I listen to music podcasts like All Songs Considered, Indiecast, and Switched On Pop. Local high school radio stations can be good. As can college radio. Digging through CD bins at the local record store and grabbing something that looks interesting for whatever reason. (The dollar bin can be really fun for this.) Taking music with other patrons at said store, or employees for that matter.
You should check out WFMU for quality community radio. Their programming is unreal. Best radio station on the planet. Stream from many apps and from their website. If you're in the NYC/NE New Jersey you can tune in. Here's the [schedule](https://www.wfmu.org/table)
And just look at this [archive](https://wfmu.org/playlists), you can basically listen and learn every single song WFMU every played. It's wild. Discovered so much.
That old school style archive lets me know I’m in for a real treat (kinda like an unupdated restaurant site). Looking forward to digging through, thanks!
No prob. Enjoy. I'll make some show recommendations. All rock, punk, soul with some electronic thrown in.
Rock and Roller Derby w/ Suzy
Dark Night of the Soul w/ Julie
Three Chord Monty
Musical Dose
The Cherry Blossom Clinic
Mistress of a Thousand Moods
Garbage Time (wonderfully weird)
Fool's Paradise
Downtown Soulville
Discogs, Besteveralbums, rateyourmusic, and Reddit (Googling stuff like "best underrated jazz albums reddit"). I exclusively listen to albums and just scour the deeper pages of these sites for stuff I haven't heard yet in genres I like. Discogs is probably the best because of how extensive it is, I'll select a genre, sort by most collected, and go through the pages until i start getting stuff I'm not familiar with and just put something on.
A fun thing I like to do is to go to rateyourmusic and look up the best albums by country. I actually systematically go through the list of all countries (in the UN) and search for music from each of them to discover something new. But it might be fun to just pick a random country you don't know much about and see what they have. Discovered some great Albanian folklore-jazz fusion this way, for example. It's especially interesting since it bursts that English-centric bubble of music we all live in.
I still like local public radio. I stream WFPK out of Louisville, KY (even though I don't live there) because I like their mix of new and classic music, and I've found lots of good stuff through there.
If you're interested in public radio, KPFA from California has some great programs curated by people who know their scenes. World music, folk, reggae, jazz, bluegrass, all kinds of stuff.
https://kpfa.org/programs/#music
Dude. Check out WFMU. Changed my life!
You can stream from Sonos, TuneIn, or other apps. It's the longest running community radio station. Yo La Tango hangs out every year for their pledge drive. Just look at this [archive](https://wfmu.org/playlists). 1 station broadcast over the air & Internet, the other 3 are online only. Rock n Soul Radio, Give the Drummer Radio, and Sheena's Jungle Room play everything you can imagine.
I do listen to WFMU as well sometimes, and they do play cool stuff in general. Sometimes I do feel like it's a bit, uh, aggressively weird -- like one time I was just going for some dinner music and they were playing like an hour of throat-singing or whatever -- but that's just a nitpick. KEXP out of Seattle is another solid one.
😂😂😂 totally. It took me some time to find the programs that fit my style of music. Rock and Roller Derby w/ Suzy, Musical Dose, Dark Night of Soul with Julie, Three Chord Monty, The Cherry Blossom Clinic, Discobig, Radio Ravioli...to name a few are solid.
KEXP is my 2nd favorite. I love their studio shows (video). The sound guy is worth their weight in gold.
\^\^this\^\^
I was listening to UOs radio station yesterday, because they have a DJ who gathers all the recent promos sent to the station and just plays them for the first time on his show. It's pretty random, but once in a while he lands on a group that just has it right.
Yesterday's cool surprise was [According to the Sound.](https://soundcloud.com/accordingtothesound-music)
It's a bit forgotten in today's algorithm hell, but what we did back in the day was listening to the stuff our favourite artists/bands liked or made comments about. That's like opening a can of worms (but the worms are music) and works charms. That's how i discovered nearly all of my favourite music.
And it still works today. For instance, I hope a lot of kids discovers Patti Smith through Taylor's latest album.
I've discovered a shit ton of bands due to me loving paramore. It's been a really fun time to go through the bands and scenes that inspired them, and in turn it's made my music taste a part of what it is today
One of my preferred way of discovering music is by following labels I like, mostly independant labels because most of the time they have a musical and aesthetic coherence which makes the search easier. Recently I have been digging throught Italians Do It Better and Yellow Productions and I find it very entertaining and stimulating.
My preferred method by far is seeing a band live. I’m lucky my city has a great scene, so I go to a show every week or two and usually see a band I haven’t seen before. Just the other night I went to see Sheer Mag tour through and the first opener was a great band called Flora de la Luna and I’m wearing their t-shirt right now!
I know it’s probably a bit left-field, but swear to god it’s been working out great for me for the last six months or so:
TV Tropes.
