Hopstretch Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 I'm starting to accumulate a fair bit of hi-res material in iTunes and much of it is made up of higher-bit rate versions of albums I already have in CD format. What I can't seem to figure out is how to tag these duplicate albums so they will sort and display separately without adding a modifier (like [24/96] or [DVD-A] or whatever) to the Album field -- since doing that screws up LastFM and other apps that pull that data. Sub-fields like Comments, Grouping etc. don't seem to be used by iTunes to distinguish different versions. Any iTunes power users out there?
Hopstretch Posted September 1, 2009 Author Report Posted September 1, 2009 Yeah, I think I'll try knocking on the door before blowing up the building, thanks.
jp11801 Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 you can use the genre field and sort by that, I try to tag my LP transfers with the genre needle drop so I can find them more easily, so you could create a genre called HiRes and change the genres to that
Hopstretch Posted September 1, 2009 Author Report Posted September 1, 2009 Thanks JP. That certainly works for sorting -- I currently just have a smart playlist that looks for any song with a sample rate > 2000kbps, but your solution is simpler and better. What it won't do, though, is show the two albums as separate versions in the main grid view, which is what I'd ideally like to be able to accomplish without screwing with the titles. Not really a big deal, just one of those "but why can't I do this way" usability niggles.
Sherwood Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 You can also display bitrate as a column under itunes. I believe that the prominence of bitrate as a sort field is a fair benchmark of how crazy you have gone, however. Mine is right after "Artist" and before "Album"
Dusty Chalk Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 I believe if it's a different genre, it will display as a different album on the iPod -- not sure about iTunes, though. If you figure out where to determine the algorithm for what constitutes a "different album", please let me know, I have some similar questions.
deepak Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 You can also display bitrate as a column under itunes. I believe that the prominence of bitrate as a sort field is a fair benchmark of how crazy you have gone, however. Mine is right after "Artist" and before "Album" How would bitrate be any meaningful indicator of what version an album is if the needle drop is 16/44 (akin to its CD brethren)?
Sherwood Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 How would bitrate be any meaningful indicator of what version an album is if the needle drop is 16/44 (akin to its CD brethren)? It wouldn't in that case, but Stretch was trying to sort out high bitrate albums from low bitrate copies of the same album. Also, shame on anyone who needledrops in 16/44. How else are we to justify 24/192 DACs?
Dusty Chalk Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 Also, shame on anyone who needledrops in 16/44. How else are we to justify 24/192 DACs?
HeadphoneAddict Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 I make a separate smart playlist for a 320K MP3 album and the ALAC version of the same album, and put the initials ALAC in the name of the lossless playlist. Since I listen to all my music by playlist and not the main list it's a solution for me. But, I see it's a problem if you have the main library list open and type in a album name where both pop up for you; and you also see them as one album in the grid/coverflow album cover view instead as two - you may not have an easy solution. What if you selected the lossless version in the list view, chose "get info", and then change the info to show the lossless version as "CD 2 of 2", then set the 320K version as "CD 1 of 2" ? I will go try that and see if they show up as separate CDs. [EDIT - nope, CD 1/2 and CD 2/2 still show up under the same icon in grid view.] [EDIT 2 - Okay, if I go in and change the composer to "Valerie Joyce 320" for one copy of the album, and "Valerie Joyce ALAC" for my 24/96 version, I can sort the grid by "composer" and both show up as separate albums, but when sorted as album or as artist they both show up under one album cover as they should. You could even use the album name in the composer field instead of the artist name. Like "New York Blue 320" and "New York Blue ALAC". Some one else suggested using genre to sort them, and you could have "Jazz 320" and "Jazz ALAC" as separate Genre, but that wont let you sort by albums like sorting the grid by "Composer" Allows.
Dusty Chalk Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 Upon doing a bit of research, the answer to my question is: artist, album, and album artist ("artist" being song artist). Slightly different for compilations (I think it ignores the artist fields, but don't know if it ignores both). A frequent point on doing this research is to watch out for invisible characters. So I would say: add some invisible characters. Try putting a space on the end or something. Let us know how it works, I'm booted into linux right now, so can't try it -- I usually only boot up into Windows for iTunes once a week on weekends.
Hopstretch Posted September 1, 2009 Author Report Posted September 1, 2009 Dusty you bloody beaut, that's it. A space on the end of the album name and iTunes treats them as separate titles. I love you and I want to have your babies!
