Every now and then, I notice something about myself that I hadn't realized before. Occasionally, it's some glaring personality trait that needs to be changed or an article of clothing; maybe a strange glowing lump that speaks appears on my forehead... you know, those everyday little things that crop up?

Well, I was looking through my Last.fm library last week and noticed that there had been a kind of surge in the number of Johns in my list. Not that I purposely select my listening material based on first names, but it is a little eerie.

The big, standouts are guys like John Mayer, John Scofield, John Flansburg & John Linnell of They Might Be Giants fame, and of course, Johnny Cash. Continuum and Try! have been a staple of the iPod in recent weeks, and I found Legend of Cash volume 1 and vol. 2 at the library (when I was picking up the reserved copies of No! and Here Come the 1,2,3's).

Scofield's album of Ray Charles covers, That's What I Say, has been a favorite of mine since it came out last year, and I really liked what he did on Out Louder... oh, John Medeski would be another addition to the list! Combustication takes me to good places, and like TMBG, Medeski Martin and Wood recently did a cool kid's album - Let's Go Everywhere - which featured a funkily twisted cover of I've Been Everywhere, bringing us back to Cash!

It's a grand old Web o' Johns, isn't it?

That isn't even the end of it. Jonathan Coulton hasn't lost his charm; if anything, I'm increasingly impressed with him the more I listen. The kids ask for Code Monkey all the time (and Creepy Doll freaked out my Goosebumps-loving 9-year-old), and I just found out what I'm Your Moon was about, and fell in love with that one.

How many more could there be? Well, you did ask... I checked out the new John Hiatt, since WTMD was talking up his Hot August Blues appearance. John Petrucci, as in the guitarist from Dream Theater, is on a renewed ascendancy on my playlist. Heck, I've even noticed a Johnette (as in Napolitano, the singer from Concrete Blonde) lurking about on there.

John Coltrane is kind of a given; I've been listening to Blue Train a lot, though not often on a scrobble-friendly medium. If I really started to dig, I wonder how many exciting, embarrassing, or unexpected Johns I might run into? Mellencamp? Bon Jovi? Adams?

Just goes to show, patterns emerge in the strangest of places. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to use the... um, you know.