Here is a list of artists who have been featured for their free and legal MP3s at least three times to date on Fingertips, dating back to 2003.
To be featured three times here strikes me as significant. Almost any artist I feature can randomly end up releasing one more song I like a lot and therefore be featured twice. But I think there’s a line drawn after two times that becomes indicative of a band or musician consistently making the kind of quality music that I have been searching for on Fingertips for more than 15 years at this point.
Some of the artists became pretty well-known in 21st-century indie rock circles (Iron and Wine, Wye Oak, Amanda Palmer), others less so (The Spectacular Fantastic, anybody?). Some I would clearly identify as among my favorite artists (Laura Veirs, Over the Rhine, and the current all-time features leader John Vanderslice), while others kind of surprised me by their presence on the list (I did not for instance expect to see Portugal.The Man and their unexpected period).
The most recent member of the club is the Portland duo Pure Bathing Culture, whose third song went up here in July 2019.
I especially appreciate those who have been featured not just in a short stretch of time but who have had staying power over the years. The current “winner” in terms of having posts on Fingertips spanning the longest amount of time is the stalwart Lancaster, Pennsylvania trio The Innocence Mission, featured both all the way back in November 2003 and most recently in January 2020 (16 years, two months). Next up in this category is the inimitable Argentinian singer/songwriter Juana Molina, who was one of the first artists ever featured here (June 2003), and showed up in more recent times in August 2017 (14 years, two months); close behind is singer/songwriter Laura Veirs (April 2004, May 2018; 14 years, one month). A few others with a long span of Fingertips success are Pieta Brown (March 2006, October 2019), Tim Howard’s project Soltero (September 2004, December 2017), and the Austin band Cotton Mather (December 2003, February 2016).
Anyway, for the select few who might find this both interesting and helpful (perhaps a good way to check out some folks you haven’t yet listened to), here’s the list, in alphabetical order. After each name is the number of times featured to date, and then the month and year of the most recent feature. Artists featured more than four times I’ve put in bold, just for the heck of it.
To keep this from being too time-consuming a project, I do not offer any links on this list. Those interested are encouraged to visit the Artist Index; all the links you need are there. Apologies in advance for any links that are dead—I’m still working on cleaning that up. Talk about a time-consuming project!
Ages and Ages – 3 – Jan 18
Annuals – 4 – Mar 10
Asobi Seksu – 3 – Dec 10
Nicole Atkins – 3 – Oct 10
Bettie Serveert – 3 – Mar 10
Bishop Allen – 3 – Mar 09
Blonde Redhead – 3 – June 10
British Sea Power – 3 – Dec 10
Isobel Campbell – 3 – Sep 06
CocoRosie – 3 – Jul 17
Brandon De La Cruz – 3 – Mar 21
The Decemberists – 3 – Mar 05
Eux Autres – 3 – Mar 12
Francis and the Lights – 3 – May 13
Lisa Germano – 3 – Jan 13
Steve Goldberg & the Arch Enemies – 3 – Aug 11
Heartless Bastards – 3 – Dec 11
Jesca Hoop – 3 – Jan 17
Innocence Mission – 4 – Jan 20
Iron and Wine – 3 – Jan 18
The Ladybug Transistor – 3 – Mar 11
Land of Talk – 5 – Aug 20
Low – 3 – Mar 13
Matt Pond PA/Matt Pond – 6 – Aug 13
Cass McCombs – 3 – Nov 11
Midlake – 3 – Feb 10
Kate Miller-Heidke – 4 – Jun 12
The Minor Leagues – 3 – Aug 11
Juana Molina – 4 – Aug 17
The Morning Benders – 3 – Feb 10
Bob Mould – 3 – Jan 19
Múm – 3 – Oct 09
My Brightest Diamond – 3 – Nov 08
The Mynabirds – 4 – Dec 17
Marissa Nadler – 4 – Mar 11
Okkervil River – 5 – May 11
Over the Rhine – 6 – Jan 11
Amanda Palmer – 3 – Jan 19
Portugal. The Man – 3 – Jun 09
Pure Bathing Culture – 3 – Jul 19
The Raveonettes – 4 – Jun 12
Sambassadeur – 3 – Jun 10
School of Seven Bells – 3 – Dec 12
Shearwater – 4 – Feb 12
The Shins – 3 – Nov 06
Soltero – 4 – Dec 17
The Spectacular Fantastic – 3 – Mar 16
Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros – 3 – Jan 04
13ghosts – 3 – Oct 11
John Vanderslice – 7 – Sep 10
The Veils – 3- Mar 13
Laura Veirs – 4 – May 18
Daisy Victoria – 3 – Aug 16
Wheat – 3 – Dec 11
Work Drugs – 3 – Oct 17
Wye Oak – 5 – Mar 20
Yo La Tengo – 5 – Jan 13
Fingertips 