Under 10k
The other day I happened to be discussing artists on Spotify with fewer than 10,000 monthly listeners. I started reviewing my library, and there were quite a few surprises—several artists I was sure didn’t have much of a following turned out to be much more popular than I realized, while some I was certain had lots of exposure didn’t have much at all.
But a misspent youth seeking out obscure indie bands means that I really like a lot of songs by lesser-known artists. A few probably never got much airtime. Some had a hit or a well-received album and then burned out. Some are still going strong but aren’t getting the recognition they deserve. So I thought I’d go through my favorite songs by artists with under 10,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and try to figure what happened to them or what they’re up to now.
Mangas Colorado - “Call You Home”
Mangas Colorado were a folk band from Cullowhee, North Carolina. Their song “Call You Home” is absolutely devastating and one of my all-time favorites.
I couldn’t find much information about the band, but they appear to be named for an Apache tribal chief who fought wars against the Mexicans and Americans during the mid-19th century. His death was a matter of some dispute, but he was likely captured by a Californian militia after arriving under a flag of truce, and the militia may have tortured and killed him and then mutilated his body. Those atrocities may have incited another Apache uprising.
Regardless of the story behind the band’s name, this song is special to me. Every time I hear it I feel sad and nostalgic and heartbroken.
Mountains rise and fall with time
Like the love we leave behind.
But you’re still gone
And I lie low, lie low in repose
But you’re still gone
There’s a hole where your memory goes
And I’ve watched the days grow old alone
All alone, all alone
And I’ve watched the days grow old alone
All alone, all alone
When the treetops trade their green for gold
I’ll call you home, I’ll call you home
The band that adopted his name released the Call You Home EP in 2013, followed by albums in 2015 and 2016. They haven’t tweeted since 2018. I also recommend the songs “This Too Shall Pass,” “Mountain Song,” and “Morning Light.”
The Tiny Tin Hearts - “The Aviator”
Written from the perspective of a pilot who sings to the love of his life as he dies in a plane crash, “The Aviator” is hauntingly beautiful.
The Tiny Tin Hearts were an eight-piece ensemble from Austin, Texas. Their Last.FM biography describes them as “blending vocals with banjo, French Horn, trombone, violin, piano, cello, lap steel and electric guitars, bass and drums . . . cross[ing] from symphonic pop to rock, folk and classical.” Hell yeah.
They won a battle of the bands competition, received some positive press, and put out a single EP, The Last Flight of the Martyr Aviator, in 2009 before disappearing from the scene. The website they may once have used, thetinytinhearts.com, is now a description and review of a Swedish casino.
And as I lose control it occurs to me
That the last thing I may ever see
Is stardust scattered
Like your hair across the sky
The engines hum
Warm as your touch
But not as bright
And the voice of terror howls
And the wings begin to scream
Tearing loose at the seam
And though I always knew
I could lose you this way
I only wanted to see you one last time
To say goodbye
Magenta Skycode - “Luvher oh Hater”
Finnish indie rock band Magenta Skycode were founded by Jori Sjöroos in 2005. According to a local Finnish newspaper, Magenta Skycode were “among the top Finnish indie bands” and received a Nordic Music Prize nomination.
Magenta Skycode have a longer track record than some of the other bands on this list: they put out music for nine years and have two albums and two EPs. But my favorite song is “Luvher oh Hater.” The lyrics aren’t phenomenal, but I love the energy of this song.
The band’s last show was in Turku, Finland, on August 8, 2014. Sjöroos was quoted as saying, “My previous bands have just ceased to exist and this time me [and] the band . . . want to say a precious goodbye.” Despite that desire, there’s not much information about the reasons for the band’s demise.
iLiKETRAiNS - “Terra Nova”
This British post-rock band eventually rejected the stylized version of their name and opted for I Like Trains instead, but I prefer the original all-caps-except-the-i’s iLiKETRAiNS. Their debut 2006 EP, Progress Reform is a melancholy historical drama. The opening track, “Terra Nova” describes the last days of Robert Falcon Scott’s doomed expedition to the South Pole—Scott reached the pole only to find that Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen had beaten him there by about a month. To add insult to injury, everyone in Amundsen’s party returned safely, while Scott and his entire expedition perished on the trip home. I love the pretention of this EP. The fact that the music video for the song is stop-motion animated Lego characters somehow makes it even better.
The rest of the EP is equally academic. Subsequent tracks discuss the events following Scott’s expedition, chess champion Bobby Fischer, and the closure of several British railway lines.
I Like Trains released their first album Elegies to Lessons Learnt, on the Beggars Banquet label in 2007. Like the EP, the record mostly featured songs inspired by historical events and a similar dirgelike style. Their label dropped them after Elegies, and the band founded their own label (called ILR, or I Like Records). They released their most recent album, Kompromat, in 2020. They’ve put out a few singles since then, and their Facebook page was active in February, but their official website is no longer available.
Danny Fishman - “Train Song”
Danny Fishman is a New York-based singer songwriter. His debut EP What I Meant to Say is strong all the way through, but the standout track is “Train Song.” It’s a wistful song about lost love and the struggle to move on, and the guitar, vocals, and lyrics hit home perfectly. My favorite passage is:
And I can’t help but remember
When you asked me for your song
And I laughed but I didn’t tell you
They were all yours all along
This is just a perfect lyric.
Fishman released his first album in 2022, Shatter and Fade, but hasn’t released new music since then.
