General advice - don’t be picky about dedicated media controls; sure they’re nice to have, but they severely limit your choices (I was in that boat too). At the same time it’s very easy to make key combinations; e.g. the Caps Lock key very often gets neglected, and if this is the case for you, you can repurpose it to Fn, and from there you can do Fn+W to play/pause, Fn+Q/Fn+E for prev/next track respectively and so on (of course the specific keys are up to you). Look for QMK/VIA support over manufacturer-specific software.

Sorry I can’t give a more specific recommendation. I second the idea that Keychron generally have good value for the money, so do Vortex and Ducky (although Ducky have gone up in price while not staying very competitive).