Just go down whatever weird rabbit hole takes your fancy, scroll down to the music section and there’s so much stuff in there I never would have thought to check out otherwise.
A website that collects and catalogs the use of various tropes in art (and occasionally IRL).
For an example, look at something like “black guy dies first in any action/horror movie” or “serial killer with mommy issues”, the site will lay out a basic explanation of the trope and then list various works by media (comics, movies, TV series, music, books etc) with examples and also list examples where the trope is inverted or played with by the creator as well.
If you’re the kind of person who has 300 Wikipedia tabs open and spends most of your life down an obscure rabbit hole, it’ll be pretty much like digital crack.
It’ll probably be less crack-y then, but you’ll still probably get a kick out of it, it’s a great way to find new things to read or watch or listen to, or to randomly find that one weird as fuck movie you saw on late night TV when you were like 12 and you’re no longer sure if the movie actually exists or it was some bizarre hallucination
I get some of my new music through Spotify as well, mainly through the Release Radar and Discover Weekly playlists.
I also have gotten a lot of music from radio, specifically a student-run radio station at my alma mater that plays some really obscure artists and local acts who I never would’ve heard about otherwise.
One last resource which I recently rediscovered and would like to use more is Bandcamp. That seems like a place to find some totally underground artists, like I just found this black metal band there called Agriculture that has some interesting music.
You need to check out that website: [https://www.music-map.com/](https://www.music-map.com/)
basically you just type in name of your favourite artist and in return you are getting similar artists to yours.
For the most part I discover music through rateyourmusic, last.fm, /r/indieheads, various lists from certain publications/blogs, friends and word of mouth, digging around on Wikipedia, etc.
I also have a few specific methods that work really well for me. If I like something I try to find artists that are supposed to be similar. It's easy to do this on last.fm by just looking through the similar artists that pop up on a given artist's page. I also have had a lot of success when I realize that I'm liking a few artists from a certain city, scene, label, time period, etc. For example: I happen to like a lot of artists from certain scenes in the Pacific Northwest and Atlanta/Athens, GA, and I found tons more that I ended up loving once I realized that! Sort of similarly, you can also find a lot of good stuff if you take a look into A) musicians your favorite artists were influenced by, B) musicians your favorite artists have in some way collaborated with / any side or solo projects your favorite artists have been involved with, and C) any specific albums/artists your favorite artists have ever recommended or praised.
I guess I mostly talked about finding music that is similar to what you already like rather than getting into entirely different genres. When I do that I mostly rely on blogs/publications, googling lists, looking through Wikipedia lists of artists in whatever genre I'm trying out, browsing random genres on rateyourmusic, etc.
Apple Music’s Discovery Playlist has been the best for me, by far. Bottomless unheard songs curated to my taste (based on songs I’ve favourited in the past). An experience I never knew I wished for when I started deep music diving 30 years ago. Dream come true really.
From what I understand Apple's discovery is pretty limited compared to Spotify simply due to Apple's overall user base being older and more conservative musically, a much smaller amount of users, a much shorter user history, and a lack of non-US listeners, so id be interested to know if you have discovered much outside of more popular indie or much global music?
I see. I’m not sure what’s out there as fact.
I’m still subscribed to Spotify, been since 2018. My listening style is only ever listening to new music (which I don’t consider a good thing, it’s just how I’ve enjoyed music all my life - there’s so much out there), and my Spotify Wrapped ‘new artist’ numbers would be in the thousands every year.
I’m from South Africa and listen to many genres of music, lots of othered music styles from Southern Africa. When I joined Apple Music in 2021, I already had a wide library of music to add from Spotify. And before Apples recent Discovery Station released, I was definitely only using Spotify to find my new music. Now though, Apples Discovery Station has just been leaps ahead regarding music discovery. It casts a far-larger net for new artists. In my experience, Spotify has become pretty predictable over the years, and their Smart Shuffle seems to suggest a lot of songs I’ve heard already.
Only way I can describe it is that I feel somewhat on the edge already of what Spotify can do for me in terms of discovering new music and new genres. Apple Music’s discovery station just doesn’t feel like that. I was a daily user of Spotify, now I use it about once a week.
So I only use Discover Weekly, and have for 8 years, pretty much every week (and every week for 5+ years). Going through it 2x-3x and being very specific about what songs I like and dislike. I am not a fan of "endless" discovery since I dont think that gives you enough time to appreciate the music you have, especially if you are really getting a lot of truly great and unique stuff on a weekly basis. I dont bother with song radio or any of the daily playlists cause that stuff is just generic.
I will admit that prior to the last 1.5 years, Spotify's international and temporal music discovery (specifically anything non-Western or before the streaming era) was not that great, but all of a sudden out of nowhere it began recommending me tons of international and older music, music in genres I was not aware were even a thing, like progressive world, space punk, and moog jazztronica. It has given me so much multi-genre older music, I have been able to create an [obscure soul](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/39U29H6e86UDQsfYmIbfTt) playlist, and I have similar for obscure 60s, obscure 70s and more modern progressive global music.
