Cool Artists You May Never Have Heard Of
// June 24th, 2009 // Music
So, I’m a big fan of music, and quite a big fan of some stuff which isn’t entirely mainstream (or that popular nowadays). I’d like to list a few artists I reckon you should check out which you may or may not have heard of, but who I think are quite good for particular reasons (:
Foals
I love Foals a lot, their music is just really inspirational and unique that I love listening to it. It’s described as “math rock” by Wikipedia and the guitar in it is great. Take a listen on Spotify.
Modest Mouse
These guys have been round for a long while but still seem to be on the indie scene. I think some of their songs are really good but I have to agree with someone’s comment last week that their songs can be a tad bit depressing (: Anyhow, I think they’re worth the listen, and they’ve released a ton of albums over the years so there’s tons to listen to! Spotify them.
Maxeen
Yeah, these guys broke up a few years ago, but their debut (and only) album, Hello Echo, has some really cool alt-rock songs on it. If you’re into alt-rock, I recommend you give it a listen! Here’s the link.
Ben Folds Five
I have to say that I think Ben Folds is an amazing piano player and singer, and some of his songs he performed with his group are good, namely One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces and I like Jackson Cannery a lot also. Give them a listen too.
Paramore
Hmm I’m on the fence with these. I quite like Misery Business but some of the other songs seem a little Avril Lavigne-ish and a bit too American (: Nevertheless, they’re worth a listen for a song or two!
ELO
I know this one just throws the post title completely out the window… but I really do like their music even if they were rather popular in their hayday. Evil Woman is probably my favourite, the beginning piano part is fantastic. Check it out.
Any other good artists do you think are worth a listen to? I’m quite interested in finding out some more artists, especially those who are quite ‘unknown’ but have an awful lot of potential. Drop a comment 
EDIT: As zerojay pointed out on Twitter, I can’t exactly call much of this music mainstream. But it’s still cool music anyhow and I don’t know a ton of people who know these artists.
Ahhh Modest Mouse and Maxeen (love block out the world =]) are two great bands indeed
Ive not heard of the others personally except for paramore which is too “girly” for my taste, not a big fan of female singers
Ill be looking into the others
A few others I like, most aren’t really widely popular but are probably more well known than your list but regardless:
)
- Muse (gone a litle mainstream since twilight but I think the style is amazing )
- A Perfect Circle (I particulary like ‘Judith’ and their version of ‘Imagine’)
-Cold War Kids (‘We used to vacation’ is worth a listen)
-Placebo (fairly similar to Muse, not too unknown but not mainstream either)
-The Mars Volta (like above not too unknown but not mainstream)
-3 Doors Down
-Broken Social Scene (‘Almost Crimes’ is a good track)
-Anatomy of a Ghost (‘American’ alternative style, not very known but not too bad)
-Brand New (‘Soco Amaretto Lime’ is my favourite, can’t really explain why
-Bright Eyes (has a slow style that im on the border of liking but ‘False Advertising’ has a unique feel IMO)
EDIT: just checked out the Foals, ELO and Ben folds five and I have to say that Foals was a good find
, the other two are just catching on to me 
Others which I sometimes like, sometimes don’t – kinda borderline on:
, pretty catchy)
)
Fair to Midland (Dance of the Manatee has a unique rock style, not too keen on other tracks)
-Grandaddy (sorry i forgot the name of the song I was going to recommened but it sounds like a 8bit bleep of an old arcade at the start if you find it
-Harvey Danger (Flagpole Sitta is a very ‘feel good’ tune
-Minus the Bear (‘the fix’ is very underrated I think, should be more well known)
Don’t know if you will like them or if they aren’t unknown enough but these a just a handful of my ipods playlist of random artists ive found over the years, check them out and tell me if you liked some or not
Good to know you like them a bit
Yeah I’ve heard Muse (my friend practically dumped his library of their songs into my Shared Docs the other day XD) and I’ve had a bit of a listen, they seem pretty good. Not heard the others you mentioned but I will be listening to those tonight!
Note: It’s not that I don’t like a band cause they’re not “unknown” enough, I just feel that mainstream artists lack a lot of originality and quality that indie artists do in many of their songs… the big artists will make their money anyhow, whereas the indie artists have to make good songs and actually have to work hard to get their bread on the table
But if they are good songs, then I don’t mind!
EDIT: Yeah that’s why I don’t like Paramore overly much
But Misery Business is tolerable!