A different kind of retro-old-school than the usual.
My general strategy for deciding what I like in music in the age of bittorrent is to dump a shitload of music into my phone from an artist I'm interested in and gauge my level of interest through repeat exposure by way of shuffle play. Starting to come around more to X, the band that accidentally made themselves very hard to Google, and Leon Bridges is becoming an artist I skip a lot less frequently Flaw in this system is some software bug that restarts my playlist from the top of the alphabet based on song title. I couldn't listen to "About a Girl" for a long time due to this and there's a Nathaniel Rateliff song I've developed a temporary hatred for since it has a tendency to play every time I start my car. Still, I'm happy enough with how this works to keep doing it. Also too lazy to be proactive because I really don't care
Been listening to Boogie a lot recently, Good hip hop. Here's one of the best sad songs I've heard In a long time and another one that is hype. I also want to share one of my favorite songs of all time, it's a great soul jam and a great love song. The amount of passion in the vocals almost always makes me tear up.
Spotify has me figured out, man! Every suggestion has been dead-on in my Afro/Soul/Funk/Groove target area. Examples: Dojo Cuts: The Tibbs (with a little ska thrown in for good measure) Marta Ren and the Groovelvets: (that's pronounced "groo-VEL-vets") The Funk Ark Of course, the playlist also includes such butt-wiggling madness as The Daktaris, The Monophonics, Ikebe Shakedown, The Budos Band, Jungle Fire, The Headhunters, Speedometer, and Vaudou Game (who is some sort of amazing afro/french/latin hybrid of groovy funkiness)