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Talk to any musician who has \u201cmade it,\u201d and they\u2019ll say that achieving fame is both a gift and a curse. While success in entertainment can obviously bring many positives, it also carries the pressure to stay relevant, the worry of constantly needing to stay connected to fans, and the loss of freedom and privacy that comes with being a regular Joe \u2014 all of which can be utterly exhausting. Add a jam-packed events schedule that robs artists of the time to detox and socialize, and fame begins to look like just as much a burden as it may be a blessing.<\/p>\n
On the flip side, those aspiring to break through and finally go mainstream deal with the pressure of an uphill climb and the potential outcome that after all the struggle, there might not be a light at the end of the tunnel. <\/p>\n
For this reason, mental health<\/a>, wellness and feeling like one is plugged into a community are things all creators need to allocate time to, and The Homies DAO is focused on just that. <\/p>\n On Episode 17 of The Agenda <\/em>podcast, hosts Ray Salmond and Jonathan DeYoung speak with singer and The Homies DAO founder Iman Europe about how the collective is using Web3 to bring artists together to focus on wellbeing. <\/p>\n During the conversation, Europe detailed how lonely being a musician can feel and how difficult it can be to maintain social connections, given that sometimes it seems like family members are constantly hitting you up for money and perks, and strangers you connect with might have the ulterior motive of getting special benefits thanks to their new-found friend\u2019s fame. <\/p>\n \u201cI know a lot of artists felt very burnt out last year and felt like they couldn\u2019t find their footing oftentimes because everything was moving so fast in Web3,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd so I saw the need for wellness in the space, and I also was needing it. I was juggling being an artist and the head of artist relations of Sound.xyz, and it was a lot. They were two full-time jobs, and I wasn\u2019t making enough time for myself and my wellness, and I saw the effects of that.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n pro tip: give yourself the first hour of the day. unplugged, doing something that only you benefit from. gym, cleaning, reading, meditating, praying\u2014 anything for you. get up an hr earlier if you have to. because taking care of you makes it so much easier to take care of others.<\/p>\n \u2014 iman, the icon. (@ImanEurope) October 24, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This inspired Europe to found The Homies DAO. \u201cWhen I got to the end of the year, I knew I wanted to focus this year on wellness more and on being able to give that back to myself and also creating space for artists to do the same.\u201d<\/p>\n When asked about the type of wellness and community activities Homies DAO members could participate in, Europe mentioned that the decentralized autonomous organization\u00a0(DAO)<\/a> provides a safe space and community where creators participating in the music industry<\/a> can socialize, unwind, meditate, work out and engage in activity that offers a sense of community. <\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re hosting our first event at the end of this month, the Homies Hangout, where we\u2019ll have different forms of wellness. So it\u2019ll be physical wellness \u2014 we\u2019ll start with exercise, riding the bikes and spinning. This will be hosted at Burn Cycling. So we\u2019ll start off with that, and then we\u2019ll take a break and then come back for a sound bath, which is spiritual wellness. And then we\u2019ll do some affirmations, and we\u2019ll have someone come in and lead a group therapy session where we can all kind of talk together and talk about mental wellness and different resources to bettering that.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n As for the DAO\u2019s future plans, \u201cWe plan to do a few things like monthly meetups like that, but also monthly meetups online where we\u2019re able to just check in with each other and just have a space for that,\u201d said Europe, adding: <\/p>\n \u201cWe later plan to do like educational content and just creating different content to bring more people on-chain. We want to create and mint projects through our DAO with the artists, maybe based around wellness. And our hopes are later to expand to offline retreats for artists, artist residencies.\u201d <\/p><\/blockquote>\n Like a handful of the other crypto and Web3-focused DAOs in the space, The Homies DAO also has a nonfungible token (NFT)<\/a> collection, with holders entitled to DAO membership and various other perks. Generally, projects with tokens or NFTs also have to contend with price speculators and NFT investors who don\u2019t contribute anything to the project.<\/p>\n On the matter, Europe said, \u201cI didn\u2019t want to make this speculative. I wanted to make this more so of a community. They are limited. I think we\u2019ll only have 500 members total right now.\u201d <\/p>\n Related: <\/em><\/strong>YouTube releases \u2018principles\u2019 for working with music industry on AI tech<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n When asked why she\u2019s not currently concerned with floor prices, increasing the collective\u2019s size, or even partnering with blue-chip projects, Europe replied:<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll only have 500 because we really want to know each other, and we\u2019re really trying to build a community, not just like a project. I think that\u2019s the difference between a DAO and a project, is you want as many people to be on it as possible. But I think when we think of wellness, it is an intimate thing. And sometimes when you make it more about like clout and, I don\u2019t know, speculation, it loses its truth, and it loses its power to really do what we want to do in this wellness.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n To hear more from Iman Europe\u2019s conversation with The Agenda <\/em>\u2014 including details on some major future plans for The Homies DAO \u2014 listen to the full episode on Cointelegraph\u2019s Podcasts page<\/a>, Apple Podcasts<\/a> or Spotify<\/a>. And don\u2019t forget to check out Cointelegraph\u2019s full lineup<\/a> of other shows! <\/p>\nA safe space for artists to breathe, relax and socialize <\/h2>\n
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The Homies aims to put the focus on people instead of the pursuit of profit<\/h2>\n