What are you listening to?

I've had Sia's 'Some People Have Real Problems' for about 6 months now, and it's a lovely album to come back to after a while. She's got a lovely voice that you never really heard much of with the Zero 7 stuff.

I dunno - maybe I listen differently, but as I wrote just now - I think she's better with Z7.

Try and get hold of some of the Zero 7 EPs if you can - tracks like 'Spinning', 'Salt Water Sound' and 'Monday Night' are sublime.

Cool - will look around... might start going back to record fairs 'n stuff like that, gave up when it was all getting expensive for me and I was buying lots of crap on vinyl that I wasn't really interested in (anyone want an Ulanbator 12"?). I'd be much more discerning these days. I hate downloading stuff where poss - need to feel the music in my hands!

Depending on how you like your downtempo stuff (electronic or guitar), I can heartily recommend:

Toymaker - The Kindergarten. Lovely electronic stuff that unfortunately keeps getting compared to the earlier Air stuff, when it's actually a sound all of its own.

Ullrich Schnauss - Some beautiful tracks on any of his albums, but I'm enjoying 'Far Away Trains Passing By' and 'Goodbye' at the moment. I listen to a lot of Boards of Canada, so this is probably best described as a more musical version of their stuff.

Sebastien Tellier for obvious reasons...

Naoki Kenji - Versatile. More electronic stuff, but it helps if you've had a really shitty ride home to stick this on.

Cool - I'll preview some of the above over the next few weeks. Cheers.

The problem with stuff like Zero 7 is that it's so unique - I've been looking for similar sounds for years now and haven't found anything that's quite there, but it's been fun wading through a huge pile of good music to get there...

Ditto... :)