Fortnite, Travis Scott and The Next Frontier of Music Experience
Human imagination has provided an escape or alternate reality where we explore improbable outcomes, and through various media, humans have honed the art of fantasy. Now, music and video games, two of the most popular forms of escapist entertainment, are bringing us closer to melding imaginary worlds and real-world together (pending all evidence that we are in fact living in a simulation).
In recent years, virtual reality and augmented reality systems in video games have made the format more engaging. The combined effect of storytelling and CGI has transported us to new worlds, at times more vibrant and real than our present reality. The alignment of music and gaming is peculiar because both industries exist on different ends of the human innovation timeline. But similar to games, music has also flourished in the virtual space for many years, and thus their collaborative possibilities have always been on the horizon.
Though the equipment needed for full immersion (VR headsets, console systems and PC gaming rigs) is chunky and expensive, music has been one of the avenues, video games have used to continue improving user immersion through its history. Unique compositions and licensed music formed backgrounds for memorable titles such as Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto series and FIFA, both inspiring a new generation of loyal virtual media fans.
Vice-versa, video games have inspired the music business. Hip-Hop’s biggest video game crossover would come in the form of Def Jam: Vendetta, a mixed martial arts combat game, in which users would fight as, and fight prominent hip hop artists, including DMX, Ludacris and Snoop Dogg. The success of the game lead to a bigger sequel Def Jam: Fight For NY featuring a wider host of artists (most being signed artists of Def Jam at the time). 50 Cent: Bulletproof, a 2005 single-player game based on the real-life rapper, also further pushed the boundaries of real-world immersion with storytelling aimed at amplifying 50 Cent’s rapper persona.
Travis Scott's Art of Immersion
On the surface, Travis Scott seemed like a prodigal son of Kanye West and Kid Cudi. Since the start of his career, Travis has opted for a psychedelic, trap and rock blend with deeply auto-tuned layered vocals. Initially, he was dismissed by hardcore Hip-Hop audiences, for being an amalgam of sonic influences that subverted traditional boom-bap, bar-focused hardcore raps. Luckily generation Z audiences who grew up during the boom of autotune listening to T-Pain and era-defining projects like Lil Wayne’s Carter III and Kanye’s 808s and Heartbreaks were always going to be drawn to the futuristic sound. The added quirk of a vividly trippy-style illuminated by trap-music and Travis’ chaotic, often larger than life songwriting, further sets him a class apart from his fore-runners.
Through the years, Travis has become more ambitious with his festivals and concert performances, daring to bring his musical world to life. His 2018 Astroworld Tour, was a feat of grandiose staging, theme-park aspirations and pyrotechnics. Today, the rapper has built a cult-like reputation for immersive exhilarating live show experiences. Last month, he raised the stakes of how fans engage his music with an in-game concert hosted on famous battle royale game, Fortnite.
The ‘Astronomical’ event opens with the arrival of a planet-sized stage, with a titan sized Travis being propelled into the open world, landing shortly after. Performing a string of hits including, “Sicko Mode”, “Goosebumps” & “Highest In The Room”. Travis is mostly solo through the performance, receiving support from hologram back up dancers. With glitch teleportation, fireworks, explosions, and an underwater interlude, the performance traverses an array of settings to provide an immersive and engaging concert experience.
The stream also featured the release of a new collaboration, Travis & Kid Cudi released The Scotts, which might be the first single from a forthcoming collaborative album between the two (titan Travis dons a Marshmello outfit towards the end of the show referencing the previous concert by the artist). By the end of the show, it was clear the ‘Astronomical’ event, was the 2020 equivalent of our favourite artists taking over the radio for the day and premiering a new song.
According to RollingStone, a total of 27.7 million users logged on to experience this collaboration between Epic Games and Travis Scott. This is in comparison to the over 10 million that logged in for MarshMello’s set last year when a similar event was hosted for the first time. In addition, new music streams for The Scotts racked up 7.45 million plays, projecting their single to the number one spot on Spotify.
