esm wrote:Tove Lo's career as a singer only began when she's 26-27, and she was mainly a songwriter before, but that's probably an exception, especially since coming from Stockholm there's a ton of connections there (and she's great as a pop songwriter).
If you look at some other pop artists with songs on the radio in the past year or so, there are also younger people like Shawn Mendes (18), Zara Larsson (turning 19 in a few days), Alessia Cara (20), Chance the Rapper (23), etc.
Random, but I've been listening to a lot of hippie music and girl groups from the 60s a lot lately. I'd just leave a Spotify playlist on all day (even when I'm sleeping, though I'd turn the volume down a bit).
Shawn Mendes is only 18? I thought he was like 23-24 tbh, I guess he sounds more mature? And I suppose Sia's career didn't really take off until she was around 30. 25-26 if you want to count Zero 7. But she's an exception for sure.
Anyway, about oldie music, lately I've been playing the hell out of
Eartha Kitt, who is only famous these days for Santa Baby, I think. But in her day she was an amazing talent who got blacklisted in the late 60's for speaking out too forcefully and unapologetically against the Vietnam War. Apparently she hurt Lady Bird Johnson's feelings back when putting the First Lady in her place was considered a faux pas.
On Spotify, see for example: spotify:album:6gOVmmV26wBBgxUtbF8YZd
Also recently I have a thing for like 50's era music with that ersatz "exotic" sound, e.g.
I love how every era in the history of recorded music produced its own characteristic gems, the vast majority of which is destined for complete obscurity. I mean even with Jpop every so often I'll hear a completely rando song from a never-quite-popular group like Dorothy Little Happy, and think, wow this is really good, too bad nobody will ever hear it. Multiply that by 100 with the nearly infinite amount of music out there that never gets any radio play outside of the rare college station. My brother-in-law used to be a drummer in a St. Louis area band that never left the Midwest bus circuit, never released a major album, never appeared on TV, never got airplay but (according to my sister anyway) they were great and had loads of local fans until, like many groups, they eventually had to stop for economic reasons.