A multitude of bits and pieces this evening.

• I’m not sure if this is a phenomenon, but I found myself checking out someone else’s iPod on the Metro the other day. You know, just to see what they were listening to. Call it “iPod snooping.” I got the song, “Contact,” but not the artist. Was it Phish? Was it the Police? I’ll never know. On a related note, I got my first good look at a Kindle this evening. The guy was reading the Washington Post on it.

• Hodgson has an interview up with Steve Vai. On improvisation:

Improvising, most of it is listening – responding to what’s coming into your ears and letting your fingers move in an unobstructed way. And there are all these little flashes that are just comfortable visuals, like you’re hearing something and you know that there’s a particular scale or note or atmosphere or chord that’s going to work.

• Metro shuffle: XTC, “The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead,” followed by “My Bird Performs.” Those tunes just bring me back to the 90s.

• FT’s Techblog on Shazam, a “mobile phone music discovery” service that apparently is attracting venture money. Can’t say I’m familiar at all with the company. Maybe I’ll check out their iPhone app. Don’t cost nuthin’.

• Bldgblog links to a blogger who captures “the internal sounds of WWII bunkers,” including some freaky pigeon noises.