[ammthe]

how do you find great music that is not in the top 100 songs charts? I found a few "audiophile" and "headphone testing" playlists on spotify but most of the songs are instrumentals.
can you recommend playlists / album I can follow that has great vocals with instruments?

 

[CT007]

Vocals and instruments??! You ask for so much -_- Most of my music doesn't have vocals, probably 90%.

I, too, have a tough time finding new music I like. Try this out: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/do-you-have-one-album-that-you-listen-to-over-and-over.882199/ I've found a lot of nice music of all styles on Soundcloud.

 

[serman005]

Most of my new music comes from friends, unfortunately. Sorry.

 

[Kira69]

Just read writings about the music you actually like. Interviews, reviews, books, forum threads, etc.

I also use rateyourmusic to look into an specific genre.

These two came to my mind after reading "great vocals with instruments":

David Sylvian - Secrets of the Beehive
The Cardigans - Long Gone Before Daylight

And if you are into metal:

Trees of Eternity - Hour of the Nightingale

 

[ProtegeManiac]

can you recommend playlists / album I can follow that has great vocals with instruments?

Artists and highlight songs (but check out the whole albums)

Frank Sinatra - In the Still of the Night, Come Fly Away, etc

Jane Monheit - In the Still of the Night, Taking a Chance on Love, I Won't Dance (feat Michael Buble), Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Depende De Nos,* When She Loved Me

Andrea Bocelli - Besame Mucho, Somos Novios (feat Christina Aguilera), Can't Help Falling In Love

Michael Buble - How Can You Mend a Broken Heart, Can't Help Falling In Love, Come Fly With Me, Put Your Head On My Shoulder, The Way You Look Tonight

South Border - Love of My Life

Epica - Feint, Run For a Fall, and Memory (CATS) from We Will Take You With Us (live for 2 Meter Sessies); Chasing the Dragon, Safeguard to Paradise, Higher High (special ed bonus track) from The Divine Conspiracy; Ombra Mai Fu,* Stabat Mater Dolorosa,* Feint, Safeguard to Paradise from The Classical Conspiracy; Falsches Spiel (Run For a Fall in German)*

Nightwish - Forever Yours (Century Child), Slow, Love, Slow (Imaginaerum), Eva (Dark Passion Play)

Visions of Atlantis - Return to You (Trinity)

Focal-JMLab CDs (various artists, audio system test disc) : Wishing Well (Michael Ruff, CD01), Isn't She Lovely (Livingston Taylor, CD03), Killing Me Softly (Dee Dee Bridgewater, CD04), Everything Must Change (Oleta Adams, CD05), Raoui (Souad Masi, CD05),* One Evening (Feist, CD06), The Boy Who Stole the Blues (Mighty Mo Rogers, CD06)

Acoustic Audiophile Voices series

Audiophile Voices series (I recommend Vol III)


Non-English tracks/albums (some have English titles or searchable English translations/Romanization of the title for international marketing)

T-Ara & Davichi - 우리 사랑했잖아 (We Were In Love)**

T-Ara - 떠나지마 (Tteonajima/Don't Leave) ; 아파 (Hurt)**

AoA - Under the Streetlights**

Junko Ueda - Atsumori and Nasu No Yoichi (classical songs inspired by the Heike Monogatari)

Houko Kuwashima - Shinkai No Kodoku (Solitude of the Seas)

South Border - Kahit Kailan (Whenever)

Martin Nievera - Kahit Isang Saglit (Even just one moment)

Jaya Ramsey - Wala Na Bang Pagibig (Is there no more love left?)


Heavier music

Nightwish - Ever Dream (Century Child), Fantasmic (Wishmaster), Astral Romance (Remake 2001; from Over the Hills and Far Away EP), Creek Mary's Blood (Once), The Poet and The Pendulum (Dark Passion Play), Song of Myself (Imaginaerum)

Epica - Facade of Reality, The Phantom Agony, Illusive Consensus (The Phantom Agony); Never Enough, The Divine Conspiracy (The Divine Conspiracy), Kingdom of Heaven, Design Your Universe (Design Your Universe), Universal Death Squad, The Holographic Principle: A Profound Understanding of Reality (The Holographic Principle)

Xandria - Valentine, A Prophecy of Worlds to Fall, Euphoria (Neverworld's End), Save My Life (Salome the Seventh Veil), Ravenheart (Ravenheart)

Visions of Atlantis - Lemuria (Lost), The Secret, Flow This Desert (Trinity)


*Non-English tracks included in otherwise English language or generally English albums/collections

**Did not list other tracks that are more electro-pop/EDM-ish/borderline bubble gum pop wiht synths, but feel free to explore; I can list my favorites if you want

 

[CT007]

Nice list.

