Bandcamp came on my radar three years ago when I was introduced to Vulfpeck, a stellar funk/rhythm band you should check out. It’s a marketplace that facilitates buying music from the artists directly. Artists name their price (and you can pay more if you choose) and receive about 80% of the money directly. That’s huge.

Last month Bandcamp held a promotional day where all proceeds went directly to the artists. That day, fans bought 15x as much as usual, bringing in $4.3 million for artists.

Not only is Bandcamp going to do it again on May 1st, but they will do it again June 5th and July 3rd.

Finding Music

Sadly, I did not do my diligence before the first sale day. The Bandcamp services were overwhelmed and slow for much of the day (all the love to the Bandcamp tech team), making shopping harder.

Even on a good day, though, it is difficult to find new music that fits your tastes. This is my only complaint with Bandcamp, discovery is arduous. They post constantly to highlight music that might be of interest, but I desperately wish for a recommender system.

Since that day, I listen to at least 80% of my music from Bandcamp, either purchased music or in search of new music.

My goal here is to highlight Bandcamp and some of the great music I’ve found. This is not comprehensive, it’s what I like. If nothing else, check out Bandcamp Daily to find something you like.

Ambient / Atmospheric

One of my favorite finds is guitarist Csarnogurszky István. He has several projects covering different styles. Definitely check out the album below, and also look at his Essentials packs, where you can get several albums across his projects very reasonably. See Black Hill, Silent Island, and musicformessier.

These are some others that are great for coding.

Rock

Without a doubt one of my favorite rock discoveries is SLIFT, a psychedelic rock trio out of Toulouse, France. In fact, I bought their entire discography.

Think rock is dead? Think again. There is so much great music to find and enjoy.

Electronic

Other (Pop, Progressive, Funk)

It would be a travesty to leave off the artist very much responsible for me picking up a guitar and learning. Cory Wong is amazing, and he has had several awesome albums since but this is still a favorite of mine.

She Makes War is an extremely prolific solo artist. This is an instrumental version of an earlier album, but if you like definitely check out the rest of her catalog.

TANG is a random find, I don’t even remember how I stumbled on them. It’s great stuff, hard for me to categorize.