Throughout the World Cup 2026, music venues will undoubtedly see reduced numbers through their doors in the 16 cities hosting this year’s games. As football fans head to the stadiums, we are taking the opportunity to shine a light on artists from each of the host cities’ local music scenes.
With matches scheduled across the USA, Mexico and Canada – starting with Mexico v South Africa on 11th June in Mexico City – there is no small territory to cover here. But from Vancouver to Dallas to Guadalajara, we’ve got you covered, with our hand-picked playlist of local favourites that are sure to sound great on any decent music system.
Not conventional football anthems, perhaps, but these tracks have been selected to showcase local artists and put your hi-fi through its paces. And besides, you might end up listening to the next big thing.
Now In A Vacuum – Concrete Vehicles (Vancouver)
Kicking things off with wild percussion and crunchy sub-bass, seven-piece Vancouver collective Concrete Vehicles (formerly known as Computer) showcase their very noisiest noise-rock in this gritty, tweeter-busting tune.
With howling guitar feedback, subs so distorted they’ll have you wondering if everything is, in general, okay, and hypnotic, breathless vocals, Now In A Vacuum’s most impressive feat is that the song manages to hang together despite the magnitude of disorder on show. What’s more, the band sound remarkably tight throughout.
Maybe not one we anticipate to hear chanted from the stands, but this song will certainly push your system’s limits.
Mockingbird – Abigail Lapell, Dana Sipos (Toronto)
Folk singer-songwriter Abigail Lapell’s voice sits somewhere between Tracy Chapman’s and Joni Mitchell’s. Taken from the Toronto musician’s album Shadow Child, this track chronicles her journey, equal parts joyous and difficult, through motherhood.
Opening with birdsong, Mockingbird eventually spills into rich acoustic guitars, harmonica and Lapell’s velvet smooth vocals. Harmonies from Dana Sipos furnish this weary, country-infused tribute to indecision, adding emotional weight to its central conundrum: “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t.”
With a wealth of detail in the upper midrange, Mockingbird provides a true test of your system’s handling of fine textures.
Stars – Sussie 4 (Guadalajara)
Central players in Guadalajara’s electronic music scene, Sussie 4’s name was inspired by musician and actress Suzi Quatro – ‘cuatro’ being ‘four’ in Spanish. Stars is a distillation of the duo’s sound, showcasing their unique infusion of French house, Latin rhythms and pop.
There’s a lot going on here. With a synthesised bass playing the lead melody above sparkling acoustic guitars and a heavy house beat, this track is sure to put your system’s frequency range to the test. The song’s most ineluctable quality, however, is its energetic, pulsing core: a feature which will highlight how your system responds to music with strong rhythmic drive.
Sur – Sotomayor (Mexico City)
Sharing the common surname of siblings Paulina and Raúl, their musical project, Sotomayor, blends Afro Latin rhythms with electronic beats. Sur, from their 2015 debut album, Salvaje, is a smooth, house infused track that sees Paulina Sotomayor’s vocals building to a crescendo that never arrives, keeping us on the edges of our seats for the song’s duration.
A notable feature of the track is its pulsing undercurrent, which is secured, in part, by a syncopated organ, evoking early 2000s club bangers. Much of the song takes place in the lower midrange, with intermittent high-frequency interjections from synthesised hi-hats and claps.
Another great test of rhythmic drive, Sur will come to life on systems capable of reproducing subtle textural layers
Ego – The Warning (Monterrey)
Hailing from Monterrey, The Warning are an all female rock trio consisting of sisters Daniela, Paulina and Alejandra Villareal Vélez. Their musical journey began with childhood marathons of the videogame Rock Band, an influence that is echoed in their anthemic, highly produced approach to classic rock.
Ego is a sleek rock rager, featuring interlocking guitar and bass lines that command a presence to rival Rage Against The Machine at their most fierce. The track serves as a rigorous audit for any hi-fi set-up; on systems with an overly bright profile, the distorted guitars and punchy snares will feel abrasive, making this an ideal benchmark for testing your system’s tonal balance.
Big Thumb – Lowertown (Atlanta)
Emerging from Atlanta’s DIY scene, indie rock duo Lowertown blend the talents of singer-pianist Avsha Weinberg and lyricist-vocalist Olivia Osby.
Epitomising the sound of their 2026 album Ugly Duckling Union, Big Thumb sets layered group vocals over a jangling acoustic guitar, tambourine and a harmonica part that brings to mind Bob Dylan at his most careless.
The song’s unconventional arrangement will provide a rigorous test for your system, specifically highlighting how it navigates complex instrumental layering and bright, expansive room acoustics.
Body And Soul – The Greg Hopkins Jazz Orchestra (Boston)
Fronted by acclaimed trumpeter, composer and Berklee School of Music professor Greg Hopkins, The Greg Hopkins Jazz Orchestra is one of Boston’s most renowned jazz ensembles.
This rendition of Johnny Green’s jazz standard Body And Soul is an energetic, passionate and impressively lifelike recording. Keep an ear out for subtle clicks and breath sounds during the saxophone’s solo – features that are sure to stand out on systems capable of a truly faithful reproduction.
