TL;DR Send me new music (please). That off-the-wall shit that you wouldn't recommend to anyone else. I enjoy finding and sharing new music. The more obscure and unknown the better because the more...
TL;DR Send me new music (please). That off-the-wall shit that you wouldn't recommend to anyone else. I enjoy finding and sharing new music. The more obscure and unknown the better because the more likely it'll actually be new. Also some tips on finding new music yourself if you've been wanting to expand your horizons.
I went through a period of musical stagnation from around 2008-2017 where I rarely found or enjoyed any new music. I mostly listened to the same dozen or so artists on repeat and even that was mostly the same songs and genres. After graduating from school there wasn't anyone to "pass the aux cable" to and so my music discovery went down the drain.
Starting in 2018 I decided enough was enough of that. I absolutely love music and even if I don't vibe with every aspect of a song I can usually find an aspect or quality of a song that I enjoy.
I'll admit I'm a bit of a hipster in that I love finding small artists/bands but the reason for this is I absolutely love introducing people to new music and the best way to do that is to get off the Top100 Charts. I also try and get away from "underrated" artists who are actually quite well known among people who love that specific genre of music. They're not really "mainstream" but they're still "well known". By that I mean artists like Aesop Rock if you're into rap or Aurora if you're into SynthPop - if your "underrated"/"underground" artist has a YouTube video with >5m views or shows up in a "Top 20 Underrated Artists in <genre>" listicle on the 1st page of Google results they're well known - just not mainstream. [0]
Some tips for exploring (and how I personally explore):
- Pay attention to labels - at least for the smaller/indie labels that stick to a particular genre/feel/aesthetic. One of my favorite JP rap labels is "Low High Who?" and while I'm not a fan of every single artist they have a lot of talent on their roster and they have a pretty consistent aesthetic to their songs and MV's.
- Ever find a new song from a new artist that you love so you check out their other songs and... they're just... bad? Or not your style? Check out who produced or mixed the song. Chances are actually pretty high that the one song you like is the only song that was produced by that producer with a different producer working on all the other tracks! Check out other work by the Producer and you might find a band where they produced an entire album instead of being a guest producer on a single song of one album.
- Search for local talent! Even if you don't actually go/attend any shows a lot of those bands will have either a YouTube or Bandcamp profile if you look for them.
- YouTube Algorithm will occasionally show me some banger new music with <4,000 views. If I see an interesting thumbnail and especially if I notice it has almost no views but is showing up in my recs I'll give it a listen real quick.
- Every Noise at Once and pick a genre that makes me say "Huh - I don't know what that genre even sounds like." Time to go listen to whatever the hell "gymcore" is meant to be.
- Asking people to really dig deep with their recs. :) Give me something off the wall! Have that favorite song that you never share because you don't think anyone else has the same music taste as you or are afraid of being judged for liking some weird shit? Sweet! Share it. I want to hear it. I don't care what genre it is - send me a link and I'll listen to it.
Lately I've been trying to expand my horizons even more because in 2022 I only added a whopping 1 new song to my yearly "new music" playlist compared to 26 in 2021 and 45 in 2020. 2023 has been looking better with 17 new songs but I really want to break my 2020 record. These playlists are "new music I enjoyed" and the music doesn't need to be "new" - only new to me. One of the first new additions was Merk & Kremont - Sad Story (Out Of Luck) (playlist link if you want to see the other 16 songs from this year).
[0] That isn't to say I don't also listen to and enjoy mainstream or "underrated" artists. Aesop Rock is hands down my favorite American/English-speaking rapper by a pretty large margin and I'm a fan of Aurora's work too. But they're also some of the first names dropped whenever you're asking for an <underrated artists> in <genre>.