Oh I totally agree with you on the grind Gryphon, believe me I do. So sure, grinding is a pain. But it's made so much better by good music, a guild with good people and your own personal story along the way.
Grinding is only a pain if you make it a pain. All of my favorite memories from RO were the countless hours I spent grinding here, or there, that one time that card dropped, etc. I haven't played for over 5 years, and as much as I would love to jump in and start playing again... I don't want anything to do with Renewal. From what i can tell, they basically just added a bunch of quests that make it very easy to level to ~100, so you can get to the high levels / end game quickly. Personally, I don't like how they changed it. There's too many classes, too many changes, you practically have to relearn the game. I don't want to relearn the game, i want to play the RO that I remember. I was never able to fully dive into classic RO because I didn't have the time back then, but now I do. So I'm very, very pumped for this new classic server.
and regarding the music, you're absolutely right. The music in RO is by far the best BGM out of any game EVER in my books. It really is timeless.