10 Asian And AAPI Artists To Add To Your Summer Playlist ASAP

From dystopian beats to pop-y bops, here are 10 artists you should know.

For many of us, this year’s Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month feels particularly important given the current climate of anti-Asian sentiment. Over the past year, as many countries around the world saw a surge in violence against Asian communities, AAPIs in the U.S. have been speaking up and sharing their stories like never before. A common theme found has been that the AAPI community has, for far too long, felt invisible in the U.S., especially in American media.

However, it seems that things may be starting to change with the increasing representation of Asians in Hollywood and the growing popularity of artists of Asian descent like BTS, Blackpink, and H.E.R. But there are so many other talented artists who have yet to receive much press in the U.S., so for AAPI Heritage Month, we are highlighting a handful of the amazing Asian and AAPI musicians who deserve a spot on your summer playlist.

Without further ado, here are 10 Asian and AAPI artists you should check out right now.

1
Run River North

The Los Angeles-based indie rock band Run River North has been entertaining audiences for about a decade. Currently made up of Alex Hwang (lead vocals, guitar), Sally Kang (vocals, keyboard, percussion), and Daniel Chae (vocals, guitar, bass)—who all happen to be Korean American—the band was originally named Monsters Calling Home after lead singer Hwang wrote a song of the same name about his immigrant parents. The band got their big break when Honda saw this music video that they had shot in their Hondas and decided to surprise them by making them think they were invited to perform for Honda executives. (The band actually got to perform on Jimmy Kimmel Live!). Soon afterward, the band signed with a record label, changed its name to Run River North, and began recording albums and touring the U.S.

“Ten years ago, there really wasn’t an all-Asian rock band on TV, so to see that within our first year—to see a bunch of Asians do that—for our parents and for ourselves, it cemented that this could be done,” Hwang tells ELLE.com. Over the years, Run River North has continued to forge their own path by playing at South by Southwest six times, appearing on Late Night with Seth Meyers, and performing at numerous venues across the U.S., most recently completing a headline tour of 27 U.S. cities in February 2020.

Now an independent band, Run River North quickly pivoted during COVID-19 by holding virtual concerts, launching a Patreon page, and shooting music videos in locations that weren’t possible before the pandemic. Their newest album, Creatures In Your Head, was also released during the pandemic.

2
Alex Porat

Powerful yet delicate and overflowing with emotion, Alex Porat’s unique vocals have amassed over 150 million streams on YouTube and garnered her loyal fans across North America, Europe, and Asia. Born in Malaysia to a Chinese mother and a Polish father, the 23-year-old Canadian singer-songwriter gave her first public performance when she was only four years old and credits her parents with instilling a love of music at an early age. As a child, she watched Disney films and listened to classical music with her family, and on the weekends her parents took her to the mall to sing karaoke.

By 2012, Porat was posting clips of herself singing on YouTube. While enrolled in business school, she began recording cover songs and writing her own music, and soon left school to pursue a full-time music career. Often labeled as an alt-pop artist, Porat describes her sound as “pop music with a bit of hot sauce,” adding that she lets her music “define itself because it’s so hard to put it into a category.”

She also admits that growing up with no Asian idols was hard. “You don’t see anyone that looks like you. Even the token song from Mulan is by Christina Aguilera,” she says. “It’s weird as a kid because you almost don’t realize it until you grow up, and then you realize that it wasn’t normal that I really didn’t have anyone in mainstream media to look up to.” Now that she has a growing audience, Porat is determined to use her platform to push for progress. “I just want more representation of Asians in the music industry,” she says. “I feel like there’s not enough—there are barely any Asian artists playing on the radio, especially in pop music.”

3
Sanjoy

From working as a Bollywood music producer in Mumbai to becoming a dance pop artist with his own studio in Los Angeles, 28-year-old Bengali-American DJ, producer, and songwriter Sanjoy Deb, known mononymously as Sanjoy, has already had quite a varied music career. When he was 11, Sanjoy and his family fled religious persecution in Bangladesh and settled in California. “I barely knew English back then, so music was how I related to kids in America,” he says. He spent his youth making music and eventually landed opportunities to perform and DJ on college campuses. “I also wanted to push forward the sound of my culture, and the whole thing progressively turned into a living,” he says.

After college, he moved to Mumbai, where he and his friend Kunal Agarwal helped start the EDM/Bollywood dance movement. Yearning for more creative freedom, they soon moved back to California and launched their own record label, Port 22. Since then, Sanjoy, who produces and writes all of his songs, has collaborated with a number of musicians, including K-pop stars Youngjae and Mark Tuan of GOT7 (with whom he recorded “One in a Million”) and other artists like Trey Schafer (their latest collaboration being “Valley of the Hills”), Kat Nestel, and Elliott Yamin of American Idol fame.

