I use an alternative to Spotify called "a folder full of mp3s". If you are into selfhosting you could also stream your collection using Navidrome but putting audio files on your phone works as well. If you need a recommendation algorithm you can sync your listens to listenbrainz.org or lastfm. There are quite a few Linux audio players that support the scrobble API.

I quit Tidal because even they have BS Ai Albums/Bands/"Singers".

Fuck SUNO.

Granted Tidal doesn't randomly start adding/playing them, you'd have to play them, but adding them to recent/growing playlists is BS too IMHO.

Anyway checkout TIDAL Hi-Fi For Tidal + HiFi on Linux.

I'm back to just using Shortwave to record radio station tracks to grow my own local self hosted music cloud now.

Not giving my $$$$ towards enabling Ai slop.

I don't have a great answer to your questions, but thanks for trying to support us during these dark times.

I've been using the web player for Qobuz, and it appears to allow for high quality output--I'm streaming at 24bit/96kHz at the moment (though I'm no audiophile, so I guess I can't confirm that's what I'm actually getting).

And apparently Qobuz pays the most per track of any streaming service, which is cool. The only thing it doesn't have is customizable "radio", but otherwise it's solid.

The what ads???

I gave up on native client for a couple things. So instead of downloading someone else's electron packaging I use the web app shortcut using Firefox to fake that qobuz is an actual app.

It's a thing on Linux Mint, not sure about your distro. You can choose icon, and make location bar visible or not. No tabs, it doesn't get mixed with other Firefox tabs, and that is it.

Honestly, while I still use Apple Music for some things (I don't like Apple, but I'm unfortunately stuck on it right now), I'm a big fan of building up a collection of digital media files bought either directly from artists or ripped from the CD collection I'm building. I usually go for FLAC, though less for its compression and more for its superior metadata support compared to WAVs.

For discovering new music, Bandcamp allows you to check out some songs; otherwise, check it out on YouTube or something and buy it directly from the artist later.

Like others have said, Bandcamp might not have everyone, but they do have a lot of indie artists and even some bigger ones. Some artists that don't have everything on Bandcamp might have their own store you can buy from.

I've been using this Qobuz client for Linux, it's electron but seems to handle HiFi - at least to my untrained ears.

I use volumio, it has integration for tidal and qobuz

if youre willing to sail the seven seas, nicotine+ with tauon music box

I use the web app for Qobuz, and it looks and feels like a regular Qobuz app.

There is also https://github.com/Nokse22/high-tide

Open source Tidal client

Mostly MP3s but I also use internet radio for streaming. I use the RadioDroid app from F Droid for that

I've been thinking about this too. Does anyone know if band camp is any good for this sort of thing?? I know that you can listen to some music there.

Music is one of the few things where I actually like for the service to have a recommendation algorithm. I don't think Bandcamp has anything like that. I'm not opposed to switching up my ways of discovering new music and instead just finding it by engaging with communities... But let's be honest that isn't quite as effective nor as plentiful as a good algorithm. If bandcamp doesn't really have any way of discovering artists then it just seems sort of supplementary.

sudo apt install youtubedl-gui

pay money directly to the musicans