Some music I've been enjoying lately.

Been downloading new music recently, which just reminded me that I'll be needing more storage soon. Only about 4 gigs left on this laptop's hard drive, while the desktop is still out of commission. (And that's also running out of space, in any case.) I really have to look into getting an external hard drive soon.

Iron & Wine, apart from having an awesome beard, also produced the excellent album Our Endless Numbered Days, which I've been listening to a lot these past days. A very relaxing set of songs, essentially composed just of a guitar line accompanying his hushed, delicate voice, although some have simple percussion such as shakers, while others contain faint hints of female vocal accompaniment. 

I'd have to say, though, his lyrics are what made the album for me, both in the simpler but oddly affecting songs such as Each Coming Night, to more drawn out numbers such as Passing Afternoon.

I also downloaded some jazz by pianist, composer, and bandleader (thank you, Wikipedia) Duke Ellington. More or less a random choice of musician to begin getting into jazz with, as he'd been mentioned by Murakami in his novels a few times, and his name was also otherwise vaguely familiar. I'm an uninformed listener, but I enjoyed the rhythm and the energetic, spontaneous spirit of the music. It's the type of music you can't help but bob your head or tap your foot along with, and will serve as excellent background music for a party, or, in fact, any activity you would prefer to be rendered groovy.