoy seeing my virtual worlds develop.”
So how can a musician feed off audience engagement in a virtual setting when they can’t hear the clapping, screams and buzzing behavior from the audience itself? The love for audience participation and feedback from their performance is often cited with a lot of performers admitting how much they need that audience reaction to truly put on a great show. Hipworth explains that this is different but similarly stimulating in a metaverse setting.
“ In the metaverse, a lot of the times you’re dealing with like chat rooms, platforms like discord where there are conversations going on. And you’ve also got people or guests in their avatars right in the space. So there’s a couple of different dynamics there that the DJ can feed off, the chatting and the conversation that’s happening, that discord in the chat room is very engaging.”
A portion of the DJs that he works with are natural to the space now. Hipworth mentions the Twitch and virtual DJs that are already comfortable with the settings they use and having the chat window open while they play a set.
“They can see visually the people that are entering the space with their avatars, and most Metaverse environments have a little dance function. So their avatars can dance around and even fly around. So sometimes it’s really stimulating for the DJ, because they’ve got the chat window, they’ve got the visual presence. It is different from the energy that you might feel in a live situation, but it’s a virtual world. And the virtual world comes with its own nuances.”
I asked him how the big DJ names, like Carl Cox and Paul Oakenfold, found their way into Djenerates metaverse? Hipworth pointed out that some of the DJs were already familiar with the space like Boys Noize but for other well-known DJs it was the first time that they heard of it. Although he has already done a collab with Carl Cox on Nifty Gateway.
Hipworth is an educator, bringing DJs and those interested in electronic music into the world of NFTs. On discord they run a DJ competition and see themselves as a career launchpad for DJs. “The DJs that are in there at the moment upload mixes every week, they stream live, and in a few weeks, I think it’s on the 20th or the 24th. We run a semi finals. And then the contestants go through to the final app, which will be held in the amnesia virtual club. And the winner from that will actually get a live gig in September at the physical club in Ibiza at amnesia.”
Aside from the fun and getting a greater understanding of what the metaverse is, attendees at Crypto Gibraltar can expect an “unforgettable experience that demonstrates the power of web 3.0 when it’s facilitated as an entertainment vehicle.”
Here are some pre-recorded mixes from the Djenerates to get you in the mood for the immersive experience at Crypto Gibraltar.
