Sure that was a regular bitrate stereo mp3? I remember struggling a lot with my 486DX/100, waiting for better assembly optimization to happen on Linux (to keep up with a DOS mp3 player that handled it better).

I no longer have the details, but the music was just some mp3 files I copied from friends. Buffering may have played a role as I had at some point, I had maxed out the specs memory-wise.