Ask Lemmy

Anymore there are a few songs on yt that I listen to that I haven't downloaded. Otherwise it's mostly all local files on my devices. File type varies.

Otherwise, I have a bunch of CDs that I can either play using my desktop or battery hog of an old Discman. Pros for desktop is I have access to my higher quality bluetooth headphones and can move and do other things whole listening. Pros for the CD player is I have an old pair of 90s in ear Sony headphones that came with it.

Couldn't tell you a particular group for a favorite band right now since I've been listening to a fair bit of 90s ( basically all my CDs ) when it comes to most of the band music I've been listening to.

Tidal, though I've quit payments so when this month runs out I'll switch to try out Qobuz. Before that I was on Spotify since it was invite-only until a few years ago when I had enough of the CEO Daniel Ek complete disrespect for artists that make him a billionaire. Before that I was sailing the seas for many years. Before that I bought CDs. Before that I bought LPs.

Generally I stream music using Qobuz because at least its more ethical than Spotify AFAIK, paying their artists better rates and not (yet) bricking their physical products (Car Thing).

I'll otherwise download music using spotdl and my old Spotify playlists, but I don't enjoy pirating myself. I mainly do this for players without internet like my MP3 player and my car's head unit that only works with iPods or mass storage.

I've been getting into records recently but this is a novelty thing for me.

I used to use Spotify, but got tired of the bullshit they were doing. Now I run my own navidrome server and use feishin for desktop and Symfonium for mobile.

I buy vinyl for older albums (or current favourite artists I follow that release LPs), and all my digital purchases are through Bandcamp. I host everything (flac or mp3 files) on a Navidrome server and stream from that.

vinyl

Spotify + FLACs ripped from CDs and Bandcamp + Vinyls.

Download via newpipe/ tubular, buy used CDs. I occasionally also use https://www.music-map.com/ to discover new artists.
Dont really have a favorite artist, but im currently listening to a lot of irie revoltes just because i went to a concert of them semi-recently

In my phone you can create a sound profile that equalizes the music to what you can hear using a hearing test. It's a game changer for listening to music day to day, everything sounds better. Even my cheap headphones sound good.

I use youtube music, and it's alright.

I like to change it up. I'll listen to USBs on my stereo, or on my phone with earphones. I listen to USBs which have mp3s from all over the place, YouTube, Radio Garden, and regular radio (on a stereo where you have to manually tune it to a station). I'm constantly unearthing new music, and music that's new to me.

I download the song once using yt-dlp, then I use Musicbrainz Picard to fetch song metadata like author, cover, title, year etc... Then I listen 100% offline in any mp3 player app.

I send my songs encrypted to pCloud free tier (gpg) just to keep a backup somewhere else.

In other words, not a single online service on earth know what I'm listening to.

On the phone I use Metro, from f-droid. At home I like to play the few vinyls I have from time to time.

Stored tunes on my phone via BT headphones.

Source: I have downloaded music through a torrent, I haven't done this for many years.

Mostly, I find music on Youtube and download that with an Android frontend such as PipePipe.

In order of percentage time spent

Streaming service (probably about half the time), Radio (maybe about 20%), Vinyl (say 15%), legal downloads and dubious legality via Plex (about equally 5%)

Some of what I listen to is kinda niche I guess, so I like to support the artist with a purchase (vinyl or Bandcamp download) where I can

Edit: typo

Primarily Spotify, mixed in with SoundCloud and YouTube for live sets.

.mp3 + Gapless (on desktop) / Gramophone (Mobile)

Spotify, but thinking about switching to hosting my music locally

for streaming, Soma.fm. for everything else, ripped CD's and mp3s/flac I've found all over the internet that I've collected for 20 something years. I use jellyfin and a VPN to listen to my stuff from my phone.

Qobuz

Used to be Spotify, now Tidal. Would prefer Qobuz, but it's significantly more expensive on the family tier.

Usually on headphones, og on HEOS via tidal connect - or, I would have preferred that, but it's super broken, so now from the tidal integration (not connect) on a wiiim...

Primarily streaming, although I have a digital media player loaded with tons of FLACs that I use when I'm out and about or in the garden.

I also have a growing record collection of about 100 or so records so I do listen to a lot of records when I'm home.

I don't really have a favourite band, it changes depending on what I feel like but currently I've been listening to

• Thornhill
• Gojira
• King gizzard and the lizard wizard
• Tool
• Animals as leaders
• Smashing pumpkins
• Catslash
• Lorn
• Fcukers

I just browse Soundcloud and YouTube. Maybe I'm unusual but I don't like listening to the same things over and over unless I am feeling mercurial enough to put a track on loop, so the sites and channels where I can find a lot of new artists in quick succession work the best for me.

Heres some YouTube channels to find music on

Strange Music Inc
Epitaph Records
Spinnin' Records
Nuclear Blast Records
CloudKid
Fueled By Ramen
Metropolis Records
XKitoMusic
MrMoMMusic
MonstercatUncaged
Rock Montage
Cleopatra Records

and if you don't have a YT Alternative who can play all uploads then there are extensions for it.

Tidal

YT Revanced, and the algo shows me a bop here and there too, like 80s Japanese jazz!

revanced youtube music. i started collecting stuff in a youtube playlist a long time ago, and at this point i't be quite a hassle to switch, so i always put it off. also, you can't really beat the simplicity of discovering a song through the algorithm and instantly having available on all devices without having to faff around with downloading it to a selfhosted insert service

Spotify, though I'm not thrilled about it.

Until there's a pirate streaming/download service that recommends similar songs/artists, I don't think I'll switch.

RIP Spotube :(