Sanjoy describes his music as “electronic dance pop with more of an international feel” and “good vibes.” When asked about challenges he’s had to overcome in his music career, he explains, “Being a musician of Asian heritage, you already get put into a niche. You feel like you’re supposed to just make music for your own circle. But I never wanted to feel like that. I wanted to bring what I learn from my culture and share it with everyone. I want to make music that’s accepted by everybody. Asian American artists should not be categorized as making music only for their own ethnic group.”

4
sundial

Indie pop duo sundial is proof that you don’t need a record label or a large production team behind you to create and share great music with millions of listeners—just two very talented people. Members Jisu Kim, who’s Korean American, and Dorothy Chan, who was born and raised in Hong Kong, met in 2015 when they were both freshmen at Berklee College of Music. They began dating and, shortly after, started making music together.

“We loved using sensory sound samples to craft a world,” Chan says. “We loved the idea of showing nature sonically, so we were thinking of what represents nature, time, and change.” Thus the name “sundial” was born. What began as a hobby later turned into a career when the pair quit their day jobs and went full-time with sundial in 2020.

The couple views music as a powerful tool for storytelling and is responsible for every aspect of their songs—from writing and performing to mixing and mastering. “We’re not done yet telling our stories,” says Kim. “Until we get to that point, it makes sense for us to work through a lot of these things ourselves. Songwriting for us is not just about making a catchy song—it’s about putting a story down on paper.”

It’s hard to categorize sundial’s music, as the duo’s styles range from R&B to electronica to folk and possibly everything in between. “You can’t put emotions into a genre, so whatever sound palette best fits the message of the song, that’s what we decide,” Kim explains.

Sundial’s DIY, genre-agnostic approach seems to be paying off: the duo has amassed millions of plays on TikTok and over 20 million streams on Spotify & Apple Music, and placed #8 on Spotify’s U.S. Viral 50 chart.

5
Pyra

Known for her unique style, unconventional sound, and bold, socially conscious lyrics, 28-year-old Thai singer-songwriter Pyra has carved out her own brand of pop music. Fusing elements of electronic pop, hip-hop, R&B, alternative rock, and other genres, Pyra calls her eclectic blend “dystopian pop,” which she defines as “genre-bending music with a message.” In her songs, she tackles themes of social justice, inequality (in “plastic world”), for example), racial and gender stereotypes (as in “yellow fever”), mental health (as in “dystopia”), spirituality, and more.

She leverages pain as inspiration for her music. “Funny enough, I can never relate when artists talk about writer's block,” she says. “I never felt like I'll ever run out of inspiration because I grew up in an oppressed country and environment. There's so much tension and hardship involved. So many things left unsaid, and things people don't really want to hear if you start chatting with them, so I say it in my music instead. Pain is the input; art is the output.”

Assuming the COVID-19 situation in Bangkok improves, her new EP, fkn bad pt. 1, is scheduled to drop in July. “It’s dystopian just like the world we live in right now,” she notes. “Anyone will relate.”

6
SHAUN

South Korean DJ, producer, and singer-songwriter SHAUN was the most streamed solo K-pop artist of 2018 on Spotify and one of the top 10 most streamed K-pop artists on the streaming platform in 2019 and 2020. Though often labeled as a K-pop star, SHAUN (real name Kim Yun-ho) has experimented with a wide variety of musical styles, from dance to house to indie pop and rock. (He debuted in 2010 as a keyboardist in the indie rock band The Koxx).

Although Americans probably know him best for his 2018 single “Way Back Home,” which charted over BTS and Blackpink and was later remixed by Conor Maynard and Sam Feldt to become a global dance hit, SHAUN is known in South Korea for writing hit singles for some of its top-selling artists, including BTS, Epik High, EXO, and Younha. A multi-instrumentalist who plays the piano, drums, and the guitar, SHAUN has even uploaded YouTube tutorials to give viewers a sneak peek at how he creates his music.

The 31-year-old released his fourth EP titled #0055b7 (which is the hex color code for blue) earlier this month—his first project since completing his mandatory military service in November 2020. The EP contains two new singles, “Blue (feat. Wonstein)” and “Closed Ending.”

7
AleXa

With her fierce visuals, explosive choreography, futuristic storylines, and a penchant for weaving together English and Korean lyrics, 24-year-old AleXa is breaking the mold of the typical K-pop star. The daughter of an adopted Korean mother and a Russian American father, AleXa grew up in Tulsa, OK, where she took dance lessons starting at the age of two, participated in her school choir, and even sang in choir competitions.