Reception and future prospect
The merger of virtual reality and music is not a new development in music tech. In the early 2000s, game development company Liden Lab, designed an interactive web-based virtual world known as ‘Second Life’. Though ‘Second Life’ had the qualities of a role-playing video game, users didn’t have predetermined missions or storylines. Instead, they could create avatars and in turn, use those avatars to live an alternative virtual life, kind of like EA’s famous SIMs series, but with real-life people, currency and real estate.
A precursor, years ahead of Facebook, 'Second Life' allowed users to interact with one another, trade virtual properties and engage in group activities such as concerts. At the peak of its viability, Sony and Warner Music hosted music premieres and listening parties on 'Second Life'. Universal Music focused more on fan-engagement, using the platform as a community-building hub for artists like Chamillionaire and Hinder, complete with options for fans to purchase virtual merchandise.
Music Business Worldwide reports that as early as 2006, commentators were projecting ‘Second Life’ would redefine music touring. Yet, by 2017 it’s user-base had dropped from a staggering 36 million active accounts to just over 600,000. Since then there have been unsuccessful attempts at reimagining virtual music experiences with varying degrees of success by services like TurnTable.fm and Twitter Music.
Hologram performances and tours have been another mode, through which virtual reality has merged with the music business. In recent times, the late king of pop took centre stage at the 2014 ‘Billboard Music Awards’, in 2012 2Pac Shakur performed posthumously at Coachella, and a Whitney Houston hologram tour was slated for later this year. Though this format has received its fair share of criticism, it’s proof that music consumption and preservation is still evolving.
In these extraordinary times, artists big and small are going even further to push the boundaries of their creativity, in order to keep fans entertained. Rae Sremmund held live stream sessions via Instagram, R&B, soul legend, Erykah Badu has expanded on the virtual concert format by monetizing viewing through her website and enabling viewers to choose what songs they want to hear. Virtual fan culture driven music battles have also been an avenue to highlight and appreciate catalogues of artists, with the world earning new respect for Wizkid’s hit-making ability, following the NS10v10 live battle.
The challenge for players and developers in this space is how to make virtual music experiences, less of a passive experience for fans. Epic Games, owners of Fortnite, and game development software, Unreal Engine recently launched their own game retailing outfit. A recent RollingStone article suggests this may be the first step in encouraging open-source development of a new range of easily monetisable virtual content since the company already has the infrastructure for processing financials.
Last year, Epic acquired 3-Lateral, a Serbia-based game company dedicated to creating hyper-realistic virtual characters. The company is behind the phenomenon of Lil Miquela, an AI-powered influencer and pop-star with over 2 Million real followers on Instagram. It’s also noteworthy that Life On Air, the company behind popular social media video app, HouseParty was acquired by Epic in mid-2019.
The investment chain extends even longer. Chinese multinational, Tencent acquired a 40% stake in Epic games eight years ago. Earlier this year, the company acquired a 10% stake in Universal Music. Music Business Worldwide reports, SONY apparently also recently announced a bunch of vacancies for technical executives, who are “dedicated to reimagining music through immersive media”.
Continued investment may be the only way for virtual music expansion to continue into developing music markets like Sub-Saharan Africa. Speaking on what these trends mean for Afropop, Lagos-based art director and 3D artist, Niyi Okeowo, told ARTISH, “In terms of skill set and manpower we are definitely on par with the rest of the world. But like most skill sets in Nigeria or Africa, there are hardly people who are convinced in the technology. We just need the right companies to invest and pay for the services”
At the time of writing this piece, the official replay of the stream of the ‘Astronomical’ concert had amassed over 20 million views on Travis Scott’s official YouTube channel. By taking the music where the people are, continued innovation will open a new horizon of corporate alliances with artists, as well as a new means for providing fans with breath-taking experiences and rollouts.
As humans, we’re confined to the ‘real’ world, but the virtual future could be next year or a decade from now. If the music industry heads into a world where people cannot attend concerts with large gatherings of people, artists will have to find a new normal for fan engagement. Reality has always been average at best, anyway, we may not have to bother with it anymore.
Credits:
Edited and Structured by Toye Sokunbi