Filmed by Cam Murdoch, Edited by Jamee Cornelia
Setting the scene.
When we began Future Surf Radio in March '22, hosting IRL experiences were a huge part of our plans and essential proof of concept for things that we wanted to achieve in the future.
The only two events that we had our sites on were NFT.NYC and Art Basel Miami. While NYC was an overall success that came with its own unique challenges, Art Basel was the grail. Bringing Future Surf to South Beach felt essential to the brand.
There were 6 months between NFT.NYC and Art Basel, which seemed like plenty of time, however the breakneck pace of web3 leading up to our trip to NYC left many of us drained and in need of a break. This combined with the "bear market" and subsequent frugality that occurred made it hard to get advance commitments and from potential partners, which also made securing a venue a task to say the least.
In October, one of the artists in our community, Isadore Noir reached out and was a big help in taking the vision for our event and the venues that we'd scouted, along with some she'd helped find, and began making calls. If you've ever heard Izzy speak, then you know she has a golden voice, which worked much to our favor in connecting us with the #2 spot on our wish list, Sola Miami.
On the back-end.
While venues were being sought after and secured, we'd entered into a partnership with Consensys to utilize features of their NFT platform to power the web3 aspect of our experience. Consensys had developed a free claim process that only required an e-mail address, which we intended to use to make the NFT more accessible to people who aren't in web3 yet.
For this NFT Cam Murdoch designed our first postage stamp (this will make sense later) and the first official Future Surf NFT (also the 3rd ever Consensys NFT).
Attendees of Secret Surf, and those that attended some of our post-basel Twitter spaces, were able to claim this NFT which will give them pre-sale access to Art Basel 2023.
This process was simple, until it wasn't lol. The tech behind this aspect of the event was crucial and provided an opportunity for us to learn a lot. The MVPs for this effort were DJ Twinny Twin, along with Stonez the Organic, and the Consensys NFT team for building a the custom website for this free claim with such little time.
Long distance shooter.
Due to life, Scolla was not able to join us. But to say his presence wasn't felt and that his blueprints weren't on this event as well would be grossly inaccurate.
The attention to detail that he possess and his ability to find the cherry that needs to be on top of the cake was on full display.
Scolla linked us with DJ Mutaal who kept us dancing all night. He also recorded a classic Scolla FSR intro and special tags to be played at the event. 🙏🏾
Showtime...almost.
We arrived at the venue at 5 pm, two hours before the event. Shoutout to Jazii for pulling up early and just for being a good friend, because the stress was real in the days leading up to the event.
But, we weren't out of the woods yet, there was one final boss to clear. When we arrived, the entire sound system and stage still needed to be setup and the gentleman that normally would've done it was in an accident, but a wise person once said "If you build it they will come" so I rolled up my sleeves and got to work.
Moments before the event was set to begin, we'd figured out sound and also taste tested the special "secret surf" cocktails that Sola had concocted for us 🍹.
The best music in & out of web3.
Jazii
Soléy
X&ND
Isadore Noir
Jadyn Violet
Jamee Cornelia
Cam Murdoch
Charm Taylor