Today is a special day. Not only has half of 2016 already flown by, we also hit the 100th blog post mark! With WtMM, our goal has always been putting out great new music from great new artists and we’ve been doing that under the New Secret category.
Celebrating the coincidence of these two facts, we thought it would be appropriate to select and review those we believe to be the crème de la crème of the artists we recommended to you throughout the first half of 2016. So, here they are, in alphabetic order:
Bishop Briggs
From the first moment, Bishop Briggs was such a pleasant surprise. In a couple of months she put out three beautifully powerful songs, Wild Horses, River and more recently The Way I Do. The amount of times any one can listen to any of her songs and still rock it out every single time is ridiculous, and makes us feel that Bishop Briggs is probably unparalleled with any other new female artist right now. And we are not the only ones, since the first time we talked about her she increased about 1,5k likes on Facebook, opened for Passion Pit, was set to open for Coldplay next Summer, and was named Indie All Star by Spotify and New Artist of the Week by Apple Music.
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Gnash
We first noticed gnash back in 2015 with the release of his EP u, and since then we feel we kept in touch with him through the Ep us and the soon-to-be-released me. After us came out, we got really excited because it seemed as if he’d found his sound. Lately it has been impossible to ignore gnash’s success. He’s all over the radio in so many countries with i hate u i love u and he talked about how clueless he was about the hit it would become with Billboard.
Facebook – SoundCloud – Twitter – Spotify – Website
ISLAND
After the beautiful and simple debut EP entitled Girl, ISLAND have recently revealed to us as the keepers of the magic in alternative rock. The two magistral singles they’ve put out this year, the affectionate screamer Spotless Mind, and the contrasting raw Come With Me, are two songs capable of awakening the endless lovers of indie-rock who are so many times forgotten by new music makers.
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Old Sea Brigade
Warm, rusty voice. Heartfelt lyrics. A consistent continuity from top to bottom. This was how we first described Old Sea Brigade’s debut EP and all we can say is that it still is. Even after 5 months since its release, this self-titled EP has a certain timeless component to it: it always sounds fresh, it always sounds right, and it always warms our hearts.
Facebook – Twitter – Soundcloud – Website – Spotify
RKCB
These guys are music machines in the making, and (still) are one of our most exciting New Secret. RKCB first became apparent to us with the brilliant attention catcher Short Films EP, released late 2015. Since then, two huge singles Future Being and Elevated were released and we are still head-over-heels with these guys. They find every time, in every record, the perfect balance between electronic and alternative pop.
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Sample Answer
We’ve never been shy about or secret admiration for Sample Answer. The crazy-hair singer is having a crazy productive year with the released of three full EPs, Good Boy, Textile Baby, and more recently Collision, showing a brutal consistency on making powerful urban songs with RnB and Rock&Roll influences. Might not be long until he puts out an unforgettable debut Album. Until then, Collision (the single) is still one of our favorite songs of the year and we keep playing it again and again and again.
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Satellite Mode
Satellite Mode started out with the brilliant singles Wild Excuses and Aphrodite late 2015, already building their sound and since then they have been gaining solid ground in the pop-electronic industry. Fair is another amazing track by this NYC duo, a feel-good song with dramatic lyrics that combines both her powerful voice and his crisp-perfect unusual electronic saxofone production.
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Terence Ryan
What can we say more about this amazing artist? Terence Ryan is not only a great singer/songwriter as is a performer and most of all: he has a voice and he wants to be heard. Coming from a rough background, Terence seems to put his learning to good use into the lyrics and overall feeling to his records. We can’t choose one, we have to mention it all: the indie/folk/electronic EP Will Word & Hand, the following rock/hip-hop single Hands On Em, and his latest release, the reggae/rock single Rule of Thumb. Great songs with even greater meaning.
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Two Feet
Trumpet-like vocals, a mix between blues and electronic, and a constantly immersive bass line. That’s the common feeling to every Two Feet song. The singer, author, and producer has released four ambitious tracks a couple of months ago but we are still trying to take them all in. Showing similarities to great names like DARKSIDE, Alt-J and Flume, every single song left us wandering this is too good to be true. As Magestic Casual has just signed him, we will be anxiously awaiting for new acts of brilliancy to come out really soon.
WILDES
Being the only representative of the IndieSapiens series in this list, the 19 year-old British singer has been suggested to us upon the release of her debut single Bares and we couldn’t let her go since. With striking similarities to Daughter and an indescribable sweetness to her music, WILDES released her second single, the overwhelming Illuminate, one month ago, and if from the first “Tell me” we were hooked, it seems we were not the only ones. We have now been hearing Ella Walker voice all over coffee houses and clothing stores, and we are not even a bit surprised.
Facebook – Twitter – Soundcloud – Spotify