This post was originally going to be titled “How does music discovery on Apple Music compare to Spotify these days?” but I want to make it more broad.
All advice and ideas appreciated!
Thank you! I discovered some new music via these suggestions!
thanks for sharing gnoosic, it’s already given me some unknown stuff that is right up my alley :)
You’re welcome and happy hunting.
I think they are powered by the same AI, but music map shows you how closely they are related
These are so damn cool! Thanks so much for sharing these links! You’ve got me all excited! :)
The hivemind hard at work. I am keeper of tidibits, curator of useless facts.
I listen to my local college radio station, as well as a handful of others on TuneIn. It’s nice having an idea of what people under 30 are into.
Thanks for the TuneIn callout. For some reason I’ve never bothered with a radio app but this is pretty slick. I should probably RTFM but it looks like like you can tune in nationally/globally? I gotta figure out where the cool kids are enrolling these days.
Yep! You can listen live to whatever is hosted on there. It’s definitely not everything, but I bet a solid 75% of US-based radio stations are on there. Can’t speak much to non-US radio, but I have listened to some stuff out of Germany before.
Another cool one is the site n10.as. It’s a volunteer radio station out of Toronto (I think). It’s primarily reruns these days, but there are still some folks doing live shows.
All of the BBC stations used to be on TuneIn, but they got pulled a couple of years ago, which pissed me off.
As a Brit, your college stations always fascinated me. We have student radio here, but it’s a completely different vibe. From what I’ve heard of your stations, they sound almost professional, with good presenters spinning the tracks they want to play, whereas our student radio is mostly just people learning how to talk into a mic, reading news bulletins poorly, and playing whichever tracks happen to already be on the playout system.
And I speak as someone who was involved in my university’s radio station when I was there, studying for a radio production degree…
My university’s college radio station runs the full gamut of what you described. It’s kind of interesting how they do it.
Broadcasting students get to have a show after completing certain core courses. They begin over summer, when listenership is very low. Listening to the station in late June/early July is adorable. I should actually tune in today, now that I’m thinking about it, because it’s around time for all the baby broadcasters to be doing their beginner shows.
Students must have the option to end their show at some point, because a lot of student broadcasters just kinda disappear. Others, though, will stay on for 2 or 3 years as they finish their degree. Some of them become VERY good.
If you’re happy to reveal such information, what’s your local station, because I’d like to hear it.
I haven’t listened in a few months, so now I’m nervous that there won’t be any cute, terrified new kids this year lol.
Either way, it’s a good station. Enjoy!
EDIT Listening now. We’re good… Mathea B. seems pretty flustered 😅
Cheers!
NPR Tiny Desk and KEXP’s live performances (both on YouTube) have both helped me discover amazing musicians.
I think I discovered most new stoner and doom bands on youtube: 666MrDoom.
A lot of the time I hear new music from different genres by hanging out with friends.
And bandcamp is also a good tool for discovering new stuff.
i like traditional musics from around the world so when i fancy something new i start with wikipedia articles on instruments i like and rabbit hole through links to get terms and countries and things to put into search strings on youtube. One day i started with tar (precursor for both sitar and guitar) and ended up grooving to Philippine boat lutes, which are brilliant. https://piped.simpleprivacy.fr/watch?v=K7hYfnG7mJM
Trad musicians tend to play in several groups so that’s another source of rabbit holes to explore. And just keeping an eye out for interesting things other people post. Mostly individual clips but sometimes happen into treasure troves like at the start of the first lockdown when someone I followed on Twitter posted about Met Opera in NYC streaming a different opera each day for free. It was a great opportunity to learn about a new-to-me type of music so I grabbed it, thinking it would be a couple of weeks at most. A year and a half later they finally stopped and I was an addict :)
Also libraries. Libraries can be fantastic for exploring new musicians and types of music.
Even when algorithms are good, there’s still a lot more out there waiting for listeners ❤️
By paying attention to bands I already like.
