Joshua Radin - Simple Times - Sky, Brand New Day, You Got Growin Up To Do (featuring Patty Griffin)

All in all a really great album, but those three songs I find particularly catchy. I find it hard to write, or read with lyrical music in general, but this album somehow breaks that rule (I wrote a couple of my very final seminary papers to this album). It's got a pleasant, folky, productive feel to it.

Two Star Symphony - Danse Macabre ...

My favorite sermon writing music is a station that I have created on Pandora Radio, seeded with the soundtrack by Clint Mansell from the movie "The Fountain." I get all kinds off eerie orchestral music, and I love it. This song "The 9th Level" popped up sounding like it had come from a Tim Burton film, but it took a lot of digging to find anything about it, or the band. I clicked the "buy it on Amazon" link Amazon didn't have anything by "Two Star Symphony." This of course made them all the more intriguing. After finding the official website/blog I found that this track was written as part of the "sophisticated and dark puppetry art (theater) in the three-part collaboration, Danse Macabre."

The Rapture - Pieces of the People We Love - Get Myself Into It

If you're looking for something with some notable grove goin' on, check out The Rapture. The whole album's really quite good within the genre.

Chris Clouse - Chimera - Upside Down, Ever so Wrong

The Lowest of the Low - Shakespeare my Butt

Tom Smith - And They Say I've Got Talent - Talk Like A Pirate Day

The best nerd inspired pirate themed song ever written.

Great Big Sea - The Hard And The Easy - Captain Kidd

I've moved on the Pirate genre.

James Newton Howard - Lady In The Water (soundtrack)

I realize my first three rec's were all soundtracks, but I've been writing a TON of papers for seminary, and I can't do lyrics when writing. I'll move on to a different genre now.

Klaus Badelt - Rescue Dawn (soundtrack)

Haven't seen the film yet, but I love the soundtrack. Amazon recommended it to me based on a couple of other CD purchases I had made. They were right.

Clint Mansell - The Fountain (Soundtrack)

Amazing movie. Amazing soundtrack. The Kronos Quartet is heavily featured in this soundtrack. They were also featured (slightly less so) in another Clint Mansell soundtrack, "Requiem for a Dream", also directed by Darron Aronofsky.