From talking to people over the years, I've been surprised how differently people interpret music. There's a big split between the lyric driven and the lyric deaf.
People talk to me about the lyrics to songs I know and I have no idea what they're on about. I can listen to, and even sing, songs whose lyrics I've never verbally parsed. So I get on great with songs that sound good but have idiotic or nonsensical lyrics (Phoenix or The Smashing Pumpkins, for example) because I don't interpret them anyway. I have to listen deliberately and with full attention to "get it."
I find this interesting as well. It's a rare song that I like /because/ of the lyrics (or even despite the lyrics). For the most part they are just part of the music - another instrument adding complexity to the song.
Despite that, I can't really program while listening to songs with lyrics. Somewhere in my brain a thread is running parsing the lyrics and stealing cycles.
If it helps color in my picture a bit, I go to sleep listening to (spoken) podcasts every night. I can be asleep in minutes even listening to reasonably interesting content. I suspect this will bite me in the ass if I ever decide to go back to university ;-)
People talk to me about the lyrics to songs I know and I have no idea what they're on about. I can listen to, and even sing, songs whose lyrics I've never verbally parsed. So I get on great with songs that sound good but have idiotic or nonsensical lyrics (Phoenix or The Smashing Pumpkins, for example) because I don't interpret them anyway. I have to listen deliberately and with full attention to "get it."