There’s an ever-growing amount of music available today, a few taps (or clicks) away. I for one feel like there’s a lot of great music in many genres and styles, coming from many countries, and in many languages. And there’s always new, interesting stuff coming out regularly.
Whether a new release from an artist you like, or an old one you want to go back to, there are so many options to choose from at any given point in time. Yet we can only hear one at a time, so we must choose. So…
How do you choose what to listen to, and how do you keep up with everything you want to keep up with? Do you manage to listen to everything you want to on a regular basis? Do you instead choose to articially limit yourself to keep sane? Or is your music taste narrow enough this is of no worry?
In the old days, Last.fm was good for discovering music I might like based on what I listen to.
Nowadays I have this method (hear me out) that consists of drinking a bit too much, listening to favorites on YouTube and opening multiple tabs with what I suspect are good suggestions. This leads me into multiple rabbit holes where I occasionally strike gold.
By ignoring about 99% of it.
I use the streaming service qobuz, which have curated playlists and “albums of the week”. It allows me to discover new styles or artists that I never thought much about. Sometimes it’s a miss, but that’s depending on taste. Also, the sound quality is really good if you have the hardware required.
By being picky and only actively seeking out my favorite genre.
I tend to dislike the music of the day, only to really like it a decade later.
When I grew up I hated Eurodance music, but now it is one of my favourite genres.
I don’t.
I keep to the Spotify 90s and 2000 mix
This site has helped me discover lots of new artists I never would have found otherwise: https://www.music-map.com/
I just dont listen to the stuff. Too many notes
I am fully involved with the music algorithm. I like that song!, clicks radio on it. Oh, this song is nice, clicks radio on that and so on.
I discover music from whatever service has the best algorithm to find what I enjoy. Sometimes it’s from amatures, sometimes it’s from unheard of artists. I rarely ever hear a song with over 100,000 plays, and I believe nobody but my mom thinks my music taste is good…
Your mom thinks your music taste is good? Dang. Mine just be like “wtf we listening to” (it’s Polish) or “Not German” skips. “We hearing Japanese, now?”. I did kinda get her somewhat into modern popular hispanic music, I think. Or at least helped in some way with that.
I really like the Discover Weekly queue on Spotify. I’ll find a track I like, then listen to the album, and if that’s good, I’ll listen to the rest of the discography. I’ve found quite a few Most Favourite Bands Ever this way.
I artificially limit myself to Creative Commons music. Never been particularly convinced of digital ownership, so I prefer stuff that I can re-download at any time. I do also like a lot that I can share the music files freely.
Well, and a very personal reason for limiting the selection, is that I’m a hobby musician myself. It helps convince my brain that my own music is worth creating, if I’m not constantly bombarded with an infinite selection of amazing music…
If you filter out only what you like, you are left with perhaps 1% of music.
I use Plex for my music, which has a lot of mechanisms that help me process new stuff.
For example, I have a smart playlist that only plays things I haven’t heard in a year. This is my “Frontier” playlist to hear new things. As I listen, I rate stuff with stars.
From there, I then have smart playlists that only play highly rated things I haven’t heard in a week or two. Depending on my mood, I’ll either listen to my frontier playlist, or my liked playlist… with other playlists further scoping on genre as desired.All these playlists filter out things that are lowly rated if I’ve heard them more than X times.
I generally shove anything/everything anyone recommends into the pot, which then naturally folds into my frontier playlist which then fold naturally into my liked playlists. I’ve discovered quite a lot of stuff I never would’ve predicted I’d like this way. From there, I’ll look at recommended artists from the bands I have and like and add those as well.
I listen to the same ~30 songs, over and over and over again.
Today is the day you find out that you’re not a person but instead an iHeartRadio radio station.
I listen to the music I liked as a youngin: grunge, 90’s alternative, nu-metal, weird Al, and sea shanties.
I also watch and listen to the Eurovision Song Contest every year since I found it a few years ago. That gives me ~40 new artists every year that I might like. I follow a few favorites and see what else they’ve made. Watching some of the national final competitions gives me dozens more songs.
ESC?! Hell yeah! I only follow the finals, though. I generally go in without spoiling much for myself ahead of time, so it all ends up being a fresh listen (other than when I already heard the song elsewhere, like Viva l’Italia, which I’ve heard before knowing it was part of the ESC)
I don’t really watch the nationals either. I did once, for Spain (the finals). I was gonna do it another year, for Spain (not sure which year came first tbh), but the one song I knew ahead of time, by Rakky Ripper, did not make it onto the finals :(
Honestly, I wonder what the best way to enjoy ESC would be. Following semis? Nationals?? How much should I invest myself? But then I think it works as is, and would be too much work following everything. Plus, a lot more options to my already large pool of artists and music.
Watching the national finals starts to feel like work. This year there were, I think, three Super Saturdays with several multi-hour shows to watch. Oof.
Benidorm Fest from Spain is usually good. San Remo (Italy) is great, of course, since they’re the template on which the ESC was based and because the Italians view THAT as the real show. Ukraine’s Vidbir is interesting because you can tell they have no budget and are often bombed during the show. Portugal’s Festival de Cançâo has some amazing songs, because they don’t care about winning ESC, they’re just focused on highlighting the best Portuguese acts.
I have some favorites from 2025 that didn’t make it out of the national finals - From Ukraine I loved Future Culture’s Waste my Time Vidbir Live - Music Video . From Finland I’m still listening to Goldielocks’s Made Of UMK Live - Music Video . Germany sent the wrong song again, they should have gone with Feuerschwanz’s Knight Club is super fun. NDR live - Music video .
I found the Eurovangelists podcast, and they’re a lot of fun to follow along with. Taking in too much media ABOUT the contest can color your enjoyment of the songs, though.
Well, best I get before the show is a Switched on Pop podcast episode about Eurovision. And I may or may not hear it before the show, depends on how much I care about going in unknowing to the finals. Portugal did definitely make a banger this year, and so did Italy. Viva l’Italia was one of my favourites ahead of the finals, and Espresso Macchiato won me over quickly. I wasn’t at first big into the eventual winner, but soon as they were the only one left for scores at the very end, I quickly changed my mind and needed them to win (I got kinda heated there…). Plus, the song isn’t bad either (though I wanted Espresso Macchiato higher up, and will deem it second place in my mind)
