Lynsey Hanley, in an excellent Guardian article, explains her gradual opening to contemporary/classical music from an exclusive diet of pop. It describes my own discovery of the world outside Metallica very well too.
I know that some people are resistant to classical music (a term I dislike), partly through a sense of rebellion, and partly because the classical world can be exclusive, smug, insular and unwelcoming, but it needn't be like that forever. Music writer Alex Ross is attacking this staid conservatism very publicly and Radio 3 (at least at night) is a playground of weirdness: try Late Junction.
Actually, I'm listening to something very calm and unexperimental at the moment: Mojave 3's Puzzles Like You - folky Americana with a very English twist, which makes me want to use words like 'dusty', 'widescreen' and 'Texas', despite never having been any closer to that stolen part of Mexico than Arkansas.
And so on to the Record of the Day. Don't worry, it's a three-track EP, Vivea by Aerial M. It dates from my obsession with post-rock, that geeky genre known in the states as math-rock because it eschewed hooks and riffs, and was loved by, well, maths fans.
I didn't know it at the time, but Aerial M was one of the many names used by David Pajo, Deity of Odd Music for Earnest Single Men With Degrees. He was in Slint as well as Tortoise, and made many appearances on records by people destined to be filed under 'cult'. Aerial M was part of his project to make loads of different-sounding music under names with M in the title: see also Papa M.
So anyway: Aerial M = earlier, American Mogwai: instrumental, thoughtful but with a steely edge, long songs expanding from simple cores, but definitely not prog.
Nothing from this EP is on Youtube (yes, I've defeated the Internet!) but here's a different track by them which gives you a flavour of their sound:
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