My Journey into the Underground Music Scene

- February 13, 2022

It's been a couple years now since the 2010s have passed, but I haven't found an opportunity to really talk about this. I really started to get into music in 2012. In my later high school years I started to dislike the state of hip-hop and actively stopped listening to the hip-hop radio station and actively listening to the new artists. In the fall of 2012, I started to discover the underground scene. I recall one of the first songs I found was "What I Do" by Gavlyn.

West Coast Rapper Gavlyn

This sounded more like the lyrical rap I was fond of in the 90s and my dive into music just blossomed from there. Where I had previously just listened to R&B, rap, and video game music, I was now diving into Latin, pop, and countless other genres. I still mainly kept my nose in the underground and indie sphere. Discovering new music was invigorating to me and became my new obsession throughout most of the decade so I listened to a lot of albums. In fact, in 2017 I listened to over a hundred albums which burned me out for 2018 and 2019 and ever since I haven't listened to new music as much. I was going to make this article about my favorite albums of the 2010 decade, but I find it hard to articulate just exactly why I like them so much beyond the vibes they give or just saying I like the instrumentals so I think a more fitting topic for me would be describing how diving into the underground/indie scene has affected me.

Well, to start off delving into the underground scene felt like uncovering a cove of hidden treasures and once you've found one the greed overcomes you telling you to find more. I did. I spent a lot of time looking into artists on YouTube and somehow managed my way onto Bandcamp which is a music streaming and digital store for various indie artists. My journey started off in just hip-hop with artists like Gavlyn, Poetic Death, and Nitty Scott MC, and eventually artists like Stereo Nasty, Yung Bae, and Chronixx. I quite liked Bandcamp because it offered a convenient way to discover new artists and preview their albums.

Unlike Spotify or iTunes which pushes mainstream artists to the forefront, Bandcamp was exclusively about indie artists so it was the best place to look for artists. They also had a nice wish list and save feature that let you keep up with artists you were into and I would also occasionally read their articles on specific artists. Bandcamp also provided the option for artists to set their own price for their albums and for consumers to pay however much they wanted given if it was at least as much as the price set by the artist. So you can show support to your favorite artist by paying a little bit more. Some artists also had a pay what you want option so that people who were broke like me could afford to buy their music and those with more money could give an artist like $600 for an EP. Bandcamp is a nice site and I found some of my favorite artists through it.

At this time I was also in school and really getting into art and so I would draw sometimes in the university cafeteria and play music there. People would vibe and/or ask me about the music and it felt good that other people were enjoying it. It became my favorite part of my day and one of the few things I can look back during my time in college and say I enjoyed.

I also realized just how large the underground scene is. I was a frequent visitor of an internet forum that had a hip-hop section and everyone in it listened to underground artists, but nobody listened to any of the dozens that I listened to and I didn't listen to a lot of theirs. The downside to being a mainly underground listener is that you feel alienated. Even amongst that internet group most of the people didn't like who I listened to and my brother thought it was weird that I listened to these artists. I found it to be the common opinion when I graduated. People would tell me that it's boring whenever I would play any of these artists and I ultimately just feel alienated.

Still, throughout these years I've had a ton of fun discovering new music and making playlists on Spotify and YouTube. I hope I will have enough spare time again to dive into music and making album of the year lists. I just wish I had people to relate with. At least I can share some music with you guys so below I posted fifteen of my favorite albums by underground artists.

Nasty by Nature - Stereo Nasty

Vibing High - MC Melodee

Voyager - Moonchild

We Used to Bloom - Denai Moore

Sweet Talk - Vanilla

Cold Winter - Sheisty Khrist

From the Art - Gavlyn

An Open Letter - Nicotine's Famous Honey

Por Vida - Kali Uchis

Plastic Whatever - Desired

Noveliss - Kenjutsu Under the Moonlight

Strange Journey Vol. 3 - Cunninlynguists