Nature Walk

Ever since romantic poet William Wordsworth looked on nature and heard the "still, sad music of humanity" many others have drawn on the same source of inspiration . . . and produced music like this. Without doubt, there's more than a hint of melancholy in the rippling, echoing harmonies of Fleet Foxes on "Blue Ridge Mountains," but the vibe is pure, sunlit optimism when Coldplay gets a hold of a zither on "Life In Technicolor" before unleashing an awesome storm of wave-cresting euphoria. Rufus Wainwright, on the other hand, treads lightly through "Pretty Things." Birds of a feather flock to . . . Next Steps.

The naturalists among you will know that Texan psych-folk outfit Shearwater named itself after a seabird . . . and as it turns out, frontman Jonathan Meiburg took graduate studies in ornithology, but there's a hint of the conflict between man and nature in "The Hunter's Star." Talk Talk's "New Grass," from 1991's post-rock landmark Laughing Stock, has an entrancing, organic feel, while self-styled "countrypolitan" band Hem takes us to "Eveningland." Daniel Lanois matches his guitar to his subject on the glinting but ephemeral "Ice." We sell sea songs by the seashore: repeat . . . then head to Deep Cuts.

Our nature walk takes a turn up the coastal path here, as Let's Go Sailing casts off with "Sideways," and Sun Kil Moon captures a sparkling horizon with the fleeting acoustic fingerwork of "Ocean Breathes Salty." Justin Rutledge wraps "Come Summertime" in soft, alt-country swaddling, and while there's nothing inherently rustic about the fabricated sounds of electronica, Boards of Canada use synths as a bridge to the natural world on "Hey Saturday Sun" and Ulrich Schnauss treats "As If You've Never Been Away" as an unfolding landscape.

Music. Nature. The two belong together. Patterns of sound in the natural world — the very rhythms of life — existed long before the first minstrel picked up a guitar and sent his own notes and tones back out into the universe; and with nature as inspiration, mankind has always felt an unquenchable urge to create order from the world's limitless possibilities, via harmony and melody. So here we offer you a bunch of artists who have spent quality time wandering woods, walking seashores, and roaming fields . . . before returning to the studio with a headful of blossoming ideas. This, fellow nature lovers, is where you'll find a full complement of 100-percent natural songsmiths, from Band of Horses to Department of Eagles.