Silicone Boone - “Found You”
I discovered this song at the height of the pandemic, and I really needed it. Silicone Boone was raised in an Old Order Amish family. He discovered his love for music playing on an old piano. At some point he came across Carl Sagan’s writing, became fascinated with outer space, and wrote an album about space travel. The whole record is fantastic—the only weak song is “Diamond”—all the others very good to truly outstanding.
I can’t find much information about Silicone Boone since the release of The Reaches in 2019, and he doesn’t seem to have put out any music since then.
Narwhal Tusk - “Remedy”
Narwhal Tusk describe themselves as a “female-fronted melodic band” based in Russia. They’re sometimes classifed under the metal genre, and they have an entry in the Encyclopaedia Metallum, for what that’s worth. The song “Remedy” from their 2016 album In Despair is awesome.
The band put out another album, My Absolution in 2017, and a single in 2019, but they haven’t produced new music in the last five years. The last post on their Facebook page is from 2020, promoting the 2019 single.
Satellite Lot - “Hold Your Fire”
I think of this song as perfect summer music. It’s got that school’s out vibe, but there’s also a slightly winsome tone.
Satellite Lot are (were?) a Portland, Maine-based indie outfit. “Hold Your Fire” is from the band’s debut 2005 LP, Second Summer. They released a follow-up album, Sleepwalk in a Burning Building, in 2007. I found this post from a blog about the Portland music scene reviewing the 2007 record. It describes the band as “something of an enigma—incredibly well respected, yet unable to keep a stable lineup in place, only rarely playing out in Portland.”
The band didn’t make any new music for seventeen years and seemed to be defunct. But this year they’ve put out three singles. Maybe they’re back?
Run Boy Run - “Who Should Follow Who”
This an incredible song about being in a relationship with someone you love, when real life suddenly interferes. I like the music more than the lyrics here. The verses are fine, but the chorus is a little too on-the-nose:
‘Cuz you say in the beginning,
“I’ll go anywhere for you”
But when you find that you want different things
Who should follow who?
That’s a minor quibble; this a great song. Run Boy Run put out two albums (So Sang The Whippoorwill in 2013 and Something to Someone in 2014). This song is from their 2016 EP I Would Fly. I’d also recommend “Far From My Home/Lion and the Fawn” and “Cora Belle.”
It appears that Run Boy Run is no longer producing music, and the band members have pursued solo careers. Their website is still available, but it hasn’t been updated since 2019.
Spirit Night - “So Long”
Dylan Balliett seems like one of those artists perpetually on the cusp of breaking out. His music, which he releases under the name Spirit Night, is consistently well-reviewed. He’s played as a tour guitarist for emo band The World Is A Beautiful A Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die. He’s caught the attention of music writer Ian Cohen, who’s plugged Spirit Night on the Indiecast podcast. Spirit Night’s record Bury the Dead was one of my favorite albums of 2023. But Spirit Night still only has about 1,300 monthly listeners on Spotify.
Spirit Night is alive and well; Balliett just put out a new record called Time Won’t Tell. I’ve only listened to it once so far; my impression that it’s good but doesn’t reach the level of Bury the Dead.
The Velvet Teen - “Radiapathy”
The Velvet Teen were fairly well-known in indie circles for a couple years in the early 2000s. After about 2006, there were some lineup changes, including the original drummer’s tragic death from brain cancer, and the band seemed to lose steam, though they continued to release EPs and put out a record in 2015.
The Velvet Teen have produced some incredible music, including “Caspian Can Wait”, “The Prize Fighter”, and “Gyzmkid”. But my favorite song is probably “Radiapathy” from their debut album Out of the Fierce Parade.
It’s unclear what the band is up to these days. Their website is active but hasn’t been updated in a while. They have a Patreon that they updated in May 2024, but the last music they’ve released publicly is from 2020.
Versus - “Crashing the Afterglow”
This is just a song that I heard at exactly the right time. The song was released in 1999, but I didn’t hear it until years later, when I was in high school. I was in a mopey place at the time, and for some reason this particular song hit home.
Versus have been around for a while. The band was formed in New York in 1990, though it took two lengthy breaks from 2001-2007 and 2009-2019. But they’re still touring, with at least four concerts scheduled next year. I haven’t listened to their whole catalog, but “Crashing the Afterglow” was the only song that really spoke to me. It’s not among their top ten tracks on Spotify.
Magnolia Sons - “Holiday Review”
I have no idea how I discovered Magnolia Sons, but it was around the time of their astonishingly good Jails Everywhere EP. The first two tracks are both awesome, but “Holiday Review” is especially amazing.
I also have no idea what happened to this band. Their Spotify page shows another EP released in 2011 followed by a bunch of singles, and has been dormant since 2014. None of their subsequent music has the same indie/alt vibe as Jails Everywhere—the band appears to have taken a severe turn towards soul and funk. Which is fine, but isn’t really my thing. They have Facebook and Instagram pages but haven’t posted on either since 2017.
¡Forward, Russia! - “Nineteen”
¡Forward, Russia! were a fairly popular art rock band in certain indie circles around the time of their debut album, Give Me A Wall, in 2006. “Nineteen” is my favorite song from that album, a melancholy proggy lament with some neat lyrics and interesting sounds.
After Give Me A Wall, the band put out a second album, Life Processes, in 2008. The same year, ¡Forward, Russia! announced a hiatus, saying they wouldn’t tour or record for the foreseeable future. In 2013, the band resumed activity on its Twitter account. They played a few shows but didn’t put out any new music. Their Facebook page has occasional spurts of activity, with a couple of posts in 2020 and one in March 2024. But apart from that, there are few signs the band is active again.