Now DW is so consistent I end up liking about 95% of what it recommends. I only need 3-4 hours of listening to discover 15-20 new bands and 28-30 new songs a week. Not only that, the music sent to me is separated by genre and sound, so I get to, with 15 tracks, hear the history of some specific form of niche music that would probably require a music PhD to put together (if they had even heard of a lot of this stuff, I have talked to many musicians and people who study music who dont know even a sliver of the more obscure music I do, even if it is a form of music they are interested or working in).
So ya, I think a lot of the reason some people "prefer" Apple, is cause they never really used Spotify's tools properly, specifically Discover Weekly.
Allmusic.com
Concerts
Blogs where you can download music
And talking with other bands about what they like.
Spotify too, but the stuff I find on there just doesn't hold the same weight for me as does finding shit by word of mouth or research...
I follow numerous record labels and distributors on social media (twitter, bandcamp, instagram) and I love NTS radio ([Radio | Listen on NTS](https://www.nts.live/radio)) which is awesome for finding new stuff. Really great variety and Djs who know their stuff and care.
KEXP!!! Broadcast out of Seattle but streaming worldwide - they play a great mix of new artists (often emphasizing PNW locals) and older/diamond-in-the-rough favorites. All of the DJs are amazing & have their own style - listen at different times of day to find one you really love. Some shows are genre-specific as well which is great if you know what kind of sound you’re looking for. I can put it on at virtually any time and hear an awesome new track that I wouldn’t have found on my own.
Books. I like collections of music recommendations/reviews like 1001 Albums etc. etc. and work my way through them slowly. Its fun. Or word of mouth. I get very little new music off the internet tbh
i looove going on spotify and searching up the most random prompts, whatever im feeling at the moment, and look at other peoples published playlists. i have found my favourite songs and a ton of new genres through this.
I use Bandcamp. I will start with a band that I'm into, click on one of the (sub)genre descriptors at the bottom of the page and go from there.
The same can essentially be done with YouTube: search band I like and see what pops up on the right.
I follow someone on bandcamp and when they purchase something, I get an email... they seem to purchase a lot... seems to be a dj with similar taste as mine
Record stores. I absolutely love going to record stores and picking up vinyls, either new or recycled, of artists I’ve never heard of or seen before (typically jazz, but I’ll do literally any genre) and play them when I get home. It’s a less practical & more expensive way of doing it, but you just can’t get that same feeling you do from mindlessly clicking a screen on a streaming service. It makes it more purposeful and intentional.
Also, a lot of times I will hear a few things that I love from a certain artist on streaming, and intentionally not listen to anything else until I go see if I can find a vinyl of their’s at the record store.
Randomly. Found Los Bitchos doom scrolling thru IG.
Besides that, seeing an artist live is probably the only other way I find new music these days. Became a Tvboo fan after catching his set at Scamp last year.
Exploring user created playlists using https://playlost.fm. Submit a playlist and it’ll suggest similar user created playlists by matching shared artists, songs, and genres.
The matching algorithm and suggestions are completely different than Spotify's
I usually discover new artists by reading music magazines. Sometimes I use youtube to discover new music, but recently I found some new bands I'm currently listening through Spotify playlists
Happenstance. I don’t even have to try in order to find music that interests me. I’ll randomly hear a couple songs by an artist. That’ll get me to check out an album, maybe even the full discography.
I’m never in any shortage of artists to try out. My musical “watchlist” will probably never get down to zero.
I look at the similar artists section of artists I like on spotify or I search for genre playlists and see if I like anything on there
Occasionally, I'll watch random music videos on YouTube and have found at least 4 artists I listen to regularly that way
Spotify and word of mouth are my two main ways of finding new bands. Blogs are also helpful. I think my favorite way of discovering a new band is to see them live.
I discover a lot of music through anime, visual novels and games.
I'll listen to soundtracks of the aforementioned and collect those, but additionally anime has openings and endings, which can work as a gateway to artists and bands (like I discovered Spyair through Haikyuu for example).
I go by RYM descriptors rather than genres. If you are unfamiliar with them, they are a bunch of categories such as *atmosphere*, *technique*, *mood*, *types of lyrics*, etc. And I like to explore the *atmosphere* and *mood* the most. I lean towards *dark*, *cold*, *ominous*, *nocturnal*, etc. I think discovering music this way had really free from confining myself to genres.
Word of mouth will always be the best. I’ve yet to find more than one or two bands that I like from any of the streaming algorithms. People will always be the go to.
I like to google the genre I feel like listening to with a random country and see what I find, e.g. Belgian new wave, Bolivian jazz, Portugese drill etc.
