Every successful musician carves a unique path into the medium. For LATASHÁ, it was through poetry slams and cyphers. Her natural affinity for wordplay and expression eventually led her down the path of becoming an independent musician equally versed in singer/songwriter stylings and hip-hop. In our latest episode of Behind The Drop, we sat down with LATASHÁ for an inside look on her rise as one of Web3’s most notable young artists.

LATASHÁ’s journey into Web3 began once she realized something was up with the music industry. Thanks to her “mini law degree,” as she described in an interview with nft now, she realized that the contracts record labels entice artists to sign aren’t so artist-friendly. Thus began her career as an independent musician who opened for hip-hop legends like Q-Tip, contemporary figures like Big Sean, and many more. “I want to prove that labels are gonna just become services. They’re gonna show up as marketing teams and give us exact things that we need instead of [locking us into predatory deals,]” she said.

After cutting her teeth as an independent musician, it turns out she’d yet to discover the tools needed to go fully independent. The key to these lies inside Web3 — specifically, NFTs powered by blockchain technology. “All the times that someone told me that my sweat equity didn’t equate, this was showing me that it did. And I deserved it,” she said. Thanks to the successful launch of her music video for GOGO WYNE, the artist earned just as much in one summer as she normally would via a traditional record deal. Of course, this was all thanks to NFTs.

By selling her music and art as non-fungible tokens, LATASHÁ set her creative visions free from the stifling energies present in record labels, and rediscovered herself as an artist. “Web3 has completely shifted my existence,” she said. “When I got here, I felt like something was healing for me. We’re finding wellness for artists again.”

Eventually, her presence in the NFT landscape landed her a position as Zora’s head of community in early 2021. Furthering the company’s goals of helping artists gain access to the tools and knowledge they’d need to break into the NFT space, LATASHÁ eventually started the Zoratopia URL webinar series. Thanks to the series’ massive success and warm reception from its attendees, Zoratopia hosted an IRL event at NFT NYC 2022 that doubled as a celebration of diversity in the NFT space. “I want people to see the diversity that is really in [Web3] and winning very well. We are disrupting something very important right now,” she said.

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