EntriesHow to Find New Music That You Will Like
Difficulty: Moderate
You can’t rely on generic, mainstream sources (tv/radio/rolling stone magazine) to bring you new music that you can really connect with. Everybody’s tastes are different, mainstream is a compromise. The best way to find new music you’ll like is to build off your existing musical tastes.
Things You’ll Need
- some musical tastes (even if they are well known bands)
- the mindset to try new things
- a little patience
Method 1 - Google bands you like in pairs:
You’re searching for lists of similar bands that include at least two bands you already like. Use quotes around the band names so it searches on the exact name instead of just parts such as: “pretty girls make graves” “des ark”. This is likely to return links to user profiles on sites like makeoutclub or myspace of people who like some of the bands you like. Look for ones you haven’t heard of and go find clips of their music online (at: music.myspace.com / purevolume.com / napster.com). Be patient; some bands you won’t like, but you can find some great matches this way.
Method 2 - Rate songs and get recommendations based on similar artists:
If your music listening repertoire is very basic you may want to try review engines such as yahoo! unlimited. Here you can rate songs as you hear them and then get statistical recommendations based off your tastes. Although the recommendations are pretty good and do include many of the smaller acts, truly indie acts with little information don’t show up in these cross-references. But this is a great place to start. You can surf all day and find music you’ve never heard of, rate it and continually improve your recommendations.
Method 3 - Get Recommendations based off what you actually listen to:
Another brilliant way is to use a free online service such as (last.fm) which keeps track of what you listen to most frequently at home and then gives you recommendations on what you may like based on other peoples listening preferences that match yours. You may find that you think ‘mock orange’ is your favorite band, but based on what your listening to, you secretly love more synth driven music like ‘the anniversary’ better. By clicking on your favorite bands profile pages you can check out other people that “listen” to the same stuff as you. See what they have also been listening to a lot that you haven’t heard of. You can find small undiscovered bands this way. You’ll see that some people will listen the heck out of some band but they are not ready to list them in their favorite bands on myspace or whatever. Also you can single out the best songs from an artist to give a first listen to.
Overall Tips
- Finding a band with a tiny fanbase that you love is the best; it’s like striking gold! Support the tiny bands you like by going to their shows when they come to town so that they can continue to create your kind of music. You will find DIY shows are much more enjoyable and reasonably priced than the huge arena-sized concerts of popular bands.
- Try new things: the first time I heard a punk screaming in the 90s I thought it sounded horrible. Later through early “hopesfall” I came to love screaming as a musical element. Be open minded about musical concepts that are completely foreign to you.
- Listen to Local College Radio: sometimes they play a lot of crap, but sometimes they play awesome stuff in different generes that you would never run across on your own (because you had no idea you had a soft spot for avant garde jazz or experimental hip-hop).
- Listen to some of the early albums from popular artists that were recorded when they weren’t popular. A few of the bands that are MTV popular today put out some of my favorite albums when they were playing house shows to ten person audiences.
- Ask your geeky music savvy friends for some recommendations, if they know you well they should be able to introduce you to a few things that match your personality. Ask for a mix-tape(cd).
Some Warnings
- Perceived vs. Actual Tastes: can hinder your new music search. You may think you love one band and rate them highly on Yahoo! unlimited but actually listen to entirely different bands based off your listening patterns on Last.fm. Remember the way a band looks or acts may be the reason why you ‘think’ you love a band when really you don’t like their music. Rate accordingly.
- If using Last.fm don’t leave music playing while you’re gone: or else your player may play every single song from your huge “belle and sebastion” collection that you acquired because you liked one of their songs but found out that was the only one you liked. Last.fm will deem them as your new favorite band, and there are no undos! (better remove bands you really don’t like from you list now)
- Be prepared to see your favorite unknown act become mainstream. Some things are just too good to be kept a secret — Go see them play now while tickets only cost five dollars.
- Also be prepared for your favorite independent band to release a crappy second album (because they tried to appeal to the masses but came up short). Don’t totally dismiss them for this. It may not be what you have come to expect from them, but you may like it (as its own separate entity) later on.
- You may find your new favorite band is no longer a band. If you’ve been listening to mainstream all this time there’s a whole history of music that has been going on behind the scenes. It’s disheartening to find out they won’t be releasing any new albums or touring to your town. Keep hope! Some bands get back together for reunion tours and sometimes put out new albums while they’re at it. Also check up to see the other bands that the individual members have formed. Sometimes they’ll reform to be practically the same band with one different member and a new name.
- Sometimes the quality of recording will be questionable: a lot of times a song will get circulated before it is properly released, look for more recent recordings. Smaller bands don’t have the time or budget to record a perfect performance. A lot of times in mainstream music it’s pro-tools (a computer) playing anyways. The good thing is digital recording seems to be improving the overall quality of low budget tracks as well. Yet, there’s still something special to be found in lo-fi recordings.
- Don’t loose hope in music! Genres & scenes that you once loved may be a thing of the past. That’s fine, it was amazing that it happened and that you were right in the middle of it, but that doesn’t mean you should turn your nose up at new music and continue to run your existing collection into the ground. Similar (but different) eras in music history are happening right now. Go find your musical niche and gain yourself a brand new set of songs (& memories) for the next chapter to the soundtrack of your life.