I would not put anything on your body to get in the way during lifting. For example, when doing olympic snatches the cord on such an mp3 player is likely to hit you in the face when doing the second pull. Save the listening to tunes during your rest periods. If the gym is so annoying that you have to wear a headset to block out the distractions it is best not to be there at all. I remember distinctly at the IMA in UW seattle Washington student weight room when in '91 they had kube 94 fm. There would be nonsense like Michael Bolton on, "when a man loves a woman" and that would start playing when I had 500 lbs on my back squatting. This didnt ruin the workout by it hindered motivation. When I heard that Bolton shit it made me want to go take a shit rather than do squats with weights. I had a petition of all the students and got that shit off the radio. The student body changed the radio to 107.7 the end the alternative radio station and that was more tolerable even though the bench press monkeys still wanted to fight me cause my repping 500 on deadlifts on the clean platform was disrupting their ego lifts. Bottom line is to save your money. Get an mp3 player for like 10 bucks at walmart then you can use a youtube to mp3 converter and get free music rather than subsidizing that apple shit.