It was at university that I started off broadening my musical tastes. In my first year I discovered Moby - indeed my friends and I managed to see him on his Play tour at Newcastle Uni (v. small venue). 2 Months later he'd hit the big time and was filling Wembley Arena. My second year had me introduced to the entire Pink Floyd back catalogue, but I'm still not sure what all the fuss over Dark Side of the Moon is all about. One legend that does appear to hold water is that of the strange syncronisation between DSOTM and the 1930s MGM film The Wizzard of Oz; multiple sites about this have been set up but here's a good one.
My third year saw me introduced to the fantastic Ben Folds Five. Sadly no longer together, although the eponymous Ben Folds still releases albums, eps and his tours are still in very high demand.
All new to me, but still very commercial music and most people will have at least at 1 if not more of these albums. I've also found myself listening to the same albums over and over. I've got about 10gigs of music on my iPod but kept finding that the same albums get played again and again - I'd hit a rut.
My breakthrough came about 6 months ago when I got hold of the soundtrack to a small indie film called Garden State. I've been a huge fan of Zach Braff after his performance on the excellent Scrubs show. In fact, Braff wrote directed and starred in the film. To say it is a good debut film is an understatement - if you haven't seen it I urge you to check it out - especially if you are in your 20s. The soundtrack features a very eclectic mix af artists: from the well known Simon & Garfunkel and Coldplay to fringe artists such as Zero 7 and Nick Drake and most interestingly, little known artists such as Colin Hay, The Shins and Cary Brothers. Fans of Scrubs will probably have heard all these acts as the music in Scrubs is also fantastic.
Colin Hay is the former front man of 80s group Men At Work, best known for there massive hit Down Under. Since the band split, Colin has gone solo and now produces some fantastic simple acoustic music. I've ordered the albums Man at Work and the US version of Going Somewhere.
Cary Brothers, remarkably seems to still be not signed. This is dispite appearing on the above mentioned soundtracks (3 songs have appeared on Scrubs). He currently has a 4 song ep out called All the Rage and later this month releases the follow up ep Waiting For Your Letter, the title track of which can be downloaded from Brothers' own site.
So thanks to the show Scrubs and Zach Braff's wide ranging Graden State OST I've finally managed to pull myself out of my musical rut.
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