The Range, the one-man electronic-pop act created by 27-year-old musician James Hinton, seeks out a cappella and spoken-word samples from obscure corners of YouTube, then incorporates them into his intricate instrumentals. It requires a lot of time online, watching amateurs sing their hearts out. Some of their unflinching, disarmingly emotional vocals landed on the Range's critically exalted second album, Potential, which arrived earlier this year, and for which Hinton spent "something like 200 hours on YouTube over about 35 days," he says. "I'm not ashamed of the number, but that's a lot of YouTube."

While making Potential, Hinton wondered about the lives of those performers—all of them amateurs, with videos boasting view-counts no higher than the triple digits. "The classic 'YouTube success story' is usually someone who, in reality, has a lot of private support and a lot of backing," says Hinton.