u/Cool-Firefighter-719

Hi everyone, welcome to week 5 of the underground music club all stars. For those who missed the last post, every Friday, I spotlight artists with approximately fewer than 10,000 Spotify listeners (or minimal Reddit love if they do not stream on Spotify) who deserve your ears. Think genre-bending, soulful, strange, or just beautifully overlooked.

For the next 2 weeks I will highlight 6 of my favourite artists from the last year of underground music club. This week will focus on music influenced by ambiance, electronics, or instumentals.

Thanks to everyone who has sent me their suggestions. If I didn't include what you sent in the first year, it doesn't mean I won't in a future week. I really listen to everything you all send and I always love to hear what you are all listening to. Got a favorite artist you want to see here? Put them in the comments or message me.

Lewis LaCook – Spoken-Word and Electronics

Lewis LaCook builds reflective electronic pieces where spoken text and sound design come together to make a musical atmosphere. The work is intimate but unstable in a compelling way.

If you like: Laurie Anderson for avant spoken-word experimentation, James Blake for sparse electronic mood, or Kae Tempest for poetic delivery over modern production.

Start here: https://lewislacook.bandcamp.com/album/isoghosting

Miffle – Psychedelic Ambient Sketchbook

Miffle makes drifting instrumental music that feels handmade and equistely strange. Loops, haze, and collage-like layering give the tracks the feeling of sonic fragments stitched into a dream.

If you like: Brian Eno for ambient world-building, Boards of Canada for warped, nostalgic atmosphere, or Oneohtrix Point Never for psychedelic electronic texture.

Start here: https://miffle.bandcamp.com/album/goodbye-world

Bruno de Almeida – Off Kilter Cinematic Jazz

Bruno de Almeida created this record that functions like scenes from an imaginary film. It is rhythmic, vivid, and full of atmosphere.

If you like: The Cinematic Orchestra for filmic jazz texture, Miles Davis (In a Silent Way era) for spacious instrumental atmosphere, or Kamasi Washington for modern sweeping jazz.

Start here: https://brunodealmeida.bandcamp.com/album/cinema-imaginado-volume-4

Ex-Easter Island Head – Hypnotic Post-Minimal Ensemble Music

Ex-Easter Island Head creates interlocking instrumental pieces built from repetition, pulse, and subtle variation. The music is precise without feeling cold, drawing you in through rhythm and patience rather than spectacle.

If you like: Steve Reich for rhythmic minimalism, Tortoise for indie-meets-composition experimentation, or The Necks for slowly evolving hypnotic structures.

Start here: https://exeasterislandhead.bandcamp.com/album/norther

emochick99 – Sample-Spliced Musical Diary

emochick99 bends rock, collage, and raw personal songwriting into something wonderfully messy. It is vulnerable, strange, completely personal and unique.

If you like: Animal Collective for fragmented emotional experimentation, Bright Eyes for diaristic intensity, or Girlpool for intimate indie vulnerability.

Start here: https://emochick99.bandcamp.com/album/henrietta-pussycat

Gom Jabbar – Historically Informed Chamber Jazz

Gom Jabbar merges the rigor of chamber composition with the motion and unpredictability of jazz. The pieces on this record reimagine famous themes from the history of music and are constantly shifting shape while staying emotionally legible.

If you like: Snarky Puppy for genre-crossing jazz adjacent energy, The Cinematic Orchestra for orchestrated jazz atmosphere, or Philip Glass for pattern-driven compositional momentum.

Start here: https://gomjabbar.bandcamp.com/album/on-the-shoulders-of-giants

Hi everyone, welcome to week 4 of the underground music club all stars. For those who missed the last post, every Friday, I spotlight artists with approximately fewer than 10,000 Spotify listeners (or minimal Reddit love if they do not stream on Spotify) who deserve your ears. Think genre-bending, soulful, strange, or just beautifully overlooked.

For the next 3 weeks I will highlight 6 of my favourite artists from the last year of underground music club. This week will focus on alternative and punk music.

Thanks to everyone who has sent me their suggestions. If I didn't include what you sent in the first year, it doesn't mean I won't in a future week. I really listen to everything you all send and I always love to hear what you are all listening to. Got a favorite artist you want to see here? Put them in the comments or message me.

Sister Judy – Hazy Slacker Rock
Sister Judy makes relaxed, fuzz-softened guitar music that sounds a little sleepy and a little singed around the edges. The songs have a slacker warmth coupled with a sticky melodic tendency underneath the haze.

If you like: Alex G for homespun guitar songwriting, Mac DeMarco for laid-back bedroom-rock charm, or early Pavement for loose, offhand indie warmth.

Start here: https://sisterjudy1.bandcamp.com/album/spent

Minaxi – Rhythmic Psychedelic Rock
Minaxi build swirling guitar-heavy songs. Their music has the expansive feel of psych rock, but it’s driven by rhythm and atmosphere rather than jam-band sprawl to create a hypnotic melodic effect.

If you like: Tame Impala for modern psychedelic sweep, The Brian Jonestown Massacre for hypnotic guitar repetition, or Kikagaku Moyo for trance-like psych with a global sense of space.

Start here: https://minaxi.bandcamp.com/album/z-of-a

Silas The Assyrian Assassin – Confrontational Avant-Rap
Silas The Assyrian Assassin makes music with a direct and confrontational bite. The delivery is raw, the production is abrasive, and the political charge is impossible to ignore.

