Periodic but very brief audio pops and cutouts

[Chance1320]

My device is a 32GB Samsung Galaxy Nexus on Verizon.

Android version is 4.2.2 (Jelly Bean).

Whether I'm streaming content over 4G LTE or WiFi *or* listening to content that I have downloaded onto the device, I periodically get cutouts in the audio. It's not stuttering or anything that would resemble hardware difficulties with the demands being placed on it; more like artifacts in the audio that shouldn't be there.

I specifically tried downloading the audio to the device to see if perhaps streaming was the issue, and it didn't solve the problem.

I have uninstalled and reinstalled a number of times to no avail.

I have used several other streaming music services, including Slacker, Rdio, MOG and Google Play Music...this problem does not exist with ANY of them. Only Spotify exhibits problems with audio playback.

To reinforce, this is not a major issue, but in my opinion it is an issue that should not be present on modern hardware with the most recent Android system designed to use the hardware most efficiently. I used Spotify previously on a 3G Droid X and had no problems whatsoever. This device should be able to blow it out of the water.

Any ideas? Thanks much.

-Colby

[Chance1320]

Going to follow troubleshooting process to the letter, and will then report back.