Author Topic: Tagging All my Music  (Read 12198 times)

HossStyle

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Hello, first time user here.  Thanks to LifeHacker for directing me to your product.

I've messed with this for a few hours now and know that it is worth keeping, so I'll head over and chip in a few bucks, as well.

But my questions - First, is there a walkthrough for using all the features of this player?  I'm almost overwhelmed with all the stuff there is to do, and a lot of it I have no idea what it does.  I'd like to know.

My main question, though, is about setting the correct genres of my music (along with the tags).  Thousands of my songs are from 10 or more years ago when I downloaded them and have incorrect or no genres/tags.  I found a way to use LastFM to tag each individual song (why don't the other options set the tags and genres like the LastFM option does?) but like I said - I have tons of music.  Is there an option to have it autotag every song (along with fixing the names of the song, artist, etc)?

I seem to have found an option in the menu for automatically doing this, but when I checked the box it didn't fix anything - all the same song still have [none]for genre or tags.

Thanks in advance for the help.  I hate to bug people needlessly but I couldn't find a walkthrough anywhere and I did a "search" on the forums and came up with other issues based on my keywords, but not exactly mine.

HossStyle

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Just to update, I spent more time searching for this feature but still can't find it.  I have found in "Tools" where I can autotag, but it only gives the the option to do it for one song at a time.  If I could just figure out a way to select every track and have it scan, it would help immensely.

*Edited*

Ok, I found a way to select all the tracks and then run the autotag in "Tools".  When I ran it I used the top option (whatever that was (it's still running)) and I'm watching it go down the list and many songs are getting "No match for artist" even though many are very popular artists.

Should I run it again using the "LastFM" option?  Is that the better one to use?  Or are one of the other options better?  How about the "digital sound signature" option?
Last Edit: February 12, 2014, 11:23:40 AM by HossStyle

HossStyle

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Ok, so just ran the "LastFM" option for the autotagging and it seems better than the defualt option, but I'm still getting lots of missing stuff.

Just as a generic example - I have an Eminem song that had a genre set as "blues" (obviously wrong).  The scan fixed almost all of his songs except this one (and a few others).  I'm assuming there are hundreds (or more) of other songs that are incorrect, as well.  Is there a better way to get these genres and tags correct?

Maybe the digital sound signature option is the way to go?  I hate to use something that I have no idea what it does.

redwing

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For auto-fixing genres with multiple files, probably LastFM option would be most useful. If it doesn't do it for a very popular song, I'd check whether artist and title tag values are correct or in a format used in LastFM.

Digital sound signature is useful when you have no idea what the track is. It will analyze first 30 seconds of the song and update all the tags. But it's not always accurate. If that's messed up, use Edit> Undo command.

For more accurate tagging, I'd recommend using auto-tag by album, which will give you bunch of choices (yes, a track can be of many genres depending on the source), but it's for one by one.

redwing

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is there a walkthrough for using all the features of this player?  I'm almost overwhelmed with all the stuff there is to do, and a lot of it I have no idea what it does.  I'd like to know.

There's a PDF guide which might be easier for browsing features than the wiki:

http://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=10958.0

dylstew

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I Prefer MP3Tag over the musicbee tag editor. I only use the musicbee tag editor for smaller problems, but it's still pretty damn good.

psychoadept

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The only thing I have found that auto-tags Genre to my satisfaction is the last.fm plus plugin for Picard.  And even then, I plan to do some clean-up afterwards.  It's at least pretty easy to fine-tune what tags are allowed with last.fm plus.  MusicBee has such a feature, but it's harder to use on the fly.  On the other hand, the learning curve for Picard in general is fairly steep...
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HossStyle

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Thanks for all the responses.  I'm going to play with MusicBee over the next few days and use your suggestions.  The PDF is also appreciated.

Steven

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i suggest you use v2.3 from the first topic on the forum as it now includes gracenote as a tag provider and also the auto-tag by track algorithm has been improved

HossStyle

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i suggest you use v2.3 from the first topic on the forum as it now includes gracenote as a tag provider and also the auto-tag by track algorithm has been improved

Wait, I just downloaded MusicBee a week ago.  There's a version newer than the one I have?

Also, I'm pretty sure that when going through the menu options I checked the "Update Automatically" option.  Won't that get me the new version?  Or does auto-update not work?

Thanks for the help, by the way.

** Just went and checked - I do have the auto update option "on".
Last Edit: February 13, 2014, 11:46:12 AM by HossStyle

Bee-liever

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Because MusicBee is very much in active development by Steven, you will find regular updates to the current stable beta version here.

After being on the forum a bit, you will also see frequent references to patches. The most current one being available at
http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_3/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip
These are alpha releases and are in response to bugs and feature requests (see wishlist) and can occur as often as twice (or more!!) a day, but usually every couple of days.
You don't have to use these if you don't want too, but the more testers and feedback from MusicBee users, the better it is for MB.

The "Update Automatically" option only checks for changes to the current release version on the main MusicBee website.

The current 2.3 beta is safe to use as Steven is finalising it for full release around late February/early March.
Last Edit: February 13, 2014, 12:13:27 PM by Bee-liever
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Zak

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These are alpha releases and are in response to bugs and feature requests...
Given the rapid nature of MusicBee's development I think it's a bit unfair to call these patches "alpha" releases. To me that suggests the latest changes are somewhat experimental and should only be used at your own risk, which is how the term applies to most projects. With MusicBee though, almost every single update has provided a more robust application than the version that preceded it.
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Bee-liever

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@ Zak
(although a bit of a tangent to HossStyle's question) They are alpha releases in the sense they precede beta releases. They are also sometimes posted by Steven to get feedback on changes and help find bugs.  The recent round of changes to the Compact Player is an example of this.  Technically, I suppose they would be incremental beta patches as opposed to a full beta release.

The term was not meant to infer they were somehow half-finished, sub-standard or even dangerous to use, merely to demonstrate the levels of updates to a new user, without blinding them with science  ;)
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HossStyle

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Because MusicBee is very much in active development by Steven, you will find regular updates to the current stable beta version here.

After being on the forum a bit, you will also see frequent references to patches. The most current one being available at
http://musicbee.niblseed.com/V2_3/MusicBee_Exe_Patched.zip
These are alpha releases and are in response to bugs and feature requests (see wishlist) and can occur as often as twice (or more!!) a day, but usually every couple of days.
You don't have to use these if you don't want too, but the more testers and feedback from MusicBee users, the better it is for MB.

The "Update Automatically" option only checks for changes to the current release version on the main MusicBee website.

The current 2.3 beta is safe to use as Steven is finalising it for full release around late February/early March.

Thank you.  Is it safe to say that the "Update Automatically" option will update when the 2.3 beta is released late Feb/early March?  Or is that a new version altogether?

Pingaware

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@ Zak and Bee-liever (To continue the irrelevant off-topic stuff)

The way I'd describe the patches is as nightly versions. That's a common enough term for software development and applicable to MB in my experience. You could describe the versions that Steven posts on Mediafire as opposed to the usual link as alphas, as they are usually that bit more experimental.

Not that it really matters, as we're just quibbling over the names of a quite fantastic release cycle.

@HossStyle

I think it should update for you when the 2.3 beta is released. However it's so long since I've used a non-patched version, I couldn't tell you for sure!
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