Diverse Tastes

I find myself listening to a lot of different things lately. I continue to dig Miles Davis, but more specifically I've been listening to Miles from the mid to late 50's - the Gil Evans stuff and others. Of course Kind of Blue but also Miles Ahead, Sketches of Spain, and Porgy and Bess. It's just so smooth and cool, its perfect for unwinding at the end of the day. Along the same lines, I've been digging the latest (I think) release by Diana Krall, From This Moment On. I have been familiar with her name, but had not heard much of her music and have enjoyed it. The album contains quite a few standards, including the namesake, and there are a number of arrangements that have some cool horns and swing nicely, but not too hard. She was actually on Letterman last week. (did anyone else catch Ventriloquist Week?)
When I'm in a completely different mood, I have been listening to a group my brother turned me on to, a band that could best be described as Irish Punk, Flogging Molly. Don't get carried away by the name. It comes from the fact that they used to play at an L.A. pub called Molly Malone so often that they felt like they were flogging a dead horse, and wearing out their welcome with the crowd. They feature a full complement of instruments that you would expect from traditional Irish folk music such as a violin, penny whistle, accordion, uilleann pipes and so forth but this is combined with a standard rock band and the effect is lots of fun. They get compared to the Pogues a lot but for my money are quite a bit more interesting. They even have written a few pirate songs. My brother first heard them, I believe, on the soundtrack from Mr. & Mrs. Smith, the Angelina Jolie - Brad Pitt thingy. Dave King, the lead singer/guitarist/songwriter was born in Dublin and was Catholic at least once in his life, based on some of the interesting references in his songs. It's great music in the car and very effective at drowning out the rap music coming from the next vehicle over at the stop light.
From the same general neck of the woods, inspiration-wise I also have a disc of music from the St. Thomas Episcopal High School Pipe and Drum Corps., who just returned from winning a fifth World Championship at the Highland Games in Scotland. ( I also fix their copiers) The album I have is a few years old I believe, but very good. I don't know, some people like bagpipes and some people cannot stand them. They seem to be very polarizing. And no, the disc I have has neither Amazing Grace or Scotland the Brave on it. I have a few other irons in the fire at the moment, musically but that's what's in my CD player currently. Yes I know CD players are so five minutes ago but I don't have an MP3 player yet.