Struggling with music selfhosting

I mentioned in my last monthly review that I’m currently switching from Deezer (my streaming alternative after the previous cheap YouTube Premium trick stopped working) to a self hosted music setup.

I first tried Nextcloud Music, as I already have Nextcloud, a Storage Share at Hetzner, so I just created a new folder for music, copied my MP3s into it, and installed the Nextcloud Music app. It offers a Subsonic and Ampache API that can be used with various apps.

After doing a bit more research, I came across Navidrome. It seems to have a larger community and is a lightweight Go app. So I set up Navidrome on my home server and connected it to an rclone Docker volume to access the music in my Nextcloud. Thanks to a Netbird reverse proxy, it’s also accessible from anywhere.

I mostly listen to music on my phone, rarely on my PC. Usually with Bluetooth headphones. Thanks to the multipoint connection, it’s no longer a problem to listen to music on your phone and then make a call on your work computer.

So, let’s talk about Android apps. Symfonium seems to be a popular choice. It can be unlocked after a trial period with a one-time purchase, and the price is reasonable in my opinion. It also has numerous features and works great with Navidrome or Nextcloud Music. You can also import and listen to internet radio stations that you configure in Navidrome.

What bothers me, though, is the sheer number of settings. It’s nice that you can configure almost every detail of the app. But if you’re overwhelmed by the settings, it’s not so great. OsmAnd is another app with countless settings, but even there I find it more manageable and easier to get along with. Maybe it’s because there are many options, but they’re better divided into different menus?

Another popular app seems to be Tempo, but it’s no longer being developed, although it has a successor called Tempus. Tempus is much simpler and looks good; it is open-source and free. What bothers me here, however, are various glitches in different areas of the app. Pages sometimes load with a delay, or sections, such as those with favorite songs, are only displayed sometimes. The app also sometimes feels a bit sluggish. Are too many network requests being sent in the background?

Overall, I don’t know which app I should use. Should I dive into the settings of Symfony and somehow configure the app to suit me, but then never touch the settings again? Or should I somehow get used to the glitches in Tempus? Or use an entirely different app? I also took a look at Ultrasonic; it seems solid but somehow a bit old-fashioned. You can tell that streaming services invest plenty of resources in app development. More than open-source projects ever could.

The other point is music discovery. Back in school days, I often went to the library, borrowed CDs with current hits that I knew from the radio, imported the CDs into iTunes, and then copied the music onto my iPod nano. Later, I also redeemed many gifted iTunes or Google Play gift cards for music purchases on the platforms.

But when Spotify came along, I gradually fell victim to the algorithm, which always suggested music that suited my taste and my current mood. That’s still the case after several switches of streaming services. That’s why it’s so hard for me now to really describe my musical taste or to find suitable albums and songs, or even artists, that I can add to my library. I had marked about 300 songs as favorites on Deezer, which is at least a small start.

That’s why I created a last.fm account again and configured Navidrome to automatically scrobble. After some time, I might find suitable recommendations on there.

Well, that’s the current state of things. I would be pleased for any tips on which Android app is good, how I can better define my musical taste, how I can find suitable additions for my library, or what I can improve in my setup! Feel free to share your experiences!