Music player for DS2’s fifth birthday

[ElphabaTheGreen]

I think I may be on a hiding to nothing with this but I’m hoping you all might know about something that Google doesn’t.

DS2 loves, loves, LOVES listening to music, but he’s very dependant on us to set it up for him on a wireless speaker from our phones, and he’s at the age where he has to hear the same thing over and over again which drives us slightly nuts. I would like to get him a player for his fifth birthday where he can pick what he wants to listen to easily, ideally from album covers on a display as his reading isn’t great yet, from a selection that we’ve assigned to him from Google Play. I don’t want to be tied into buying albums for him on an MP3 player. I definitely don’t want a CD player - he trashed the last CD player we had and, well, CDs are obsolete.

I WILL NOT buy him a phone or tablet. He is like a crack addict with screens - he will watch them obsessively then, when told to stop, throw a filthy tantrum, therefore it’s far better he doesn’t go on them at all. If a music player has any functionality other than the music, eg photos or videos, he will obsess over that and just give me something else to police and fight with him about. I would really like to just be able to leave him to his music on headphones, the way DH and I were with our cassette players when we were children. He really would love something like that.

Any ideas??

what about an ipod nano like this? you can't use google play with it (but maybe you could ask for itune vouchers from relatives who would like to give a birthday gift?) but its main functionality is listening to music and it has album covers by the words

It’s MP3s, sleep which we really don’t want.

As far as I know you have a choice of
(1) CDs.
(2) MP3s.
(3) Streaming.

If you don't want to use phones then you probably can't have (3). MP3 players come in different types and you can get those that only play music and not much else. Like www.argos.co.uk/product/1988372. If you don't want MP3s and you don't want CDs either then I don't know what you can have!

Is the wireless speaker too near you and driving you mad? You could bluetooth them to his room from your phone and shut the door.

Is the wireless speaker too near you and driving you mad? You could bluetooth them to his room from your phone and shut the door.

That’s basically what we do!

We’re thinking if we could get something like an iPod touch and make Google Play the only app on it, we could make him an album list. His writing/spelling is crap so he’s not really going to be searching for explicit content albums yet.

He’s a hoot. His listening choices are either musicals or classic rock (Queen, The Doors, Rolling Stones etc). You could get worse than ‘A Night At the Opera’ and ‘Matilda’ on repeat, but it is wearing me down slightly.

Ipod touch would probably have other apps on it, wouldn't it? Not sure how much you can clean it up.

I’m suspecting that but DH is a professional IT super-whiz who might try and have a fiddle to see what he can do.

Either that or patent the prototype of a kid’s music-only streaming device

www.whathifi.com/best-buys/streaming/best-music-streamers Music streamers. Or just have Alexa who will respond to all his requests.

What about an echo dot? It's on offer for prime day too

NeverEver Only ranging from £500-£5000. I’ll get him one for every room!! 😱

Re: Alexa or Echo Dot - he’s fecking hopeless with voice activated. DH is a right surly bar-steward about Alexa/Echo anyway (can you not just GET UP and turn on the light?) so would never agree to one, but DS2 has had a lot of completely unsuccessful practice with a friend’s Alexa. He got an orchestral version of Thriller on repeat exactly once which was nearly the death of us all. We only release him onto the voice activation on Netflix for LOLs - it took us quite some time to work out that his repeated, increasingly shouted request for ‘Loony Magooney’ was actually Team Umizoomi. He also makes attempts while he has hiccups and can’t work out the issue.

A tonie box!

That’s cute, HurryUp! Not quite what we’re after as it requires MP3s if he wants his own music but he might like the stories.

Maybe an echo show then? I know you don't want screens but if he can't do voice then this is the only other option. Plus it's not the same as a tablet.

just get a cheap tablet and only have a music app on it and link it to a bluetooth speaker or headphones