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50 albums · 1964–2025

Music of Singapore, from the Quests and xinyao to Stefanie Sun, JJ Lin, indie and today

· 2 min read · by 1001 Albums

A band on the outdoor stage of the Esplanade at Baybeats, the Fullerton Hotel lit across the water behind
JJ Lin singing on stage in a long black coat, confetti falling around him and a violinist behindThe Esplanade Concert Hall from the circle, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra on stage under the timber ribs of the hall
Baybeats at the Esplanade's outdoor theatre, 2011. Photo: elfgoh, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. · JJ Lin on stage at the KKBOX Music Awards, 2015. Photo: Gene Wang, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. · The Singapore Symphony Orchestra in the Esplanade Concert Hall, 2018. Photo: Intforce, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Singapore's popular music starts with the beat bands of the sixties, the Quests above all, then the Malay rock of Sweet Charity and Ramli Sarip, Rahimah Rahim and Anita Sarawak, Kembara in M. Nasir's Singapore years, the xinyao movement of the campus folk singers with Eric Moo's Kopi-O, Dick Lee's The Mad Chinaman, the Kopi Kat Klan's Why U So Like Dat, Kit Chan, Mavis Hee, Tanya Chua, Stefanie Sun's Yan Zi and Kite, A-do and JJ Lin for the Mandopop the whole region sings, Jacintha's jazz, Humpback Oak, Electrico, the Observatory and the Great Spy Experiment from the clubs and the Baybeats stages at the Esplanade, Wormrot's grindcore, and Charlie Lim, Linying, Sobs, Subsonic Eye, ShiGGa Shay and Fariz Jabba today, with Vanessa-Mae and Chloe Chua with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra for a nod to the classical side. The list has 50 records from 1964 to 2025, one or two by each of the names above and only a small part of what they made; Liang Wern Fook and the other xinyao songwriters, Taufik Batisah, Naomi and the Boys, the Crescendos and the Padres are missing because their records are not on Deezer, and the Chinese opera and getai stages, the Tamil film and Indian classical scene, the Malay ghazal and dikir barat, and most of the classical tradition would each need a list of their own. About 36 hours of music, 5 days of a few records each.

By genre

Pop 24%Rock 13%Punk & New Wave 3%Other 60%
  • Pop 24%
  • Rock 13%
  • Punk & New Wave 3%
  • Other 60%

The genres named most: singaporean, mandopop, pop, indie rock, malay rock, indie pop.

The colours of the covers

A stripe for each cover, in the colour Tidal picks from it, sorted by hue; the greys at the end.

Where the music comes from

Music from 1 country: Singapore 50. The deeper the colour, the more albums: one, two to four, five to nine, ten and more.

The 1960s

The 1970s

The 1980s

The 1990s

The 2000s

The 2010s

The 2020s

More lists

Lists of Countries first, then others; all of them on the blog. The blog.