I'm in the process or moving, far too slowly as it happens, to Cardiff - or Caerdydd to give it its native tongue name - capital of Wales, the land of my mother's fathers, the land of song.

So, MySpace Exploration will be a short orbit this time.

There's nothing scientific in MySpace, this won't prove anything about the health of the music scene in Europe's youngest capital; people lie about their locations in cyberspace. Since I've set up my page numerous spammers have offered me tricks to boost my profile views and song plays, so all I can do is ramble at random around that tough little port city.

Doctor Watson started the Sherlock Holmes canon by describing London as a cesspool for the British Empire into which all the loafers eventually drained. In some ways Cardiff serves the same purpose for Wales, still overwhelmingly a rural country.

Cardiff, or Carediv to give it its local pronunciation, has an accent all of its own, is a football city in a rugby country and is tough and blue collar capital of the South Wales valleys in a country best known as a dreaming, poetic land of misty-eyed melancholics.

A good place to start is the home of The Loft Studios; they're based in the city's snazzy new Bay, a regenerated docklands packed with restaurants and bars, the stunning Millennium Centre concert hall and the Senate that houses the centre of devolved Welsh government.

There's an ever-revolving selection of the acts they've worked with - including a fair smattering of Welsh language acts.

My current favourite there is the dreamy psych-pop of Mesa, whose "Aikon" is a thing of great beauty.

Singing in Welsh is a political act; it's commercial suicide in a way but the survival of the mother-tongue in Wales has been a hard-fought battle and plays a huge role in the idea of Wales' independent national identity.

The neighbours haven't always been friendly and even into this century wiping out the language was a policy - my Nain and Taid (grandmother and grandfather) grew up when it was commonplace for children to be beaten by teachers for speaking their first language in school.

Sadly, I don't speak more than a few words but it is a beautiful, mellifluous tongue, and Mesa's dream-pop showcases its musicality.

Now, I haven't listened to drum and bass for quite a long time now - the rattling was too much, but in High Contrast I round some I could really get along with very nicely; he hasn't neglected the tunes you see. "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" could sit very nicely on any gangster soundtrack with its cleverly manipulated vocal sample. "Eternal Optimist" lives soulfully up to its title and while this is dance music, it is indubitably listenable dance music.