I absolutely can't handle lyrics. I think you're right. Those of us who remember using gopher protocol probably grew up listening to radio hits even if we bought the tape or CD, so it was known and in its own way monotonous. But served the purpose of drowning out my brothers or roommate.

Now I don't own a TV and rarely listen to radio, and my tastes have dramasticly broadened, so I almost never listen to the same song more than a handful of times. I find lyrics are a show stopper. Even overly ambitious classical, jazz, electronica trips me up.

Here's a playlist I've been listening to for a while, seeded by, of all things, gopro surf videos, which has become my go-to study set, usually fed in with Bose QC-15s

http://open.spotify.com/user/grep2grok/playlist/1NcLBwixEKqQ...