Welcome to our weekly Breakthrough Thursdays, where we source the 20 best new tracks from upcoming, independent artists around the world. We love giving these guys an international platform to share their tunes; with the hundreds upon thousands of new songs coming out every day, it’s not always easy to get them heard, even when they’re really, really good.
As always, this list features a massive range of genres, styles and sounds. We recommend playing this on shuffle, or using the below annotations to check out what you might dig the most.
Enjoy!
1. Astral Skulls, Contact
A deep synth beat paves the way to guitar riffs, building a racy, invigorating atmosphere one layer at a time. Retro, crunchy and super cool.
2. The Pixies, Where Is My Mind? (Kelly McKellar cover ft. Anthony Custable)
A gorgeous electronic instrumental cover of one of my all time favourite tunes. Sit back and let yourself sink in.
3. Amycanbe, Queens (Dustin Lefholz remix)
Temperate and emotive, this slow-builder really draws you in to each hollowed beat and the slow, gorgeously breathy melody
4. Millennial, Paralysed
Spritely guitars, a comfortable groove and a radio-friendly melody make for smooth, easy-listening indie rock.
5. Pastel Mute, Totem
I love how the rhythms grows beneath the dark, seductive indie melody. An immersive, interesting layered track.
6. Chystyna Marie, Loaded Gun
This is a really sexy, bluesy track with rich, powerful vocals and a huge, glorious chorus. One of my favourites this week!
7. Plum, Light Years, Dark Years
This track is incredible. HUGE guitar riffs and a wicked melody, I immediately envisioned this going off in a festival tent somewhere.
8. Grandmax, Blue
Another instrumental slow-burner, this track builds slowly but surely, with a cruisey rhythm pulling it together. The best kind of chill-out music.
9. Bat Matt, BBBathtub
Indie rock with a bluesy twist, I love the melody, and it’s just awesome and hilarious to have lyrics like “rub-a-dub-dub-dub-dub, scrub-scrub-scrub-scrub” in a serious sounding song.
10. Overjoy, Airport Song
One for the house-heads. A gorgeous, progressive track with airy melodies and glistening synth trickles. Drawn out but never boring, I love it.
11. HimeHime, Living You
A ten-minute progressive track featuring everything from video-game bass to understated vocals, to guitars and screeching synths. Never a dull moment.
12. JJ Adrian, Right Now
Emotive club-ready R&B, with a massive rhythm and smooth, sensual vocals. The kind of awesomely overdone track you might hear on an episode of Empire.
13. Micah Williams, Wild Youth (prod. Andre Ossit & Jo FLX’N)
A HUGE beat and a menacingly understated flow makes this pick for best independent hip-hop this week. There’s big things coming for Micah.
14. Toni Basel, Mickey (Trishes cover)
I’ll bet you’ve never heard the famed track quite like this. Low, slow, seductive R&B, it’s a brilliant new spin on the classic track.
15. P’aris, Focus
Angelic electro-pop, featuring an almost childishly-innocent melody, backed by clean beats and a huge, uplifting chorus. Perfect for summer!
16. Punk Adams, Juicy (ft. Strange Source)
Juicy blends an atmospheric synth soundscape with slick hip-hop and velvety smooth vocal melodies. The flow is really chilled, it’s so easy to get into this one.
17. Cafuné, Warm Body
This is all kinds of fun. Huge beats, bubblegum synths and a cool, catchy melody. Another track for the summer playlist.
18. Zev Prince, PSA
An aggressive flow above a seriously old-school beat, and some brilliant wordplay make this a really impressive new release.
19. Ryan Torres, Lessons For Everything
I love the movement throughout this gorgeous, progressive electronic track. Immediately enveloping, you could easily play this over and over again.
20. Gaddy, H.E.R
I don’t come across instrumental, psychedelic trip-hop this good very often. Tipper-level playfulness and a myriad effects, layers and tone colours, this is my top pick this week.