Welcome to the new-comers. Anything you can contribute regarding music, instruments, singing, history, tunes, lyrics, questions, answers, comments, etc, please jump in!
The 'thread creep' (b.s. and tangents) as we call it will inevitably grow on it's own around any topic that is under discussion.
Regarding personal chat (hey, we do have a personal message system here) it is natural for some of it to creep into threads. We have the common interest of music, so I say, yeah... what Joe said.