Buist and Larson grew up in musical families, released their first two albums while in high school, hired percussionist Michael Dause in 2014, and began touring nationally.

[6] Larson recalled that a key encounter that inspired her and Buist to pursue a professional music career was when they attended a school workshop by the Moxie Strings, which was the first time they had seen a female duo playing electrified orchestral instruments in a popular style.

[7] In 2012, they auditioned and won a spot in the first-ever singer-songwriter major at the renowned Interlochen Center for the Arts high school, where they formally created The Accidentals.

Larson had developed a music video for a demo of her original song "The Temptation of St. Anthony" as her senior year stop-motion animation project.

Most notably, war-themed closing track "Blessed" was produced and mixed in Bloomington by Zero Boys' Paul Mahern, who previously worked with artists such as Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp.

[14] Increased production values and stronger songwriting developments brought the band a broader acclaim than their previous, fully self-produced work in Bittersweet, garnering the attention of multiple publications.

[21] Throughout 2013 and 2014, the duo kept busy gaining renown by opening for artists such as Brandi Carlile, Andrew Bird, Dar Williams, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Sixto Rodriguez (Sugar Man), The Duhks, Aunt Martha, Rosco Bandana, and Lauren Mann.

[28] During the tour, the Accidentals performed alongside Ben Sollee at Chicago's City Winery[29] and with The Wailers at the Orbit Room in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

[30] They had their first headlining show at renowned folk music venue The Ark on June 7, 2015, after the tour,[31] as well as at Electric Forest and Blissfest's respective 2015 iterations.

[32] On August 25, 2015, Marshall Crenshaw joined the Accidentals for their first-ever live joint performance during the final Tuesday Evening Music Club show of the summer at Meijer Gardens.

Post-show, Crenshaw praised a "precocious" Accidentals for their engaging live technique, saying in a statement to the Michigan music publication Local Spins, "They're killer.

[36] The Accidentals later spoke with NPR on its Weekend Edition, during which Buist detailed the developmental process of "Michigan and Again", which began after a recommendation from a friend of the band to write a song about their home state.

[39] The EP includes the titular "Parking Lot", as well as a remixed version of the song featuring rapper Rick Chyme that they call "FRAP", or "folk-rap".

It's a wonderful thing, to be sure, but when you have brains, musical talent, enthusiasm and the ability to connect with a growing fan base through the monster method of social media and viral videos, there's no telling how far you can go", and that "The Accidentals certainly didn't happen by accident.

"[44] On January 9, 2017, the band announced that they were signed to Sony Masterworks via a feature in Local Spins, and they said they were looking forward to releasing the album internationally sometime during the spring of the same year.

[45] The band announced that the album would feature multiple guest performers, including Jack White bassist Dominic John Davis, Jenny Conlee of The Decemberists, Keller Williams, Kaki King, Lily & Madeleine, and Carbon Leaf.

"[57] In December 2017, ABC News named Odyssey one of the best albums of 2017,[58] and Michael Blalas of Huffington Post put the Accidentals at Number 2 on his "Best of Music List in 2017", after Aimee Mann.

[62] Larson insisted that the band's goal in releasing the song before the election was to avoid a "divisive message" and instead to encourage "everyone to become more aware, more informed and participate".

[65] In late 2018, Buist and Larson played a series of collaborative shows with fellow singer-songwriters Beth Nielsen Chapman and May Erlewine,[66] and the full band recorded a song in Cleveland, Ohio with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra.

[89] One music commentator who discovered the "Daily Breather" series put it on his best-of-year list and said of it: "The stories, the calmness and the compassion gave my mind sanity in an insane time.

[93][95] The song "Anyway" was co-written with Tom Paxton, "Might As Well Be Gold" with Maia Sharp, "Night Train" with Dar Williams, and "All Shall Be Well" with Mary Gauthier and Jaimee Harris.

[102] The magazine said that the song "nimbly walks the lines between angular post-punk and jangly Americana" and has a chorus with "the bittersweet spirit of Nineties alt-rock".

[87] Around the time Vessel was released, the band embarked on a tour from Michigan to the East Coast and Southeast US with co-headlining singer-songwriter Sawyer Fredericks.

[113] In early March 2023, the band released the full-length album Time Out containing the songs from the two previous EPs and played a series of intimate shows "in the round" with Mary Bragg, Gary Burr, and Georgia Middleman.

[125] The album, which Local Spins said was "long-awaited",[126] grew out of the band's "Play Your Paragon" video series,[127] which started in 2020 and featured cover versions of songs by women.

[131] Jim Linderman of the Dull Tool and Dim Bulb blog referred to them in 2014 as "the best unsigned band in America" and "tastefully eccentric", adding: "They pack performing space with a multi-generational mix.

"[132] In 2015 the band delved into blues, rock and roll and hip-hop musicality, as can be heard in songs such as "Trouble"[133] and "Parking Lot",[134] as well as in collaborations with artists such as Rick Chyme.

"[3] Growing up in musical families, including professional pianists for fathers and vocalists for mothers, Larson's and Buist's influences bounced between jazz, country, classical, bluegrass, alternative rock and the obscure.

[138] Their self-described "all over the place" list of influences in 2015 included Andrew Bird, Stéphane Grappelli, Arcade Fire, Death Cab for Cutie, St. Vincent, Django Reinhardt, Sufjan Stevens, The Appleseed Collective,[139] and The National.

In a "20 Questions" feature with PopMatters in 2017, the duo cited additional influences as topmost inspirations to their craft including Kimya Dawson, Patti Smith, Caroline Shaw, David Bowie, Freddie Mercury, and Brian May.