Definitely the medication.
Mark
sorry, couldn’t resist
As far as other trad.(-ish) stuff goes, Kevin Burke is the man. Paddy Glackin is quite good too. Johnny B. Connolly, Tony Linnane and Noel Hill, some of Altan’s early stuff, Paul McGrattan, Conal O Grada. Iarla O Lionaird is a fine singer–his solo album was great, though I’m not really into his work with the Afro Celt Schmaltz System. For much better electronic music in a similar vein, search out Scotland’s wee prodigy Martyn Bennett.
Other things I enjoy when not listening to Irish traditional-- J.S. Bach, Dave Brubeck, Talking Heads, Joy Division, Bill Evans, Smokey Robinson, Elvis Costello, Ravel, David Bowie, Solomon Burke, Beck, The Beatles, Belle and Sebastian, Otis Redding, Burt Bacharach, Nirvana, The Shins, Nick Lowe, etc. I’m not a big Led Zepp fan, but sometimes I sing “Wanna Whole Lot Of Love” at karaoke over here when I’m trying to completely destroy my voice…
On a totally off-topic side note, I was recently listening to some Australian radio station on the web with an Aussie friend of mine when they played a string band version of Iggy Pop’s “Lust For Life.” Truly one of the most inspired and hilarious things I have ever heard. “Wellllll Ah’m jest a modern guyyyyyyy.” I think if we had more of this sort of thing, the world would truly be a better place.
Hey Sporting Pitchfork;
My friends and I have long discussed the idea of starting a lounge lizard act -lots of ruffled shirts and cheesy green sparkly jackets- that will do entirely lounge-y covers of famous old punk tunes. “Anarchy in the U.K.” a al Burt Bacharat, “Police Truck” a la Frank Sinatra, “Holiday in Cambodia” as done by Dean Martin, etc etc etc… If we ever get it up and going I’ll send you some MP3s. Heh heh heh.
Mark
As a flute player, I’m fond of Harry Bradley (Bad Turns and Horseshoe Bends, As I Carelessly Did Stray . . .), Conal O’Grada (The Top of Coom), and Paul McGrattan (Keelwest, and others).
For some incredible, not solely Irish fluting, Jean-Michel Veillon is great. I like his duet album, Beo!, and his playing with the band Kornog (whose albums are also pretty nice, a mix of Breton and other types of Celtic-ish music). Also the great Indian bansuri players: G. S. Sachdev, Hariprasad Chaurasia – wonderful control over a simple bamboo flute.
Because my wife belly-dances professionally (poor me, always surrounded by slinky dancers in tight clothing whenever we have a party . . .), I listen to a fair amount of middle eastern stuff, and really dig it. The band Turku, whose albums are available through www.cdbaby.com (I got mine there when I ordered Neillidh Mulligan’s album, and John Skelton and Kieran O’Hares flute duet album Double-Barreled ) has some nice, traditional stuff. Rachid Taha (Made in Medina, etc.) is a contemporary singer of rai songs, whose stuff rocks as groovily as anything from the West. Claude Chalhoub has some very haunting, groovy tunes on his self-titled CD: he plays middle-easterny stuff on violin, with modern touches; very rich stuff. Sasheela Rahman, a singer of Indian heritage, has a pretty nifty album out called Salt Rain; Lorenzo, if you like Shelia Chandra, you might dig Rahman. . .
Been listening to Kevin Burke’s re-released solo album, too, and his more recent live album.
Non-trad: Los Lobos is about as tight as a band gets, I think, especially on Colossalhead and Kiko. But I’m finding more and more that I can’t listen to most pop/rock albums more than a few times without getting kind of bored, so I haven’t bought much new stuff in a long time. Makes me feel out of the loop.
Then there’s all the classical stuff – I’m a former orchestral brass player – and jazz. Love that smoky jazz. And blues! Ah, the blues . . .
Thank god for music. After getting whatever grace I have kicked out of me all day at a corporate job, getting home to some tunes is surely a lifesaver.
Still gotta get me a set of pipes, one day, though. Been listening to Ronan Browne a lot lately (Touch Me if You Dare); great stuff.
Some day.
–Aaron[/i]
Thanks for the link, Aaron (Turku and Rahman)…and you poor thing, all thse belly dancers (a whole lot a shake’n going on 
).
Re. the Kevin Burke “Live” album…I was among the few (about 50 people) in attendance during that private concert. Martin Hayes played about 3 sets with him, Aidan Brennan played guitar on half the tunes, and my wife and I were sitting with Johnny B. Connelly. When it came time for Martin Hayes to join him, Martin was nowhere to be found, so I remember Kevin announcing in his gravely voice, “anyone seen a long-haired, Jewish hippie float’n around the bar anywhere?”
Pat Metheny rocks.
You cant go wrong with a bit of capercaillie, shoogelnifty and possibly a nice slice of Frankie Gavin.