HeadphoneAddict Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 Dusty you bloody beaut, that's it. A space on the end of the album name and iTunes treats them as separate titles. I love you and I want to have your babies! But does that screw up the last.fm thing that happened when you added 24/96 to the album name? Changing the composer as I suggested above and sorting the grid that way allows both albums to have separate icons in the grid, without affecting the album or artist for last.fm
deepak Posted September 1, 2009 Report Posted September 1, 2009 Also, shame on anyone who needledrops in 16/44. How else are we to justify 24/192 DACs? I'll take a 16/44 DAC over the majority (almost all) 24/192 DACs
Hopstretch Posted September 1, 2009 Author Report Posted September 1, 2009 (edited) But does that screw up the last.fm thing that happened when you added 24/96 to the album name? Changing the composer as I suggested above and sorting the grid that way allows both albums to have separate icons in the grid, without affecting the album or artist for last.fm Preliminary testing indicates that LastFM's fingerprinting can handle the null character OK. Looks like you can add the space to "Album Artist" with the same result and as a bonus the various versions still display grouped together when sorted by album. Edited September 1, 2009 by Hopstretch
deepak Posted September 2, 2009 Report Posted September 2, 2009 having heard a few of the vintage DACs so popular here, all i can say is "ewwww" Not strictly sticking to 16/44, I'd buy 24/96 DACs
blessingx Posted September 5, 2009 Report Posted September 5, 2009 Stretch, I've use modifiers ([K2], [XRCD], etc.) in the album name and from appearances it seems Last.FM auto-corrects for this (or at least keeps correct associations). In default configuration (with most Last.FM clients) it's still "scrobbling"/"fingerprinting" the data, no? Am I missing something?
Hopstretch Posted September 5, 2009 Author Report Posted September 5, 2009 Stretch, I've use modifiers ([K2], [XRCD], etc.) in the album name and from appearances it seems Last.FM auto-corrects for this (or at least keeps correct associations). Am I missing something? I think it will use "meaningful" modifiers -- MFSL also works, I think, certainly if you include the catalog number -- but will trip on ad-hoc ones you apply yourself, like [24/96] or [HI-RES].
blessingx Posted September 5, 2009 Report Posted September 5, 2009 Hmmm. A quick test shows "[WTH Hopstretch]" and "[err... Andrew?]" are "meaningful" modifiers also. Correctly identified the same song was played by me twice, correct art, same album available for purchase on Amazon, etc. Even linked with others as listed: 1,186 plays by 424 listeners. Or maybe I'm missing something (always a strong possibility). This was using the default Mac Last.FM client with scrobbling/fingerprinting on. Abbey Lincoln - Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise.
postjack Posted September 5, 2009 Report Posted September 5, 2009 could it have something to do with brackets? I have endless different versions of the same album and have always had trouble scrobbling when I have "MFSL" or "(MFSL)" at the end, or "WB-234234A" or "(Diament)" (drop the quotation marks).
postjack Posted September 5, 2009 Report Posted September 5, 2009 could it have something to do with brackets? I have endless different versions of the same album and have always had trouble scrobbling when I have "MFSL" or "(MFSL)" at the end, or "WB-234234A" or "(Diament)" (drop the quotation marks). well i just tried my DCC of Queens "Night at the Opera" with the DCC GZS-1144 by itself, in brackets, and in parentheses, and it scrobbled correctly with all of them. i dunno.
Hopstretch Posted September 5, 2009 Author Report Posted September 5, 2009 Just doesn't work like that for me, Ric. Am using same platform, client and settings. Who TF knows?
blessingx Posted September 5, 2009 Report Posted September 5, 2009 Okay, there are a few variables here (though maybe not between us Andrew) including tag versions, player, Last.FM client, client settings, but I've now used the following album names: Abbey Is Blue [WTH Hopstretch] Abbey Is Blue [err... Andrew?] Abbey Is Blue (purrr-ends test) Abbey Is Blue Really Blue Abbey had sex with Evan @ Big Sur I thought the last two might throw it, but it identified the correct album every time, song played five times, etc. The scrob seems to be overriding the tag. Sounds like through "fingerprinting." At least with this track. Scrobbling set to 50%. Maybe your fingerprinting is failing somehow Andrew? A Google came up with... [url=http://blog.last.fm/2009/01/29/closing-in-on-clean-metadata-artist-and-track-spelling-auto-correction-is-here]Last.fm ? the Blog
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