This year, the Brit Awards is going to be hosted in Manchester – the first ceremony outside London in its 50-year history. However, judging from the nominees, you’d think the city was cut off from the world in 1997. Zero Manchester artists will perform, and the only Manchester artist even up for an award is Noel Gallagher, who has already won Songwriter of the Year despite writing no songs in the last 365 days. Now, Manchester isn’t owed any nominations, and it would be ambitious to campaign for, say, Blackhaine or Andy Stott to get a performance nod. But there is no better time to celebrate the rich consolidation of scenes in the city.

Manchester is known for its eternal grey skies, but I like to think of them as silver. That sheen seems to seep into the city’s atmosphere and its most exciting new music, stretching from the industrial edges of Salford to the sleepier indie shops of Stockport. In its recent history, Manchester’s venue setup has become one-of-a-kind, giving the city this elusive quality that fascinates and perplexes outsiders. There is, of course, the White Hotel, which one TikToker hilariously described as a Call of Duty: Zombies map turned into a nightclub, which has become a bedrock for experimental artists and niche club nights over the past 10 years. That same energy can be found in different regions of the city, from drinkers like the ever-changing Peste in Ancoats, to the Peer Hat in Northern Quarter and Cafe Blah in Withington.

Meanwhile, Manchester’s nightclubs are changing the conversation about UK nightlife, such as the phone-free Amber’s and BYOB student gaff XLR. Then there are record shops like Eastern Bloc, Haunted Dancehall, SK1 in Stockport and the online encyclopaedia Boomkat. These places, sounds and people are far away from the outdated prescribed mainstream image of the Hacienda, Oasis and John Cooper Clarke, and slowly, the perception of a city out of time is changing. Yet, with the fast development of residential high-rises instead of affordable housing, coupled with a renters’ crisis, many are enjoying it all as though it could vanish tomorrow.

The current sound of Manchester’s underground exists in many different, and often interconnected, corners. Below, we’ve picked acts from five of them – these are obviously not the only five sonic corners of the city, just those that are taking hold at this very moment.

RAT HEART

Tom Boogizm is widely regarded as one of Manchester’s most adventurous DJs, once playing for 10 hours straight at his $hotta Rave party. His solo project, Rat Heart, reveals the other side of that esotericism, funnelling what feels like his entire record collection through the River Irwell. Early releases sound as if Prince had made Dirty Mind while holidaying in Detroit’s pioneering techno clubs. Skip past a few Kanye and Drake freestyles, and you’ll land on the ice-dried flamenco guitar of “The Done A Number On Us”.

Rat Heart fully flourished with last year’s Dancin’ in the Streets LP, stripping things back to their starkest form yet. Boogizm has an evasive, piss-taking streak – he rarely gives interviews and favours titles like “Ratty Rids The Clubs From The Evil Curse Of The Private School DJ’s” – but sink into the bleak gallop of the piano on “Not 2Nite”, twining with night-calling electric guitar, grime-soaked gulps and Causa Kandemir’s smouldering vocals, and that façade falls away.

RENZNIRO

In one of the most distinctive developments in UK rap, local artists like Blackhaine and roop draw on Manchester ambient to set the stage for drugged-out, confrontational storytelling, occupying the same weightless space as Space Afrika, Demdike Stare, Kop-Z and LINTD. Rapper and producer RenzNiro looks to bridge the HS2-sized gap between this sound and the London-centred UK Ug scene.

Placing propulsion beneath beds of thin strings, padded chords and reversed vocals, he raps as if trying to lift the weight of the world from his shoulders, recalling early Chip, or Wiley at his most motivational. His exacting gaze lends his voice gravity, as when he smacks his lips and inhales before declaring, “I gotta keep my cards close to my chest / I can’t ever waste a word,” on the trudge-stepping “SIXTEEN”. A recent performance at Stoller Hall, backed by a live string ensemble, makes his ambitions unmistakably clear.

SHELL COMPANY

The walk home from the White Hotel to the city centre, with its broken glass, security dogs and flickering streetlamps, is really the red carpet for Manchester’s music rats. Spoken-word post-rock trio Shell Company make music seemingly for this route. Frontwoman Rosabella Allen’s poetry sounds like it’s being recited through an old payphone, propping tales of decaying relationships with details of dirty tunnels, brightening clouds and empty bus stops. “I can no longer adorn my life with you,” she deadpans on “Adorn” as the instrumental echoes like a dream pop song that’s been hollowed out and heatlamped. Shell Company has released three EPs so far, including one of deadpan duets with Lisbon-based poet Older Brother. But like 4AD collective This Mortal Coil, their music is linked by a sense of stillness amongst the noise, noodling and nocturnal poetry. It’s 5am somewhere.

YYRE

Yyre pulls together delirious 160 BPM sets of jungle, breakcore, footwork and speed-boosted grime in a way that only the 2020s could make sense of. As one of the original founders of Tough Act – a White Hotel-based club night built around queer aggression, hardcore rave and deep-fried shitposts – Yyre flipped the script by playing the sounds that weren’t being heard at Manchester’s queer nights. That it became such a beloved party is a testament to the scene’s capacity to embrace new ideas, supported by gracious venues like the Derby Brewery Arms and Soup.

Since the party’s closure, Yyre still consistently enthrals while staying in a tight BPM range. Their philosophy is that “there’s no tune that doesn’t sound better sped up by 25 per cent”, and they’ll leave you panting – for breath, and for more.

SILVERWINGKILLER

With just a single EP to their name, SILVERWINGKILLER have already become one of the best live bands in the city. Raising merry hell with little more than a drum kit, a laptop and a mic, the duo whip a blizzard from the caustic squelches, overblown IDM jitters and happy hardcore melodies of 90s rave. It engulfs vocalist Yushang Ni as she bellows one-line hooks like, “Stick with who you are / just don’t fuck with my desire,” on “ROOF ON FIRE (X OVER9000)”.

With vocalist Yushang Ni coming from Shanghai and counterpart James Baca hailing from Peterborough, SILVERWINGKILLER embody the transplant energy that makes Manchester such fertile ground for unlikely teamups. Buoyed by the international success of artists like Mandy, Indiana, club-adjacent bands redlining on electronics have become de rigueur in the city – count fellow upstarts Another Country $ and Crimewave among them. We’re spoiled up here.