i heard you're looking for music
I feel like I’ve been in a little bit of a new music slump, mostly listening to my fave albums on repeat.
I read this article a few months ago (maybe linked from someone on here? or on are.na? sorry need to start saving where I get things from). It’s about how you’ll consider all the music you hear before you turn 25 to be the best music you’ve ever heard for the rest of your life because after 25 parts of your ear cells start to decay and you’re forever nostalgic for your youth.
The rational part of my brain tells me this is mostly bs. I know plenty of people over 25 who have deep emotional connections to artists they found semi-recently. The nagging little part of me says but what if it’s trueeee though so then I panic a bit and try to shove more music in my brain.
I don’t really like the algorithms that try to tell you what music to listen to, they’re often really dissatisfying and repetitive. The algorithms have also often been paid by big record corps to show you something in particular. Maybe you will remember that Spotify tried to push Espresso by Sabrina Carpenter into every playlist & “random & shuffled” radio last summer? I do! And it was very annoying to me.
Lately I’ve been having more people ask me where I find music. In my own music slumps I also tend to forget the best ways for finding new music, so here’s me documenting my favourite ways to find stuff! Mostly free from algorithmic recommendations… Maybe you will get that rush of happiness and excitement when you find something really cool that you really love! It’s worth the effort, I promise. You will like the music even more when it is kind of a struggle to find it yourself.
Music Streaming Services
I know Spotify kind of sucks and I’m trying to switch to something a bit more ethical… but in the meantime here:
- Go to an artist’s page that you like on Spotify on Desktop. Scroll down a bit until you see the “Discovered On” section. These are the top playlists on the platform where people are being exposed to the artist for the first time. Try to scroll a bit until you find a playlist created by a human (not Spotify) and then click on it and listen to it. You’ll usually find this sonically adjacent to the artist you love. You can also be a little voyeur and find playlists that spotify users created with very personal meanings.
- An example: if you go to the page for the artist Pavement and do the above, you will find the following playlists:
- Follow people you know and look at whatever they are listening to. On desktop, whatever people are actively listening to is displayed on the right hand side! Lots of fun tunes found this way. Also a good reminder to check in on your friends if they are listening to their sad tunes 24/7.
- Some magazines/stores/cool places put together really fire playlists. I randomly found the Row on Spotify, which I think is a store owned by Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen? Anyway, whoever on their team puts together their monthly playlists has great taste. Here is the AUGUST 2025 one. If you’re ever sitting in a cafe and you like the music, look quick online and see if they have a cafe playlist!
- Apple Music has the unique capability to upload full DJ sets. I love that you can listen to Fred again..’s London Rooftop set fully mixed here.
YouTube
- Magical generator of good music. Type in any genre you like and just start clicking through some of the full albums that are posted on there. Just keep crawling further and further through the website by clicking on links through the sidebar recommendations. God it is also so endearing to read people’s comments. Most of them are randomly finding these albums, just like you. A few good places to start:
- Some channels make little videos with songs set to movie clips. I found i’m cyborg but that’s ok when I was 14 and it exposed me to some really great little songs and movies! They also went crazy on 2014 tumblr. Plenty of channels like this.
- Tiny Desk Concerts! the very best. so many big and small artists come on here and pull together some fabulous sets. Link to one of my faves (and one of the most famous).
Last.fm
You can set up a last.fm profile pretty quickly and it will begin tracking all the music you listen to on streaming services. It’s like Spotify Wrapped but free and you can look at your stats any time. I’ve been using the service since I was 13 and it has recorded all the stuff I have listened to for over a decade. To find new music on there here’s what I do:
- Navigate to an artist’s page that you like. Scroll to the comment section and click on a user who left a positive comment about the artist. The website will tell you how “compatible” you are with the person. If it’s high, check out their other top artists you don’t recognize and do a a deep dive into their discography.
- Follow people you know and steal their taste. Maybe look at their top artists of all time?
- If you want to dive into my psyche - here is my profile... more than 10 years old (wtf)!! I haven’t the heart to change my profile picture, which will remain a gif of Konata from Lucky Star for all perpetuity.
Your favourite artist’s favourite artist
Your favourite artists probably talk about their influences somewhere:
- Check their wikipedia
- And also see if they are nepo babies. I started listening to fred again.. because Brian Eno is his godfather
- Maybe they’ve done a What’s in my Bag? with Amoeba Records. Great way to find the things your artists think are very cool. Only downside is it will make you really want to spend money on records.
- Artists are sometimes very overt about their influences and will write songs in the style of another artists. See LCD Soundsystem’s Somebody’s Calling Me, which is beat for beat just Nightclubbing by Iggy Pop
- I also love Imperfectly Perfect. It’s for more than just music recs. But still awesome. See if your faves have done one.
Radiooooo
- I’ve only recently been getting into radio stations, mostly online hosted. If you don’t feel like doing too much work, just pick a station where someone else has already done the work for you. Here’s two I love:
rym
- RateYourMusic is one of the single greatest music websites on the internet that is also full of extremely pretentious people. For your own sanity do not venture into the comment section. If you want to listen to things that maybe 10 people on Earth have ever heard, or if there’s an extremely specific micro-genre you want to get into, check this out:
- The genre tool has been one of the most important pieces in my own music history education. You can pick a tiny genre and find out what are the top rated albums, what year the genre peaked, and read tons of good reviews from people who have dedicated time to listening and writing about an album. Here’s the page for dance music (and all its subgenres!)
- The user-generated lists tool is so good. Here’s some great lists:
- funky little guys by user Steorra (collection of album covers with funky guys on them)
- memory in a bottle by user dreamfortress
- Folkloric, traditional, meditative bangers from all around the world by user Ullur
Other humans in the flesh world
- your record store guy
- It’s vitally important to befriend the people who own record stores. I found so many cool records because of my guy ian (shouting him tf out), who always ordered in records especially for me. Record store people are so cool and there is no one better to nerd out about music with. they’ll be so happy to talk to you (ymmv)!
- your friends who are cool
- Lots of my buddies just have music on in the background when we hang out. Or they put it on when we drive around. Recent shout outs to L’s driving playlist she made for us both & also anna’s excellent music she has curated so well for her living room.
- music events
- go to music events. I don’t care if you don’t live in a big place. Your neighbour might be a very gifted saxophonist and then you can be blessed by his talent. Humans were kind of born to make music and it’s awesome that so many people do.
- Purposely look for shows with genres you’re not familiar with. I went to a small punk festival for the first time a few weeks ago and it was so cool and awesome with great people
some of my artist discovery stories
- The first person I ever stole music taste from was my older brother, maybe when I was nine years old. I remember the moment I went on to his old MacBook and found his iTunes library. I clicked on two artists called Phoenix and Death Cab for Cutie and loved every second of listening to their albums. It was sort of like gaining consciousness for the first time, because it woke me up to the idea that you didn’t have to just be subjected to the music around you, but you could have an active role in finding new stuff. Simple but life changing.
- In one of my first weeks of university I ended up in a friend’s dorm room huddled around a bunch of people singing softly to a guitar. Tessa started playing a song by Florist, and I found a new favourite artist. Sometimes an artist recommends you a person.
- The coolest hairdresser I ever had, Stevie, told me to listen to Animal Collective and they were so right, I did love them. The song My Girls has taken me through many many kilometres of running.
If you go hunting for music treasure and you find something cool you should share it with me. Or if you have another cool way to suggest of finding music! Let’s talk about tunes!! you can contact me at this link.
Love n hugs and happy very warm August,
sam