There really isn't anything janky going on here, it's a poor lack of communication on the part of the spotify program and lack of understanding on the part of the user.

As for Spotify, as a long time user I love it. Very much worth a try.

You can signup with an email address , but the option is hidden quite low in the signup page.

Best way to avoid this sort of stuff is just to sign up to spotify with throwaway email.

I have found that it's worth buying a domain name and just tying it to a VPS with SMTP installed (or using a third part service that offers unlimited addresses). That way you can just generate throwaway email addresses as you need them.

You can also use Mailinator[0] and their many other domains for throwaway email addresses. In fact, you can point your MX records to mail.mailinator.com for a custom domain without running a VPS.[1]

[0] http://www.mailinator.com/ [1] http://mailinator.blogspot.com/2008/01/your-own-private-mail...

I have a google apps for business account (a former free one before they started charging).

I just create lots of alias emails associated with a domain name I used to use and still own. Works like a charm and they are always accepted.

I hear mailinator email addresses don't always get accepted by some services (though I haven't experienced this myself to verify).

True, but those services are quite limited and not that secure in that anybody who knows the email address can login to your account.

Not necessarily. They also give you a “gibberish” address to the account. So if I use “foobar” as my mailbox on mailinator, they will list an address like M8R-wk43th@mailinator too, that does not let people log in.