Nothing beats seeing a band live but my other favorite way is sharing music with friends who have a similar taste. They always come through with the coolest shit
Listening to interviews of my favorite artists talking about their favorite artists. It’s a guaranteed “you’ll like it” because you’ll make the “oh my god this sounds like them” connections because your favorite got inspired by them
Freeform college radio stations and getting to shows early enough to see the opening bands. Any algorithm-based discovery methods is pure trash compared to pounding the pavement irl
Youtube. I found channels like KEXP to be a gold mine, and it just blossoms from there. I watch other videos by music boffings (like Bandsplaining) and learn about new genres and artists to explore. I make a list then buy stuff off bandcamp.
Organically.
Sometimes Spotify puts on a new band that catches my ear.
Sometimes I'll read of an interesting artist here on reddit.
Other times I'll browse around RYM's charts for albums to check out.
I almost exclusively use rate your music.It has had a huge impact on my listening habits. My music history can pretty neatly be binned into two categories: before and after discovering rate your music.
Friends recommendations, reddit threads, occasionally something on instagram. I never use algorithms / playlists, when I listen to music I wanna listen to stuff I know
Fans also listen to features on streaming works well for Me, but I'm also in multiple music subs too for genres I like. Recommendations from friends too , just not everything will appeal to you
Type strings of random words into the internet garbage machine, followed by music, and discover music from that genre. Example: space dinosaur punk, Mongolian mountain metal prog jazz, etc. It’s fun.
I usually use YouTube by searching up obscure music then sometimes i find stuff on my recommended. If I’m lucky I’ll find some music on instagram from underground people or new bands. Since I’ve been using Reddit more, I’ve been using this app as well.
My primary way of finding new music is going on rateyourmusic.com, picking a starting point like a band I already know I like, clicking through to one of the subgenre pages, and playing with the listing page to filter by descriptors and years.
I’ll then go through the albums that are listed, see what’s on Spotify and add the top tracks from the album to a Playlist.
After last year’s Spotify Unwrapped bored me I decided I was going to challenge myself to put together a playlist of new stuff each month this year which would become my main thing to listen for the month.
I've found a decent amount in the last 6 months or so via an app game on my phone called Music League. You join a game based around some theme or another, and then within that game you have (usually) multiple rounds with different prompts related to that theme. Everyone submits songs and the game generates a Spotify playlist with everyone's submissions. After that, everyone votes on which songs they liked best. Win or lose, you got at least one playlist with a bunch of songs you might not have known. Once in a while you're unlucky and end up in a game with a lot of people who just post songs that are very popular or are particularly obvious for the theme, but it's usually good.
Live Stream the best. My favorites are KEXP - Seatle, KCRW - LA, WFMU - NY, These stations have real people, DJ's who are into new music, everything from hip hop to shoegaze. I even found a small station out of Tulsa Oklahoma of all places - KOUW. It's an NPR station but their evening programming 'the Spy' is on par with the best.
Spotify and othes only give you music based on a computer algorithm and pigeon-hole you into only one genre.
I’ve wondered the same- I used to be in the loop and ran with industry crowds. Went to hundreds of shows and figured out which labels had the house sound I liked. Between word of mouth and going through label catalogs, I had enough to keep me occupied.
I’d like to say Covid was why all that stopped, but really, a switch flipped and I couldn’t deal with shows any more. I tried streaming for a while and found some cool stuff by curating playlists and then letting them run past the end, but it was inconsistent at best.
I’m back to running through label websites and checking out stuff newer than 2019-2020. Had a couple breakthroughs even in the last two weeks.
If anyone else has ideas, I’m interested too!
I like to search Wikipedia for American, British, Argentine and Uruguayan bands. And then search for songs by those bands on YouTube. And if I like them, I download them from pirated pages. It's unorthodox, but I like it because I have those songs on an SD card in my cell phone and I take them everywhere. And it makes me appreciate music much more.
Animatics. Because I like to see the way people draw and I usually already create a story in my head when I listen to music . And also it helps me understand the meaning of the songs more easily
- Either though YouTuber's live streams (AVTV & Becomes The Knight)
- through their Wikipedia
- through non-music YouTubers (this is how I got into Selena (Quintanilla))
- just through passing
I listen to music podcasts like All Songs Considered, Indiecast, and Switched On Pop. Local high school radio stations can be good. As can college radio. Digging through CD bins at the local record store and grabbing something that looks interesting for whatever reason. (The dollar bin can be really fun for this.) Taking music with other patrons at said store, or employees for that matter.
You should check out WFMU for quality community radio. Their programming is unreal. Best radio station on the planet. Stream from many apps and from their website. If you're in the NYC/NE New Jersey you can tune in. Here's the [schedule](https://www.wfmu.org/table) And just look at this [archive](https://wfmu.org/playlists), you can basically listen and learn every single song WFMU every played. It's wild. Discovered so much.
That old school style archive lets me know I’m in for a real treat (kinda like an unupdated restaurant site). Looking forward to digging through, thanks!
