Feature: Aiden Bissett
Words by Kelly Carrazzone
There is something so refreshingly authentic about a young artist who is fearless in the face of emotional vulnerability. Someone who pours their heart into their music and gives listeners a space to channel all their frustrations, doubts, and heartbreak without a care in the world. 18-year old Aidan Bissett may be a newcomer in the industry, but boy is his skyrocketing success turning heads. On the tail end of the summer, Bissett has released his brand new single “DUMPED”, a rock-heavy, angsty ode to exasperated heartbreak. I caught up with Aidan via Zoom to talk about his exciting new single, his exponential growth as an artist during the dreaded 2020, and the highly anticipated release of Aidan’s future music projects.
Photo by Brooke James
Shaped by the niche music scene of the west coast, Aidan Bissett was surrounded by a lot of alternative and indie-pop sounds during his younger years in Oregon. After picking up the guitar at a young age to learn some of his dad’s favorite classic rock songs, Bissett says he slowly fell down the indie-rock rabbithole, citing Wallows as one of the main bands to influence his love for the grungy, feel-good genre. It’s impossible to deny Bissett’s voice wasn’t made for crooning alternative rock music. His deep, unique vocal tone brings a certain edge to typical indie-rock anthems that is hard to shake. In a world of thousands of artists, Aidan Bissett is a breath of fresh air, bringing a high-energy wave of angsty excitement to his music.
Using the downtime of COVID-19 quarantine to his advantage, Bissett crashed into the music scene full force, taking singing lessons, studying popular music, teaching himself music theory, taking online music production courses, and ultimately posting his original music in snippets on the wildly popular online platform TikTok. After releasing his debut single “Different” in July 2020, the new artist garnered over 100,000 streams on Spotify and instantly had fans itching for more music.
“In high school I would tell my friends I sang and made music but everyone just thought it was a hobby. Then when I put out my first single ‘Different’ it was really cool because people genuinely seemed excited by the song. And friends will be very honest with you if something’s not good, so that was relieving!”
Riding off of the public’s invigorating excitement from his first single release, Aidan kept the energy high and the guitar riffs heavy on his next single “Worst Girls Of All Time”. Aidan’s raspy, alt-pop vocals tie together the production of a polished performer with the young artist’s boyish, teenage charm. While Bissett had been picking up online attention throughout his first two releases, his overwhelming virality came alongside the release of his third single “More Than Friends”.
Released in September 2020, “More Than Friends” is a breezy, end-of-summer track that showcases Bissett’s groovy, windows-down sound that is impossible not to love. The single sent TikTok fans into a frenzy as the song went viral in a matter of weeks. Sitting with nearly 10 million streams on Spotify alone, “More Than Friends” proved that Aidan Bissett was more than just a rising artist. He was now the face for up-and-coming talent in the indie-pop world of music.
followed by his single “So High”. With each single release, Bissett expertly reveals a new layer to his growing artistry. The young singer/songwriter says he is in awe of how receptive people seem to be towards his recent music. His fanbase only continues to grow as the starlet becomes more and more comfortable sharing his most vulnerable experiences in his songs.
Photo by Brooke James
This week Aidan released his brand new single “DUMPED” paired with a ridiculously fun, angst-driven music video directed by Brooke James. Aidan told Tongue Tied Mag that this song actually came from a writing day that didn’t feel right. When he started messing around with chords and playful lyrics on his guitar instead, the artist and co-producer Ryan Daly unintentionally stumbled across the foundational work “DUMPED”.
To fully digest the brilliance of Aidan Bissett’s latest track, you must check out the “DUMPED” music video (conveniently located below!). The visual features Bissett living out his distressed, jam-out-in-your-bedroom teenage dreams. Singing “They always find my weakness, the last one cut the deepest, but I don’t feel like I’m alone” the rising starlet may be hurting, but he refuses to go down quietly.
Aidan Bissett is the fresh voice in the indie-rock atmosphere that we’ve all been looking for. With sounds reminiscent of COIN and Wallows, this rising star is making a path of his own with music that soothes our angsty heartbreaks with ease.
Run -- don’t walk -- to Spotify and Apple Music to jam out to Aidan Bissett’s brand new single “DUMPED” out everywhere now! Be sure to check out the incredible singer/songwriter on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook to keep up with all his latest music releases.
