Arielle's Top 8 New (to me) Artists of 2013

2013 was a year in which my musical tastes changed - or I suppose I should say broadened - quite a bit. I went to more shows, became a more active consumer of music and made more of an effort to learn about what I was listening to.

"Arielle, you go to a lot of shows," many people have noticed.

"Who are some of your favorite new artists?" no one ever asks. Well, no one, I'll tell you!

So even though no one seems to write these "year in review" type retrospectives once it has actually turned the new year, I will run the risk of being gauche and list my 8 favorite additions to my iPod in 2013. In no particular order...


1. Vampire Weekend

While much of this whole list will qualify as "Arielle, you are absurdly late to the party on this one," this is probably most true of Vampire Weekend. These indie rock guys are upbeat and fun and even Ezra Koenig's lack of stage presence cannot bring them down (it helps that his Twitter is hilarious, though).




2. Bassnectar

Bassnectar makes me want to get down and dirty. I mean this literally. It makes me want to dance low to the ground while covered in mud. His stuff is sick and filthy and lots of other words that are supposed to mean bad things but are actually good things.



3. Pretty Lights

I downloaded some Pretty Lights stuff early in 2013 because I was supposed to go to a festival he was playing at and I wanted to familiarize myself with the music before I went. Well, I didn't go to that festival, or the other festival I was supposed to go to, or the other other festival I was supposed to go to where he would be, but I kept listening to his stuff anyway and by the time I finally saw him in October I was long since hooked. Every EDM fan I've met in the year since I got into this scene loves Pretty Lights, as well they should. His live shows are unparalleled. And they involve top notch use of lasers. I take the shittiest ever concert photos and even I was able to capture these:

As a bonus, in case any of you happen to be cool enough to own a turntable, I was told his music sounds amazing on vinyl. So, there's that.



4. Gramatik

One of the reasons I love Gramatik is because his music is so diverse. You can get excited about 10 songs that all sound different but are all wonderful and chill but hip-shakey. Plus, his guitarist looks like Bret from Flight of the Conchords.

5. Alex Clare

You know Alex Clare. He has that song in that commercial. You know that song. "And it feels like I am just too close to love you...WUB WUB WUB WUB WUB WUB." I went to listen to him at Lollapalooza solely for that song (what commercial even is that?) and ended up loving his entire set. He was blues-y and rock-y and many things in between. His entire album is amazing. And he's Jewish! What what.



6. Knife Party

Drink an extra cup of coffee before heading to see these Aussies work their magic. This is some high energy crazy nonsense flail around dance party stuff. "You blocked me on Facebook! And now you're going to die." (Around 1:40ish in the video) (And for anyone who cares, my favorite song by them is called Sleaze)



7. Brillz

Brillz was a Pandora find, which is pretty exciting because hey, isn't that the point of Pandora, kind of? He's classified as trap music, which is a term I only really learned how to use in the last few months. While I was underwhelmed with his live performance when I saw him a few days ago, I don't even care because I will gladly just listen to his album over and over again at home.



8. Big Gigantic

Walk, don't run, to Big G's website where you can download all their stuff for free (this is true of several artists on this list, actually). They are amazing. This is like EDM/jazz fusion with one guy on the drums and one guy on the sax AND doing all the production. It's super dancey but not clubby dancey. Groove dancey. I got into Big Gigantic when I bought tickets to see Brillz (see above!). Big G was the headliner so after buying the tickets I downloaded some of their stuff and before I listened to it was all, "Well, I'll just leave after Brillz if I don't like this because I'm sooo alternative, leaving before the headliner and shit," except I loved it so much and that show was SO MUCH FUN. When it ended my soul filled with tears because I wanted it to go on forever and even though I had barely heard of them a month ago, I cannot imagine my life without Big G in it now.


And there you have it. I was initially going to do a list of 10, but I had trouble narrowing the last 2 spots down from a number of contenders (also I got lazy). So, honorable mentions go to:

- Passion Pit
- Matt & Kim
- Showtek
- Atlas Genius
- The Glitch Mob
- Flux Pavilion
- The Black Keys
- HAIM
- Macklemore & Ryan Lewis

What new music did you discover in 2013??