[encloser]

I'm another person in their 40s that (tries to) primarily listens to Indie. What are you tips for discovering music?

I primarily am using Pandora and it really depends how much time I spend thumbing music up or down. Once I zero in a station it doesn't seem like I hear new artists or songs very often.

I'll also add that in my personal case, pandora led me to finding and buying more music. Spotify and smartphones over iPods (and buying a house) are why I don't by albums very often anymore.

[Litost]

I was going to say discovering music is easy, maybe it's just me, but like anything, just get stuck in?

a) Find some bands you like, go see them live.

b) Get talking to people at the gigs (this helps if they're smaller venues), they'll recommend all sorts.

c) See the support bands, odds on you'll like some of them, then go and see them, see the other bands they're in, it doesn't take long before this gets out of control :).

d) Make friends, go and see bands they like, it might not always be your thing, but if it's a social thing anyway, it doesn't really matter.

e) Go to festivals, listen to all the bands beforehand - i used to generated spotify playlists of glastonbury etc. Ok, listening to stuff on spotify doesn't make the artist much, but if you like them, go see them when they headline, buy merch, recommend them to friends etc.

f) I used to take photos, it's pretty much a dead industry nowadays but it puts you in touch with bands and helps get you kind of noticed which might lead to opportunites you might not get otherwise.

g) Be eclectic, you're spoilt for choice, if you're lucky enough to be in London or SE England or a decent sized city.

h) Follow bands on facebook, soundcloud... often this leads to other similar bands.

i) Personally i don't bother with large venues or bigger bands that much, i might make the odd exception, but there's serious amounts of really great music and musicians well away from the expensive/aircraft hanger venue/popular stuff and there's the bonus it might actually have some meaning because it's not trying to make money :).

[illegalsmile]

I haven't and don't find Pandora to be good for finding new music. Now that I don't have much time to seek new artists I usually hop on people's playlists on Spotify or try radio stations, something a little more hand picked. When I really had time to find new music there are college radio stations that put out podcasts DJ picked music, there are lots of blogs to guide you and you can always use the charts in various countries. The staggering amount of new music that comes out every week makes it extremely difficult to keep up with especially if you like to listen to the entire album.