From Within – DAMOYEE, Mad Keys (Dallas)
Multi-instrumentalist DAMOYEE carries the Dallas R&B torch ignited by Erykah Badu, weaving a vibrant, genre-defying tapestry of R&B, jazz, pop and folk. From Within sees her collaborating for the first time with composer and pianist Mad Keys.
This track impressed us with its hypnotic arrangement, featuring DAMOYEE’s vocals mixed into glitching harmonies, electric pianos and featherlight percussion above a subby bassline groove.
Somewhat heavier on the lower frequencies, From Within is no walk in the park for your subwoofer.
We Are The Drum – Kendrick Scott Oracle (Houston)
Jazz drummer Kendrick Scott leads us into this track with unpredictable, pitch-shifting tom hits. Soon joined by the rest of his quintet, the arrangement expands to include expansive, airy piano, saxophone, guitar and bass.
Although We Are The Drum is not a strictly drum-led arrangement, this mix spreads the kit impactfully across the stereo field, giving us the sense of sitting right in the drummer’s seat – quite the thrill in the midst of such an esteemed group of musicians.
A solid litmus test for speaker placement, this track has an uncanny realism; when your speakers are aligned correctly, the performance should occupy your listening space with startling presence.
This Is A Photograph – Kevin Morby (Kansas City)
Taken from Morby’s 2022 album of the same name, This Is A Photograph is an impressive exercise in gradual adaptation. Centering around a repeating electric guitar riff, this song delays gratification to an almost unbearable point, and in doing so makes the full band’s eventual arrival all the sweeter.
With punchy, compressed drums, ethereal acoustic guitars and a masterfully understated saxophone part, This Is A Photograph is a contagiously joyful, afro-rock inspired headbanger. But with Morby’s vocals sitting right up front and a soundworld that shifts from small room reverberance to tight, studio sonics, it does demand an adaptable system.
Another Second Chance – Rocket (Los Angeles)
Los Angeles’ Rocket have well and truly taken off since releasing their debut album R Is for Rocket in 2025.
Taken from their debut, Another Second Chance is a grungy, romantically concerned track that packs all the punch of Nirvana, but pairs it with soft, shoegazey vocals. Impressively, this song retains the clear feeling of a band in the room while embracing a produced, studio sound – a feat we suspect has something to do with skillfully deployed dynamics.
A bright, thrashy banger with a tender underbelly, this track will test the high-frequency balance and dynamic sensitivity of your system.
Serpentine Dragon – Richie Hell (Miami)
Argentinian born Richie Hell moved to Miami in 2015 and has since gone on to impress audiences worldwide with eclectic mixes that draw as much from traditional South American music as from the Madchester movement.
Serpentine Dragon opens Hell’s 2025 album Dream Waves with nauseating psychedelic intensity. Featuring pulsing synth bass, inscrutable chanting vocals and acidic lead synthesisers, this track will take you on a journey – if your system can handle it.
Play Me – Fcukers (New York)
Fcukers don’t hang around. Formed in 2022, the New York band have already collaborated with LCD Soundsystem’s James Murphy and supported Tame Impala on his Deadbeat tour. Listening to Play Me, it’s not hard to understand how they’ve garnered such significant attention in so little time.
Fusing New York indie sleaze with UK drum'n'bass sensibilities, this track relies on a warbling synth-bass and an unrelenting breakbeat to keep the energy high for its two-and-a-half minute duration. To feel the fine details of Kenny Beats’ production on this track, you’ll want a system with a good transient response.
Shadow People – Dr Dog (Philadelphia)
An ode to the residents of the singer’s neighbourhood in Philadelphia, Shadow People, from Dr Dog’s 2010 album Shame, Shame is a masterful study in contrasts. Pairing troubling lyrics with an up-beat arrangement, the track succeeds in becoming, inexplicably, all the more melancholy.
With Beach Boys-esque vocal harmonies that multiply towards the song’s cacophonous ending, and grand distorted guitars to boot, this bounding display of psychedelic Americana will test how your system handles the sound of a band going hell for leather.
Mayo Con Yago – Polyrhythmics (Seattle)
A steady rhythm section underpins explosive brass and organs to establish Mayo Con Yago’s New Orleans-inspired groove. With squeaky clean guitar tones and subtly hypnotic percussion, this track has all the hallmarks of Seattle’s deep funk scene, where Polyrhythmics cut their teeth.
Brilliant bursts of brass reveal the influence of Afrobeat legends like Fela Kuti, while the clarity and force of the recording suggests prog-rock sensibilities.
Keep an ear out for that guitar, though: its clean tone serves as an excellent test for any potential distortion in your hi-fi set-up.
Staring Into Heaven/Shining – Sour Widows (San Francisco Bay Area)
Staring Into Heaven/Shining explores Sour Widows’ co-frontwoman Susannah Thompson’s fragmented experience of grief as she tries to make sense of her mother’s death from a rare form of cancer.
Featuring warm, overdriven guitars, ’90s alt-rock inspired chord progressions and moments of heart-rending sincerity, this song is an emotional powerhouse that demands a high-fidelity system capable of capturing its intense sincerity.
Lyrics such as, “If I lay this still, we could be falling asleep, and I’m just your baby,” leave a lingering pit in the stomach, which is only deepened by the band’s cathartic, booming accompaniment.
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