The Wu-Tang Clan will make and sell only one copy of its forthcoming The Wu – Once Upon A Time In Shaolin album, according Forbes.
“We’re about to sell an album like nobody else sold it before,” RZA says in an interview with Forbes. “We’re about to put out a piece of art like nobody else has done in the history of [modern] music. We’re making a single-sale collector’s item. This is like somebody having the scepter of an Egyptian king.”
The article says that the album has 31 songs that clock in at 128 minutes. The RZA and the album’s primary producer, Morocco-based producer Tarik “Cilvaringz” Azzougarh, want to take the album on a tour through festivals, galleries and museums, and charge a fee to listen to the album.
“The idea that music is art has been something we advocated for years,” RZA says. “And yet its doesn’t receive the same treatment as art in the sense of the value of what it is, especially nowadays when it’s been devalued and diminished to almost the point that it has to be given away for free.”
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RZA and Cilvaringz say they were inspired by Jay Z’s Samsung partnership for the release of Magna Carta Holy Grailand Nispey Hussle selling his Crenshaw mixtape for $100 a copy.
“I think it’s a musical portrait that’s going to revolutionize music in the future,” Masta Killa said to Forbes. “And I’m thankful to my brother Ringz, to collaborate with, and I’m ecstatic to be a part of it.”
The album will be housed in an engraved silver-and-nickel box that was handcrafted by British-Moroccan artist Yahya, whose works have been commissioned by royal families and business leaders around the world.
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