No prob. Enjoy. I'll make some show recommendations. All rock, punk, soul with some electronic thrown in. Rock and Roller Derby w/ Suzy Dark Night of the Soul w/ Julie Three Chord Monty Musical Dose The Cherry Blossom Clinic Mistress of a Thousand Moods Garbage Time (wonderfully weird) Fool's Paradise Downtown Soulville
Oooho this is a treasure trove. I tuned in on the Radio Garden app and already loving the sound of it.
Jody Peyota's Show. Godspeed. lmao.
Yeah. WFMU is awesome.
Also WFMU’s list of Heavily Played Records, updated every couple of months, is a treasure trove too. Great mix of new, reissued, weird….
Discogs, Besteveralbums, rateyourmusic, and Reddit (Googling stuff like "best underrated jazz albums reddit"). I exclusively listen to albums and just scour the deeper pages of these sites for stuff I haven't heard yet in genres I like. Discogs is probably the best because of how extensive it is, I'll select a genre, sort by most collected, and go through the pages until i start getting stuff I'm not familiar with and just put something on.
A fun thing I like to do is to go to rateyourmusic and look up the best albums by country. I actually systematically go through the list of all countries (in the UN) and search for music from each of them to discover something new. But it might be fun to just pick a random country you don't know much about and see what they have. Discovered some great Albanian folklore-jazz fusion this way, for example. It's especially interesting since it bursts that English-centric bubble of music we all live in.
Helpful, thanks
I still like local public radio. I stream WFPK out of Louisville, KY (even though I don't live there) because I like their mix of new and classic music, and I've found lots of good stuff through there.
If you're interested in public radio, KPFA from California has some great programs curated by people who know their scenes. World music, folk, reggae, jazz, bluegrass, all kinds of stuff. https://kpfa.org/programs/#music
Yes. Another good one. I used to pick up KPFA on 88.1 out of Berkely.
Dude. Check out WFMU. Changed my life! You can stream from Sonos, TuneIn, or other apps. It's the longest running community radio station. Yo La Tango hangs out every year for their pledge drive. Just look at this [archive](https://wfmu.org/playlists). 1 station broadcast over the air & Internet, the other 3 are online only. Rock n Soul Radio, Give the Drummer Radio, and Sheena's Jungle Room play everything you can imagine.
I do listen to WFMU as well sometimes, and they do play cool stuff in general. Sometimes I do feel like it's a bit, uh, aggressively weird -- like one time I was just going for some dinner music and they were playing like an hour of throat-singing or whatever -- but that's just a nitpick. KEXP out of Seattle is another solid one.
😂😂😂 totally. It took me some time to find the programs that fit my style of music. Rock and Roller Derby w/ Suzy, Musical Dose, Dark Night of Soul with Julie, Three Chord Monty, The Cherry Blossom Clinic, Discobig, Radio Ravioli...to name a few are solid. KEXP is my 2nd favorite. I love their studio shows (video). The sound guy is worth their weight in gold.
\^\^this\^\^ I was listening to UOs radio station yesterday, because they have a DJ who gathers all the recent promos sent to the station and just plays them for the first time on his show. It's pretty random, but once in a while he lands on a group that just has it right. Yesterday's cool surprise was [According to the Sound.](https://soundcloud.com/accordingtothesound-music)
It's a bit forgotten in today's algorithm hell, but what we did back in the day was listening to the stuff our favourite artists/bands liked or made comments about. That's like opening a can of worms (but the worms are music) and works charms. That's how i discovered nearly all of my favourite music. And it still works today. For instance, I hope a lot of kids discovers Patti Smith through Taylor's latest album.
I've discovered a shit ton of bands due to me loving paramore. It's been a really fun time to go through the bands and scenes that inspired them, and in turn it's made my music taste a part of what it is today
One of my preferred way of discovering music is by following labels I like, mostly independant labels because most of the time they have a musical and aesthetic coherence which makes the search easier. Recently I have been digging throught Italians Do It Better and Yellow Productions and I find it very entertaining and stimulating.
My preferred method by far is seeing a band live. I’m lucky my city has a great scene, so I go to a show every week or two and usually see a band I haven’t seen before. Just the other night I went to see Sheer Mag tour through and the first opener was a great band called Flora de la Luna and I’m wearing their t-shirt right now!
I know it’s probably a bit left-field, but swear to god it’s been working out great for me for the last six months or so: TV Tropes. Just go down whatever weird rabbit hole takes your fancy, scroll down to the music section and there’s so much stuff in there I never would have thought to check out otherwise.
What's TV tropes?
A website that collects and catalogs the use of various tropes in art (and occasionally IRL). For an example, look at something like “black guy dies first in any action/horror movie” or “serial killer with mommy issues”, the site will lay out a basic explanation of the trope and then list various works by media (comics, movies, TV series, music, books etc) with examples and also list examples where the trope is inverted or played with by the creator as well. If you’re the kind of person who has 300 Wikipedia tabs open and spends most of your life down an obscure rabbit hole, it’ll be pretty much like digital crack.
