Guns N’ Roses Rock Star Launching Live Concerts on the Blockchain

Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Matt Sorum is launching a new platform designed to put starving artists in the spotlight.

The former Guns N’ Roses drummer is creating Artbit, a live concert hosting platform that promises to give performers a virtual stage, allowing them to earn money directly from fans and protect their content using the blockchain.

The creators of Artbit say performers of all kinds will be able to use the platform to produce live shows and perform for fans around the world through a crypto ecosystem powered by hashgraph. Fans can easily tune in, interact with the artist and give them cryptocurrency as a reward, if they like what they see.

“Before I had any recognition as a musician, I was roaming back alleys in Hollywood, playing any gig I could get, sleeping on couches and surviving off Top Ramen,” says Sorum. “Today, getting recognition is easier, but getting paid is even harder. With Artbit, we’re giving power back to the fans to tell the world who deserves attention, and we’re giving a platform to artists to turn their dreams into a paying reality.”

Sorum told Yahoo Finance he wants to push the power cryptocurrencies have to create equity, eliminate the middleman and make sure artists are fairly paid.

“As we all know, platforms like Spotify — only a very small percentage of artists can even make money on that,” he says. “Any new or young artist has really got to work really hard to even get on the front page of a platform like Spotify — and even at that point you can’t really monetize your art. With Artbit, we’re going to have direct access. People are going to be able to get online right away, not be served a bunch of ads, and have a direct community to be able to monetize their craft now, with no middleman, direct payout, with a wallet, with crypto, and a community that’s safe and secure…”

Artbit appears to be in the very early stages of development. So far, no launch date has been set and there is no information on whether there will be a token sale.