When you ask a lot of people for musical suggestions, you’re going to get a huge steaming pile of music. This was the point of my original request and I’d like to than everyone who took the time to respond to my request.

I lost count at ~200 bands. It was at that time I realized there was no way I was going to listen to all of that music in a reasonable amount of time, so I began to randomly select songs out of the comments. Yes, this means your song may not have been perused and I apologize, but we’re talking about hours and hours of potential music listening. Add to that fact that I intended to pay for my music whenever possible and you’ll appreciate my selection criteria.

Anyhow, I ended up with 58 songs on the list. In order to give them each a fair shake, I listened them to a few times using the handy My Rating feature in iTunes to rank and re-rank songs. As of today, I had 11 songs which had 4 or 5 stars.

A couple of comments before I point you at what I consider to be decent music:

• I really don’t like Bjork or anything Bjork. I realize she’s edgey and revolutionary, but I simply find her annoying. Anything which sound Bjorky was instantly disqualified.
• I’m disappointed with my final 11 because, on the whole, they reflected my musical taste. One would expect this to occur, but I was hoping to end up with a list of music that sounded nothing like what I normally listened to. Sigh. Hard to break old habits.

Ok, so some good music you should purchase.

Best Band: The Postal Service. I ended with several of their songs in the final 11 because I appreciate their sound. After a couple of plays, I realized they reminded of light airy sound of The Dream Academy. Two songs to buy: This Place is a Prison and Nothing Better.

Best Australia Joni Mitchell (And/or Cat Stevens) Replacement. The Waifs. Bridal Train is a phenomenally catchy tune.

Best Song You’ve Already Heard. This song didn’t come from Boiling Point feedback, but I saw the video on MTV (ahem) and needed to own this song. Fall Out Boy’s Sugar, We’re Going Down Swinging fulfills all my adrenaline requirements and the video needs watching.

And three other songs I have to mention:

• Such Great Heights, Iron & Wine
• Warm Sound, Zero 7
• California One / Youth and Beauty, The Decemberists

Honorable Mention goes to Stereolab’s Lo Boob Oscillator simply because it’s something I liked that sounded like nothing I’ve heard. Also, great song name bonus points.

And the prestigious award of a “Song which Rands Happened to Like a Lot” goes to Electric Six’s Danger! High Voltage. In the vein of the prior selection, I picked this song because it was so different from much of my other music. Moath will the proud owner of a signed copy of the Joel’s Best of Software Writing I book as soon as he/she sends me a shipping address.

Thanks again to all who sent suggestions. I’ll continue to happily comb through the entries looking for further musical nuggets