In 2008, when she was around 11 years old, she discovered and fell in love with K-pop. “Growing up, there weren’t many Asian American artists I knew of, so K-pop was an introduction to global Asian representation for me,” she says. “The entire package—the singing, dancing, visuals, and music videos—really sparked an interest deep in my soul.”

After winning an online talent competition, AleXa signed with the Korean record label ZB Label and made her K-pop debut with the dance track “Bomb.” A self-professed sci-fi and cyberpunk fan, AleXa explains that all of her music videos have an “interwoven storyline” within a multiverse and thus should be watched in chronological order. AleXa describes her songs as “cyber-warrior power anthems,” adding, “If you like strong beats, powerful instrumentals, and insane choreo, my music might be right up your alley.”

8
The Chairs

Taiwanese indie trio The Chairs is one of the hottest acts in Taiwan right now. Comprised of 27-year-olds Jing Chiu (lead vocals, guitar, keyboard), Zhong Chen (vocals, guitar), and Benson Sun (bass, backing vocals), The Chairs write and perform retro-style songs in both English and Chinese that span a variety of genres, including psychedelic pop, folk, rock, and retro pop. The band was nominated for multiple awards at the Golden Indie Music Awards in Taiwan in 2016 and 2019 and won the Best Vocal Group Award at the 2019 Golden Melody Awards (the equivalent of the Grammy Awards in the Chinese-speaking world.)

The members first met each other in high school and officially formed their band in college, calling themselves The Chairs in order to enter singing competitions because the room they were in at the time had only guitars and, well, chairs. Now with three albums under their belt, they admit they’re still learning about the music business in Asia and other parts of the world. Their first U.S. tour was cancelled when the pandemic broke out in New York. “It was the toughest time for us,” says Chiu. On the flip side, they’ve been able to spend more time making their new album while in quarantine and plan to release it later this year. “Hopefully when the pandemic ends, we can go to places we’ve never been to to do live shows,” adds Chiu.

9
Gentle Bones

Singaporean singer-songwriter Joel Tan, better known as Gentle Bones, is one of Singapore’s top English-language artists. Dubbed the “Ed Sheeran of Singapore,” he became the first Singaporean artist to sign with Universal Music Singapore in 2015 and earned a spot on Forbes’ inaugural “30 Under 30 Asia” list in 2016.

Tan started writing songs and playing the guitar when he was 16. Finding his real name to be too common, he adopted the stage name “Gentle Bones” by putting two random words together to “evoke a sense of mystery” and began uploading covers to his YouTube channel. The now-27-year-old has come a long way since then, continuously working to hone his sound, which he describes as an “electronic kind of lullaby.”

“If I am able to be a part of your journey to sleep every night, I think I would have achieved my dream of songwriting,” he says. Although all but one of his songs to date have been in English, he hopes to release more songs in Mandarin in the future.

10
KATIE

The Korean American artist Katie Kim, known mononymously as KATIE, rose to fame in South Korea in 2014 after winning the fourth season of the TV show K-pop Star. Born in South Korea, KATIE immigrated to the U.S. with her family when she was 10—a move that set her on the path to becoming a musician. “I didn’t know much English then. I used to be a pretty outgoing child and became this reserved and quiet fifth grader. I was often made fun of for my wrong grammar or pronunciation at school and hearing phrases like ‘Go back to your country’ or ‘Ching chong ling ding dong’ was kind of just a norm,” she says. Fortunately, she found music to be a source of comfort and a creative outlet for her emotions. “After school, I would come right back home and listen to a popular music radio station. As an introvert and with both parents working, I spent a lot of time thinking and finding myself, and music was there to help express it,” she says.

With her Korean background, KATIE has often been mischaracterized as a K-pop artist, though she doesn’t consider herself as one. Influenced by artists like Lalah and Donny Hathaway, Lauryn Hill, Frank Ocean, and Anderson .Paak, she sings only in English and describes her music as “R&B with jazz.” Her music videos—each of which has racked up millions of views on YouTube—are visual masterpieces, as is the artwork for her singles and EPs, most of which feature an arched doorway on the cover—a symbol of her journey as a musician. “It represents the entry of me into this world as a musician,” she explains. “I think the arched door shows this idea of newness and curiosity for what’s to come.”

When asked what she hopes people will get out of her music, KATIE replies, “I hope that people will feel that they are not alone. The world is lonely and hard sometimes, but we are never alone in this game of life.”


This article originally appeared in ELLE.