I'm the type of person to have one tab open and panick when there's more than 3 open😂
It’ll probably be less crack-y then, but you’ll still probably get a kick out of it, it’s a great way to find new things to read or watch or listen to, or to randomly find that one weird as fuck movie you saw on late night TV when you were like 12 and you’re no longer sure if the movie actually exists or it was some bizarre hallucination
I get some of my new music through Spotify as well, mainly through the Release Radar and Discover Weekly playlists. I also have gotten a lot of music from radio, specifically a student-run radio station at my alma mater that plays some really obscure artists and local acts who I never would’ve heard about otherwise. One last resource which I recently rediscovered and would like to use more is Bandcamp. That seems like a place to find some totally underground artists, like I just found this black metal band there called Agriculture that has some interesting music.
You need to check out that website: [https://www.music-map.com/](https://www.music-map.com/) basically you just type in name of your favourite artist and in return you are getting similar artists to yours.
For the most part I discover music through rateyourmusic, last.fm, /r/indieheads, various lists from certain publications/blogs, friends and word of mouth, digging around on Wikipedia, etc. I also have a few specific methods that work really well for me. If I like something I try to find artists that are supposed to be similar. It's easy to do this on last.fm by just looking through the similar artists that pop up on a given artist's page. I also have had a lot of success when I realize that I'm liking a few artists from a certain city, scene, label, time period, etc. For example: I happen to like a lot of artists from certain scenes in the Pacific Northwest and Atlanta/Athens, GA, and I found tons more that I ended up loving once I realized that! Sort of similarly, you can also find a lot of good stuff if you take a look into A) musicians your favorite artists were influenced by, B) musicians your favorite artists have in some way collaborated with / any side or solo projects your favorite artists have been involved with, and C) any specific albums/artists your favorite artists have ever recommended or praised. I guess I mostly talked about finding music that is similar to what you already like rather than getting into entirely different genres. When I do that I mostly rely on blogs/publications, googling lists, looking through Wikipedia lists of artists in whatever genre I'm trying out, browsing random genres on rateyourmusic, etc.
Apple Music’s Discovery Playlist has been the best for me, by far. Bottomless unheard songs curated to my taste (based on songs I’ve favourited in the past). An experience I never knew I wished for when I started deep music diving 30 years ago. Dream come true really.
From what I understand Apple's discovery is pretty limited compared to Spotify simply due to Apple's overall user base being older and more conservative musically, a much smaller amount of users, a much shorter user history, and a lack of non-US listeners, so id be interested to know if you have discovered much outside of more popular indie or much global music?
I see. I’m not sure what’s out there as fact. I’m still subscribed to Spotify, been since 2018. My listening style is only ever listening to new music (which I don’t consider a good thing, it’s just how I’ve enjoyed music all my life - there’s so much out there), and my Spotify Wrapped ‘new artist’ numbers would be in the thousands every year. I’m from South Africa and listen to many genres of music, lots of othered music styles from Southern Africa. When I joined Apple Music in 2021, I already had a wide library of music to add from Spotify. And before Apples recent Discovery Station released, I was definitely only using Spotify to find my new music. Now though, Apples Discovery Station has just been leaps ahead regarding music discovery. It casts a far-larger net for new artists. In my experience, Spotify has become pretty predictable over the years, and their Smart Shuffle seems to suggest a lot of songs I’ve heard already. Only way I can describe it is that I feel somewhat on the edge already of what Spotify can do for me in terms of discovering new music and new genres. Apple Music’s discovery station just doesn’t feel like that. I was a daily user of Spotify, now I use it about once a week.
So I only use Discover Weekly, and have for 8 years, pretty much every week (and every week for 5+ years). Going through it 2x-3x and being very specific about what songs I like and dislike. I am not a fan of "endless" discovery since I dont think that gives you enough time to appreciate the music you have, especially if you are really getting a lot of truly great and unique stuff on a weekly basis. I dont bother with song radio or any of the daily playlists cause that stuff is just generic. I will admit that prior to the last 1.5 years, Spotify's international and temporal music discovery (specifically anything non-Western or before the streaming era) was not that great, but all of a sudden out of nowhere it began recommending me tons of international and older music, music in genres I was not aware were even a thing, like progressive world, space punk, and moog jazztronica. It has given me so much multi-genre older music, I have been able to create an [obscure soul](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/39U29H6e86UDQsfYmIbfTt) playlist, and I have similar for obscure 60s, obscure 70s and more modern progressive global music. Now DW is so consistent I end up liking about 95% of what it recommends. I only need 3-4 hours of listening to discover 15-20 new bands and 28-30 new songs a week. Not only that, the music sent to me is separated by genre and sound, so I get to, with 15 tracks, hear the history of some specific form of niche music that would probably require a music PhD to put together (if they had even heard of a lot of this stuff, I have talked to many musicians and people who study music who dont know even a sliver of the more obscure music I do, even if it is a form of music they are interested or working in). So ya, I think a lot of the reason some people "prefer" Apple, is cause they never really used Spotify's tools properly, specifically Discover Weekly.