If you like: Death Grips for abrasive experimentation, Public Enemy for confrontational political force, or Run The Jewels for militant urgency and attack.

Start here: https://silastheassyrianassassin.bandcamp.com/album/the-day-will-come-when-the-robots-will-turn-against-their-human-masters

Dead Billionaires – Hook-Heavy Political Punk
Dead Billionaires write fast, sharp songs full of disgust, humor, and social pressure. The band moves with classic punk momentum, but the writing has enough bite and swagger to make the anger feel personal rather than generic.

If you like: Against Me! for conviction and velocity, Green Day (early era) for political pop-punk snap, or IDLES for cathartic social fury.

Start here: https://deadbillionaires.bandcamp.com/album/disaster-preparedness-coloring-book

Hot Dress – High Energy Emo-Punk
Hot Dress makes energetic melodic songs that balance emotional friction with pop instinct. The guitars are sharp, the hooks land hard, and the whole thing feels like it was made to ricochet around a small room full of sweaty people.

If you like: Paramore for emotionally charged pop-punk lift, The Strokes for clipped guitar cool, or All Time Low for singalong immediacy.

Start here: https://hotdress.bandcamp.com/album/room-for-none

Proper. – Thoughtful Emo-Punk
Proper. blends the catharsis of emo and punk with writing that is specific, searching, and socially aware. There’s intelligence in the structure, in the perspective, and in the way the band builds tension into every chorus.

If you like: The Hotelier for emotional scale, Jeff Rosenstock for punk confessionals with brains, or Thursday for dramatic, full-body intensity.

Start here: https://likerealproper.bandcamp.com/album/the-great-american-novel

Hi everyone, welcome to week 2 of the underground music club all stars. For those who missed the last post, every Friday, I spotlight artists with approximately fewer than 10,000 Spotify listeners (or minimal Reddit love if they do not stream on Spotify) who deserve your ears. Think genre-bending, soulful, strange, or just beautifully overlooked.

For the next 5 weeks I will highlight 6 of my favourite artists from the last year of underground music club. This week will focus on music with a modern and fresh approach towards jazz or classical composition.

Thanks to everyone who has sent me their suggestions. If I didn't include what you sent in the first year, it doesn't mean I won't in a future week. I really listen to everything you all send and I always love to hear what you are all listening to. Got a favorite artist you want to see here? Put them in the comments or message me.

Dakah Hip Hop Orchestra – Cinematic Orchestral Hip-Hop
Dakah Hip Hop Orchestra brings symphonic scale to hip-hop rhythm, folding in jazz improvisation, live groove, and cinematic arrangement. Their music feels huge without becoming stiff like a full ensemble living inside a beat.

If you like: The Roots for live-band hip-hop energy, Kamasi Washington for large-scale jazz ambition, or Gorillaz for genre-blurring orchestral imagination.

Start here: https://music.apple.com/us/album/unfinished-symphony/696175271

São Paulo Underground – Ambient Chamber Music with Brazilian Gravity
São Paulo Underground transforms Brazilian melodic sensibility into slow-moving, textural instrumental music that feels suspended in air. The pieces unfold patiently, less like songs than environments — luminous, spacious, and quietly transportive.

If you like: Brian Eno for expansive ambient design, Philip Glass for meditative classical repetition, or Sigur Rós for emotional widescreen atmosphere.

Start here: https://cuneiformrecords.bandcamp.com/album/cantos-invisiveis

Amina Claudine Myers – Radiant Spiritual Jazz Minimalism
Amina Claudine Myers composes and plays with a combination of warmth, patience, and inner force. Her music carries gospel feeling, modal openness, and impressionistic color, making even the quietest moments feel illuminated from within.

If you like: Alice Coltrane for spiritual jazz transcendence, Bill Evans for lyrical harmonic sensitivity, or Max Richter for slow-burning emotional clarity.

Start here: https://redhookrecords.bandcamp.com/album/solace-of-the-mind

Allison Au – Melodic Modern Jazz with Theatrical Grace
Allison Au’s music feels positioned between jazz ensemble writing and narrative song. Her phrasing is elegant, the arrangements breathe beautifully, and the melodies carry a kind of vocal intimacy even when no one is singing.

If you like: Esperanza Spalding for genre-fluid jazz elegance, Kurt Weill for cabaret-inflected harmonic color, or Stacey Kent for intimate melodic sophistication.

Start here: https://allisonau.bandcamp.com/album/migrations

Ensemble Mik Nawooj – Classical Meets Hip-Hop in Motion
Ensemble Mik Nawooj fuses chamber writing, orchestral composition, and hip-hop structure into music that feels both intellectually ambitious and immediately alive. The result is dynamic, theatrical, and rhythmically charged — concert music with pulse and bite.

If you like: Black Violin for classical-meets-hip-hop energy, Flying Lotus for orchestral beat-world experimentation, or The Roots for live ensemble groove with formal ambition.

Start here: https://ensemblemiknawooj.bandcamp.com/album/death-becomes-life

Mali Obomsawin – Indigenous Jazz with Deep Emotional Force
Mali Obomsawin brings together improvisation, folk memory, and cultural history in music that feels fiercely personal and politically grounded. Her work can be spare or explosive, always carrying an unmistakable sense of purpose and presence.

If you like: Charles Mingus for jazz intensity and compositional fire, Arooj Aftab for heritage-inflected modernism, or Joanna Newsom for music that feels both intimate and mythic.

Start here: https://maliobomsawin1.bandcamp.com/album/sweet-tooth