The 80's are playing in my head

In my headphones, it is the 1980's all over again.   I remember a time when "radio" was something you heard more or less constantly,  where people in your town called DJ's  played what they thought you might like to hear. Boy has that changed.   There has been huge consolidation in broadcast radio,  and these days the "DJ's"  for your "local station" work from offices hundreds of miles away,  if they have not been replaced by computers.   Honestly,  I can't remember the last time I heard broadcast radio.

There are certainly a lot of options for listening to music in this world 2.0  era.   A zillion years ago I used to work for Rhapsody-- in a horrible outsource customer service job,  and I remember how promising  it seemed.   More recently I became a big fan of #Pandora radio.   I liked being able to create my own channels  (though I didn't much like that pushing the Thumbs up button on a song made that song likely to play in Any of my channels) and I listened to it enough and enjoyed it enough that I paid $35  for a one year subscription to premium-- no commercials and no limits on how much you can listen.   But since stumbling into and becoming very taken with @EmpireAvenue last week,  I find myself this morning back to listening to music on YouTube.

Before signing on for #Pandora I used to listen to music on You Tube often.   After awhile the ads got to me and I got tired of having to be my own DJ.    Who doesn't dream of that perfect DJ,  never seen but always heard who somehow always knows just what you need to hear right now.  However when I found that I could get points in EA for  "liking"  videos on YouTube,   I loaded it up and started making some playlists.   The suggested songs make it easy to create playlists (though I can't for the life of me figure out how one Plays one's playlists once they are made-- I would be embarrassed to tell you the kludge I went through to get listening this morning ;)   So how do you listen to your music?   Do you pay anything?   What do you like about it?   Do you recommend it to others?