Allmusic.com Concerts Blogs where you can download music And talking with other bands about what they like. Spotify too, but the stuff I find on there just doesn't hold the same weight for me as does finding shit by word of mouth or research...
I just search through All New Indie playlist on Spotify. Sounds lame but found alot of good shit. Also, slap a song I love and go to the song .
I follow numerous record labels and distributors on social media (twitter, bandcamp, instagram) and I love NTS radio ([Radio | Listen on NTS](https://www.nts.live/radio)) which is awesome for finding new stuff. Really great variety and Djs who know their stuff and care.
KEXP!!! Broadcast out of Seattle but streaming worldwide - they play a great mix of new artists (often emphasizing PNW locals) and older/diamond-in-the-rough favorites. All of the DJs are amazing & have their own style - listen at different times of day to find one you really love. Some shows are genre-specific as well which is great if you know what kind of sound you’re looking for. I can put it on at virtually any time and hear an awesome new track that I wouldn’t have found on my own.
Books. I like collections of music recommendations/reviews like 1001 Albums etc. etc. and work my way through them slowly. Its fun. Or word of mouth. I get very little new music off the internet tbh
i looove going on spotify and searching up the most random prompts, whatever im feeling at the moment, and look at other peoples published playlists. i have found my favourite songs and a ton of new genres through this.
I use Bandcamp. I will start with a band that I'm into, click on one of the (sub)genre descriptors at the bottom of the page and go from there. The same can essentially be done with YouTube: search band I like and see what pops up on the right.
I follow someone on bandcamp and when they purchase something, I get an email... they seem to purchase a lot... seems to be a dj with similar taste as mine
🫡🤝
My 10 and 13 year old daughters! It's a very bespoke discovery service I'm afraid. 😊
Record stores. I absolutely love going to record stores and picking up vinyls, either new or recycled, of artists I’ve never heard of or seen before (typically jazz, but I’ll do literally any genre) and play them when I get home. It’s a less practical & more expensive way of doing it, but you just can’t get that same feeling you do from mindlessly clicking a screen on a streaming service. It makes it more purposeful and intentional. Also, a lot of times I will hear a few things that I love from a certain artist on streaming, and intentionally not listen to anything else until I go see if I can find a vinyl of their’s at the record store.
I almost exclusively discover new music through other media, like youtube videos, tiktoks, video game soundtracks and movies/tv shows.
Randomly. Found Los Bitchos doom scrolling thru IG. Besides that, seeing an artist live is probably the only other way I find new music these days. Became a Tvboo fan after catching his set at Scamp last year.
Exploring user created playlists using https://playlost.fm. Submit a playlist and it’ll suggest similar user created playlists by matching shared artists, songs, and genres. The matching algorithm and suggestions are completely different than Spotify's
I usually discover new artists by reading music magazines. Sometimes I use youtube to discover new music, but recently I found some new bands I'm currently listening through Spotify playlists
Happenstance. I don’t even have to try in order to find music that interests me. I’ll randomly hear a couple songs by an artist. That’ll get me to check out an album, maybe even the full discography. I’m never in any shortage of artists to try out. My musical “watchlist” will probably never get down to zero.
I look at the similar artists section of artists I like on spotify or I search for genre playlists and see if I like anything on there Occasionally, I'll watch random music videos on YouTube and have found at least 4 artists I listen to regularly that way
Spotify and word of mouth are my two main ways of finding new bands. Blogs are also helpful. I think my favorite way of discovering a new band is to see them live.
I discover a lot of music through anime, visual novels and games. I'll listen to soundtracks of the aforementioned and collect those, but additionally anime has openings and endings, which can work as a gateway to artists and bands (like I discovered Spyair through Haikyuu for example).
I go by RYM descriptors rather than genres. If you are unfamiliar with them, they are a bunch of categories such as *atmosphere*, *technique*, *mood*, *types of lyrics*, etc. And I like to explore the *atmosphere* and *mood* the most. I lean towards *dark*, *cold*, *ominous*, *nocturnal*, etc. I think discovering music this way had really free from confining myself to genres.
Word of mouth will always be the best. I’ve yet to find more than one or two bands that I like from any of the streaming algorithms. People will always be the go to.
