I love music, but I also like to travel. During a recent jaunt across the pond, I spent some time in England, Ireland and Scotland. Possibly the most rewarding, inspiring and memorable part of any trip is interacting with people that have experienced life from a different vantage point than your own. This includes the local education of music.For example, while chowing down on a delicious pot of mussels at the Mussel Inn in Edinburgh, Scotland, the most incredibly chill electronic music softly hummed in the background. Inquiring about the artist to our funky alt waitress yielded a wealth of information regarding Archive, a UK-based group falling along the lines of Portishead or Faithless, but without the big beats of the latter...down tempo stuff that was perfect for the environment and the ambiance. I immediately bought their "Londinium" album (which was playing during my dinner) and followed it up by the slightly less provocative "You All Look The Same To Me". I have also been surprised after listening to Londinium to find that some Archive songs have been featured in film soundtracks that I probably never would have recognized had I not ate at that restaurant at the moment in time.When one traveller meets another, much is shared about what they have experienced in their journeys. In Scotland I met a college age guy from Vermont (virtually a neighbor!) who had brought some Ocean Colour Scene double-CD from England. We went out drinking and so on, and he was going on and on about them, even at one point comparing and contrasting them to the Beatles! Not sure if they warrant such an association, but after giving their material a listen, I was hooked! Their songs range from radio-ready pop hits to wandering journeys of a musical quality I had thought long dead from my American-top-40-radio-rubbish based perspective.I returned home from my trip with some great memories, excellent photos and even better music. Since my trip, the Chinese/Scottish singer KT Tunstall has hit the airwaves with some of the best female vocal capabilities and moving songwriting since Canadian singer/songwriter Sarah McLachlan, proving once again that sometimes you really have to scour the earth to find quality music that pleases the ear and lifts the heart and soul.As the music front here at home has become so utterly polluted with mashed up hip-hop samples and looped vocals, it's getting harded to find real good music. I hope this post serves as a reminder to look behind us for those gems we might have passed by, while we wait for the next quality artist to hit the airwaves.Happy 2007 my fellow moggers!--afpjr