Do I know who they’re touring with? Are they posting about other bands in their scene? Maybe they like to post about cool music they’re listening to.
I’ve discovered music from an artist posting bandcamp friday recommendation thread, instagram story AMA’s, q&a moments with musicians at shows, showing up for openers at shows, etc.
A variety of ways, but probably most commonly by browsing Discogs and rateyourmusic.com. Discogs is great for looking through labels that release the music you already like, finding side projects of your favorite artists, or just diving into random genres.
Rateyourmusic, is an interesting one. The website as a whole certainly has a certain preferences, but its genre charts are great for getting started with new genres of music and getting a foundation in genres you aren’t familiar with.
Last.fm is also a great tool as others have mentioned.
- thru TikTok reposted to Instagram. People laugh about it, but sometimes I get to hear new stuff from other regions of the world.
- musicians who post their practice videos, often they are songs that I’ve already heard, but from time to time, I will be exposed to more obscure / older stuff. Especially in genre that I’m not too familiar with, e.g. funk, black metal, etc. It’s even more fruitful when the musician is not from English speaking region, e.g. Brazil.
Phew, I’m glad I’m not the only one. I feel like a weirdo frantically googling lyrics I’ve heard on tiktok but it works! And it’s often cool stuff from other regions, you’re right.
Spotify radio is usually spot on and very close to what I like.
Nother way I use, is through music reaction videos.
Right, Discover has been my main vehicle for finding music for years. Spotify definitely does have a great algo for suggestions.
Reaction videos is actually a good call. I found Hi Ren last week that way, and while it isn’t really a casual listener, per se, I did think it was really compelling. My issue with the react videos generally is they feel ‘acted’ a lot of the time because YouTube loves to rabbit hole people into those. Good way to make a buck at the moment
Yes, the reaction scene is a bit weird, but I like @tanktheteck in particular, since I have similar tastes to him.
The Daily Mixes from Spotify have done a great job of figuring out what I enjoy, and finding more of it from different artists
Honestly? TikTok.
I have found more good music and culture on TikTok than anywhere else on any other platform. Remixes, up and coming artists, classical, jazz, hippie, pop, subculture. You name it.
I think this has to do with how TikTok’s algorithm nails you down to similar interests and stuff, but also not so much like YouTube where it’s literally ONLY more of the exact same.
Spotify sometimes hits a good station, but you largely have to find your own vibe-of-the-moment.
TikTok now, though, for years, has been turning up some of the most interesting and good to listen music. I get northerner civil war anthem remixes, super genuine pop piano music that I’m blown away by, culture videogame anthems, and more.
The one drawback is that it’s not fast. If you search through music on a service, top lists and “audiophile” lists, you’re bound to find tons of cool new things that you probably never would have found. TikTok cannot compare with doing your own actual mass searching. But, as a platform of just using it, it’s been otherwise by far the best.
My girlfriend has found a lot of great music there as well over the past couple years. She doesn’t even search it out, really. She doom scrolls like normal but the culture of tik tik has a bent towards soundtracks and people seem to like to show off their cool music that way. Good call
Another question: what’s your strategy when approaching a new band that catches your attention?
Listen to most popular? Pick an album and ride?
I just had the though that picking from an artists 1st - 3rd album might be a good alternative to looking at whatever is most recent.
I check Wikipedia or wherever first, not for reviews but just to get a sense of when they were most active or just to get a full discography. Sometimes I notice Spotify just straight up doesn’t have some bands oldest stuff, so it helps me figure out where I want to start
A thing I like to do if I’m in a cafe or place with good music playing, I’ll just straight up ask the staff – if theyre not busy – what they’re playing. Sometimes gets a nice little conversation. Then I’ll add it to a playlist and go from there. Of course I can shazam it or whatever but it’s not as fun
I search genres I enjoy on rateyourmusic and grab a few albums from there :3
Sometimes YouTube or NPR but my favorite visual way to do it is with Music Map. You type in the artist and it brings up a map of similar ones. The closer an artist is to the one you searched for, the more similar they are.