Mike Oldfield - Man On The Rocks
Masterplan - Masterplan / Aeronautics / MkII
Mech - Mech / ZWO
Yanni - Sensuous Chill
Elton John - The Diving Board
Joe Bonamassa
The Essential Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble
Meat Loaf - Bat Out Of Hell

 

[Sonnycz]

www.Last.fm Go to the page of an artist you like and click Similar Artists. You're welcome.

 

[Poganin]

Anything by Blackmore's Night, seriously. They sound great on speakers, but when you listen to them through headphones it's a completely different level.

Likewise, a lot of enka songs sound great on headphones due to their instrumentation: Fuyumi Sakamoto, Ikuzo Yoshi, Hiroshi Itsuki, Yutaka Yamagawa, Eun Sook Kye, Meiko Kaji, Yoko Nagayama to name a few.

Most of those performers can be found on Spotify.

 

[earChasm]

how do you find great music that is not in the top 100 songs charts? I found a few "audiophile" and "headphone testing" playlists on spotify but most of the songs are instrumentals.
can you recommend playlists / album I can follow that has great vocals with instruments?

I think Roon is a great way to find new artists. Besides paying their fees you can also buy the Discovery streamer and have fun with the light version of Roon. If you are using Lumin, the last.fm option is built in.

 

[megabigeye]

Finding new, good music is certainly a challenge. It used to be so much easier when I had friends whose musical tastes were similar to mine and we could swap CDs and make mix tapes for each other. But those days are long gone. My friends nowadays have trash taste in music and I'm the only one that still listens to CDs (and I ain't swappin' LPs with nobody!). Alas!

Pandora is okay for music discovery, so long as you never give any artist the thumbs up. If you give an artist/song the thumbs down, Pandora will try to find something new and different that you don't hate; but when you give the Thumbs Up it tells their algorithm that you want more of the same, so your David Bowie station will only play Bowie.
YouTube is actually pretty good at recommending similar artists. I think you have to have the privacy setting set so that they can track and follow you, though, otherwise it can't learn what you like.
Allmusic.com. Other than the really obscure underground stuff, it's pretty much all there on AllMusic. There's a "Related Artists" section that has "Similar to," "Influenced by," "Followed by," "Associated with," and "Collaborated with" subsections. There is a lot of information there and in conjunction with YouTube it can be really useful. You can also poke around in the moods, genres, styles, and themes sections. So. Much. Info.
Spotify has "Fans Also Like," which is okay-not-great. It seems like it's just based on what is most popular, so if you're already into a genre, most of the recommended artists will be kind of obvious. If you're just getting into a genre it might be okay.
Google! I googled "10 best electronic albums" and am more than pleasantly surprised with my findings. I ended up finding a list on Flavor Wire of the best electronic albums spanning five decades! There was some great stuff on there that I'd never heard of.
I've also had some luck with music magazines. In particular, Mojo and Uncut both come with CD samplers. Some of it's good, some of it's not. I've found a few artists I didn't already know about that way. Uncut focuses more on new and indie/rock-oriented music, Mojo is a little more eclectic... Or maybe I've got that backwards. I can't remember.
Record stores! Of course, this has a lot to do with where you live. The best record stores are the ones with listening stations and knowledgeable staff. I can spend hours and hours flipping through vinyl and CDs and sampling stuff. If there's no listening station, ask for recommendations. Bring your phone and headphones with you so you can look up what they recommend on YouTube, Spotify, etc.
Oh yeah, and I almost forgot record labels. The bigger ones probably aren't so good for music discovery, but when I have an album I like from a small label, I'll check out what other artists are on that label. Sometimes it pays off.

As for specific recommendations: it's probably best if you list some of the artists you enjoy. While I'd also say I like good vocalists, I'd rather stick a needle through my eye than have to suffer through a lot of the stuff recommended here. I'm sure most people would say the same about my tastes.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

Nice list.

Also why "Shuffle All" or "Play All" is never used on my devices. One time it was on for some reason my friends played one track through the BT speakers in the patio, and at some point it played this (which sparked an impromptu sing along)...


...then played this, which resulted in some dumbfounded stares of "What?!"...


...then as if to remind them I'm still me, but was weird as hell anyway, it jumped to this.

 

[voxie]

I

how do you find great music that is not in the top 100 songs charts? I found a few "audiophile" and "headphone testing" playlists on spotify but most of the songs are instrumentals.
can you recommend playlists / album I can follow that has great vocals with instruments?

Just grab a free trial via Tidal or my preference Qobuz.

 

[kaiwenwu]

just use tidel

 

[zept0sec]

Believe it or not, but you might want to start with the list of Grammy Albums of the Year, including all nominees.

 

[WildStyle-R11]

Am I the only that checks back on youtube once in a while and if there is a song *Click*. I also quite often try to find good soundtracks or ost from movies on youtube, which then makes YT suggest similar stuff and so on and so forth. Once you get on a roll, it can't be stopped. ^^