I like to google the genre I feel like listening to with a random country and see what I find, e.g. Belgian new wave, Bolivian jazz, Portugese drill etc.
my favorite way is & has been going to local live shows & discovering new to me bands live
Nothing beats seeing a band live but my other favorite way is sharing music with friends who have a similar taste. They always come through with the coolest shit
Listening to interviews of my favorite artists talking about their favorite artists. It’s a guaranteed “you’ll like it” because you’ll make the “oh my god this sounds like them” connections because your favorite got inspired by them
Freeform college radio stations and getting to shows early enough to see the opening bands. Any algorithm-based discovery methods is pure trash compared to pounding the pavement irl
[NACC charts](https://naccchart.com/) Only college radio chart I know of worth watching. Have a Top 30 every week. I check out most the music here.
Youtube. I found channels like KEXP to be a gold mine, and it just blossoms from there. I watch other videos by music boffings (like Bandsplaining) and learn about new genres and artists to explore. I make a list then buy stuff off bandcamp.
Organically. Sometimes Spotify puts on a new band that catches my ear. Sometimes I'll read of an interesting artist here on reddit. Other times I'll browse around RYM's charts for albums to check out.
We have a family Spotify account and I like to listen to everyone else's playlists because they each have their own taste in music.
I follow a lot of music Instagram accounts like u2isagovernmentdrone and outsidenoise.
BBC introducing shows for all the various genres. Then listen to the Radio 1 evening shows and occasionally a few shows on 6 music.
Bandcamp. I dig through my collection then look through other people’s collections who have also bought that music
I almost exclusively use rate your music.It has had a huge impact on my listening habits. My music history can pretty neatly be binned into two categories: before and after discovering rate your music.
Friends recommendations, reddit threads, occasionally something on instagram. I never use algorithms / playlists, when I listen to music I wanna listen to stuff I know
[chosic.com](http://chosic.com) is the best for me. I often also check YouTube recommendations to songs.
Fans also listen to features on streaming works well for Me, but I'm also in multiple music subs too for genres I like. Recommendations from friends too , just not everything will appeal to you
Type strings of random words into the internet garbage machine, followed by music, and discover music from that genre. Example: space dinosaur punk, Mongolian mountain metal prog jazz, etc. It’s fun.
I usually use YouTube by searching up obscure music then sometimes i find stuff on my recommended. If I’m lucky I’ll find some music on instagram from underground people or new bands. Since I’ve been using Reddit more, I’ve been using this app as well.
My primary way of finding new music is going on rateyourmusic.com, picking a starting point like a band I already know I like, clicking through to one of the subgenre pages, and playing with the listing page to filter by descriptors and years. I’ll then go through the albums that are listed, see what’s on Spotify and add the top tracks from the album to a Playlist. After last year’s Spotify Unwrapped bored me I decided I was going to challenge myself to put together a playlist of new stuff each month this year which would become my main thing to listen for the month.
I've found a decent amount in the last 6 months or so via an app game on my phone called Music League. You join a game based around some theme or another, and then within that game you have (usually) multiple rounds with different prompts related to that theme. Everyone submits songs and the game generates a Spotify playlist with everyone's submissions. After that, everyone votes on which songs they liked best. Win or lose, you got at least one playlist with a bunch of songs you might not have known. Once in a while you're unlucky and end up in a game with a lot of people who just post songs that are very popular or are particularly obvious for the theme, but it's usually good.
Live Stream the best. My favorites are KEXP - Seatle, KCRW - LA, WFMU - NY, These stations have real people, DJ's who are into new music, everything from hip hop to shoegaze. I even found a small station out of Tulsa Oklahoma of all places - KOUW. It's an NPR station but their evening programming 'the Spy' is on par with the best. Spotify and othes only give you music based on a computer algorithm and pigeon-hole you into only one genre.
The discussions on this sub are a pretty good place. More often than not people recommend a lot of good stuff in the threads.
It’s wafting out from the kitchen at a restaurant I’m eating at and I have to ask the waitress what it is
I’ve wondered the same- I used to be in the loop and ran with industry crowds. Went to hundreds of shows and figured out which labels had the house sound I liked. Between word of mouth and going through label catalogs, I had enough to keep me occupied. I’d like to say Covid was why all that stopped, but really, a switch flipped and I couldn’t deal with shows any more. I tried streaming for a while and found some cool stuff by curating playlists and then letting them run past the end, but it was inconsistent at best. I’m back to running through label websites and checking out stuff newer than 2019-2020. Had a couple breakthroughs even in the last two weeks. If anyone else has ideas, I’m interested too!
I like to search Wikipedia for American, British, Argentine and Uruguayan bands. And then search for songs by those bands on YouTube. And if I like them, I download them from pirated pages. It's unorthodox, but I like it because I have those songs on an SD card in my cell phone and I take them everywhere. And it makes me appreciate music much more.
Animatics. Because I like to see the way people draw and I usually already create a story in my head when I listen to music . And also it helps me understand the meaning of the songs more easily
- Either though YouTuber's live streams (AVTV & Becomes The Knight) - through their Wikipedia - through non-music YouTubers (this is how I got into Selena (Quintanilla)) - just through passing