I had Spotify for years and years. Their recommendations got worse over time and i found myself listening to them less. And the. Almost not at all. So I cancelled. I’ve tried tidal and Deezer. Bandcamp has been ok for finding music sometimes. I’ve been checking cds out of the library more. Lots of damage to those that interferes. CD sound quality should be better than mp3. I’m considering making a physical media purchase every month or two and reducing streaming.

With my ears. Sometimes with my toes but it’s not as enjoyable.

Spotify, but considering switching back to piracy

Spotify. I know a lot of people here like having thier own collection cough arrr cough, but Spotify makes finding new music from pretty unknown artists too easy.

The weekly Monday and Friday playlists are too amazing

I use Spotify. I have some Anker Soundcore iP30 ear buds that I got for $25 through Costco. They work well enough. I was thinking about getting an MP3/DAP and managing my own library though. Spotify’s recommendations totally suck, but it’s so easy to access. However, as of late, I feel that infinite options actually limits my listening, because instead of enjoying it, I’m always looking to what’s next because it may be better.

There are really only a couple of occasions when I will.

1. When driving alone. Sometimes I will be in the mood for a podcast, but occasionally music instead. I have a single playlist of around 1600 tracks on my phone for this.
2. When my SO and I are eating at home. We both have misophonia to some degree. In my SO’s case this results in her wanting to stab anyone making chewing noises with a fork. It is slurping noises with me. To minimise the stabbing we listen to, typically, BBC R3 when eating together. Until recently we had a DAB radio for this, but reception is crap where we are nowadays, so we have a bluetooth speaker setup for our phones.

I stream my own collection (about 35K tracks) from my home laptop (at the moment) using mpd.
It’s available everywhere there’s internet 24/7.
It’s usually playing (at least in the background) whenever I’m awake.
I use tailscale to access remotely (phone/car/wherever).

In case that fails, everything is backed up and synced to the free ibroadcast.com plan.

All the time, however I can.

My collection is about 60gb, in mp3s. I have a navidrome server at home, and Tempo app in my phone. In the car, I use a 64gb thumb drive and the car stereo.

I also have about 200 CDs and 500 LPs for when I’m relaxing or cooking or cleaning.

My process involves a PC with Arch Linux (btw), .flac files, Strawberry music player, a Fiio K5 Pro DAC, and Audio Technica ATH-M50x headphones.

Bose QC Ultra headphones connected to either my phone or computer, running Plexamp and streaming music from my homeserver.

I used to listen to music, but now I only listen to podcasts.

Not sure why but I no longer feel like listening to music.

Usually while I’m working I will listen to various lofi playlists and while doing housework I will listen to my favourite songs list or when I’m traveling by train. I do all this with Spotify.

In the highest quality available with an external USB DAC and studio monitors. Usually I listen to music alone; I don’t like blasting music on speakers unless I’m in my car.

Navidrome is my goto. Even has apps for iOS and Android, not native though. Don’t ask me where all the mo3s on my server come from, they just appear there.

Through a few community radio stations. I’ve long been a volunteer DJ for one in my region. Tune into the shows that I resonate with. Awesome to hear what some actual folks have curated for the week. Discover lots of new music that way and also through research into what I’d like to play on the next show.