I do it every game. I enjoy games way more that way.
I was playing with a friend the other day and he was getting stressed. At the end of the game, he told me some guy was flaming me and talking shit the entire match. If it wasn't for him mentioning it, I would never know.
I recommend everyone do the same. I also listen to this radio with relaxing music while playing http://www.sky.fm/dreamscapes
I never listen to local radio or watch mtv anymore, nothing they play really suits me. Di.fm and Sky.fm are good online sites that I use with about 20 'radio stations' a piece. They have all sorts of thing to choose from (though di.fm is exclusively electronic music.)
I also go on wikipedia, look up a genre I like and pick out interesting sounding artists from the list. From there it is pretty easy to find artists they are similar too, Last.fm can make it even easier.
There will always be great, creative music. The question is whether it will be on the radio stations programming.
I love DI, but I want my old yearly rate back! lol!
AND YES I WOULD PAY IN BTC
What channels do you guys like there? I dig teh trance, progressive, trap 1/2 the time when there is no chanting, and I love UMF Radio. Sometimes I skip over to SKY.FM {sign up for DI and you get SKY free}, they are siblings to listen to solo piano, classical, or regae.
http://www.sky.fm/ (anything foreign that I can't get too invested in or sing along with to go look up lyrics)
http://www.getworkdonemusic.com/ (your usual dance/etc electronic stuff for those days that any lyrics would distract you.)
Someone should make of gif of this next time it rains. I think it would be pretty cool to throw it up on my flat screen, pull up this website http://www.rainymood.com, and put on some smooth jazz http://www.sky.fm/play/smoothjazz. I would be in heaven!
Edit: The music on the rain site might be better suited to the situation!
skyfm roots reggae radio! Here you can listen to some random reggae tunes and if you suddenly hear one you like you can check out what artist it is and maybe look up other of their songs!
Another tip is, go to spotify, grooveshark or what ever and just search by genre and search for reggae and "listen around" some things will stick and some things wont!
On the top of my head, I recommend Bob, Stephen, Ziggy and Damian Marley, Black uhuru, Tonto irie and Toots and the Maytals!
In my old student house, when we cooked, my roommate brought his laptop in the kitchen and we had cooking reggae. Listening/watching anything int he kitchen while cooking is pretty awesome.
http://www.jazzradio.com/ has a lot of channels and a pretty large library
http://www.sky.fm/bossanova/ ( and di.fm ) ( i think they are sister sites ) has a few jazz sections but after a few months i found myself recognizing some tracks being 'overplayed' in a way
( i am almost strictly a bossa nova listener so i havent checked out all their channels )
Also, SKY.FM has an all-piano trio stream that is worth checking out if you are looking for some variety. If you use iTunes, it should appear as a Radio stream under Classical (Classical Piano Trios - SKY.FM).