The metalcore band Harm. IMO better than Spiritbox but only has like 3000 montly listeners on Spotify.
Way too many to list but I’ll throw one out. Do you like Radiohead, REM, The National, Pixies, Frank Turner, or Dinosaur Jr.? Well, they (or their lead singer) all love Mark Mulcahy’s music enough to have recorded a cover song for the tribute album when Mark’s wife passed.
Mark led the band Miracle Legion, released some solo work, and led the band Polaris (not the metal band from Australia), best known as the band from the show The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Also noteworthy: Miracle Legion toured and released an EP with The Sugarcubes, aka Bjork’s band.
Song recommendations: The Backyard, All For The Best by Miracle Legion - Hey Sandy, Saturnine by Polaris - Taking Baby Steps, The Fiddler, Hey Self Defeater by Mark Mulcahy.
Album recommendations: Drenched by Miracle Legion, Music from The Adventures of Pete & Pete by Polaris, and Fathering by Mark Mulcahy.
Neko Case! The voice of God with red hair, I call her. Also her other supergroup band The New Pornographers is amazing. A one of a kind voice.
Also Drive-By Truckers should be considered a worldwide treasure.
Caroline Polachek.
Her cover of “Breathless” will absolutely leave you so.
If your library has Freegal she’s on there BTW. :)
Just got really into her, I absolutely love what she does with her voice. I just received her second album on cassette.
She has the best vocals on the planet, I’ll say it over and over again.
I should check out her work, pretty sure the only place I’ve heard her was on a flume collab
My fave album by her is Pang, but Desire, I Want to Turn Into You is also incredible.
Panpticon, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Chat Pile, Ashenspire, Swans, Obongjayar, Black Midi, and emancipator
Haven’t heard them, no, I’ll have to give them a look! The rest of my recs are wildly different so they aren’t for everyone who likes emancipator, haha.
The Revivalists are an incredible bluesy rock band, but everything of theirs on the radio is their blandest stuff. They really excel with live performances and amazing instrumentals.
“It Was a Sin” builds slow but gets really high energy by the end
“Soul Fight” has a top notch saxophone solo
Here’s a full concert at Red Rocks
They are a really good live act, better than the records, the show is great.
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Weird Al Yankovich
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Antonin Dvorak
In general, Parliament/Funkadelic has a ton of artists within its scope worth exploring. George Clinton is probably the most famous among them, but there’s also Eddie Hazel, Bootsy Collins, Gary Shider and his son Garrett Shider, Fred Wesley, and a lot more.
I also recently discovered a Japanese artist called Masaki Ueda who seems criminally unknown.
Eddie Hazel is one of the best guitarist ever. For those not familiar just give Maggot Brain a listen. It was completely improvised and record in one take.
Nick Drake.
Years ahead of his time and while he gets a lot of recognition posthumously in certain music circles, he didn’t have any hits during his life, or even any hits after, so the average Joe hasn’t heard of him.
All three of his albums are fantastic, though Five Leaves Left is my favorite.
Road is such a sad song, pretending not to be a sad song. And yes his whole catalog of subtle, beautiful music, he was a genius.
Odd recommendation but Hayes Carll the country singer, I love him and told one of my friends part of what I find so compelling about his music is that you can always hear in his voice this edge of sadness, even in his really happy songs (and he’s good at happy songs) it sounds like he knows it can’t last. That is part of what I really appreciate about Nick Drake, he wasn’t good at hiding the sadness in his voice, and it adds depth to everything he is singing.
Cold blue
Electric Storm by White Noise. Included the lady who recorded the Dr Who theme.
Frontier Ruckus is a band that I grew up alongside. I shamelessly plug them whenever I get a chance. They make music about the places I grew up and sing about it in a way that makes me feel so close to it. Their new album just came out, but their first 2 albums are their standout. The Orion Songbook and Deadmalls and Nightfalls.
Shilpa ray.
Here’s her audiotree live session, but if no one is going to invest 30 minutes into a new artist, at least check out this part, two of her best songs done in a sort of medley format.
I’ve seen her play a few times, once she was playing for free on a sidewalk, which seemed criminal to me, honestly. She’s way too good to be setting up her own shit and waiting while some bar owner’s nephew futzes with a shitty PA system. Second time she had her full band and it was hands down the best show I saw last year. And I saw a lot of great shows, KNOWER being one of them, mononeon, Sleafors Mods, Dry Cleaning…
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