Author Topic: Best way to apply ReplayGain to entire FLAC library  (Read 11256 times)

lgcas

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Hi all,
I recently noticed that my FLAC library does not have ReplayGain tags applied to it (checked via Edit>properties and there were no volume leveling calculations stored; is this the correct way to check?). I would like to apply ReplayGain tags to my library but am unsure of the best way to do this. Would track or album basis be the correct way to do this and should volume just be kept at 0db. Furthermore, should I run this on my entire library at once? I have some songs that are much quieter than others for example.
Thanks!

The Incredible Boom Boom

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There's been extensive discussion here on ReplayGain. The answer is it's all up to you. My suggestion is to read up on it and then come back if you have any confusion.

lgcas

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There's been extensive discussion here on ReplayGain. The answer is it's all up to you. My suggestion is to read up on it and then come back if you have any confusion.
From doing some reading, it seems as if the best way to apply ReplayGain to an entire library (for shuffling, my main use case), is to use track gain. The only thing that I am confused about is album gain. Would this be something where I can select my entire library and MusicBee knows what songs are in what albums based off of tags? Or would this be a case of selecting each album and scanning them individually?
Also, if I were to add more songs to my library, do I need to rescan the entire library or just the new songs that I added?
Thanks!

frankz

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You should scan for album and track gain.  If you mainly shuffle, you should have musicbee use track gain when listening, but it doesn't hurt to have the album gain data in the file in case you ever want to use it. It's a non-destructive process and doesn't change anything about the audio data in the file so there is no harm in scanning.

Musicbee will go through whatever files you select album by album using the tags you use to define an album.  

You will need to scan new tracks as they are added to the library.  You will not need to rescan old tracks.

You should never select your entire library and do anything all at once unless you're sure you know what you're doing, which does not appear to be the case.  You should do it in groups.
Last Edit: January 23, 2021, 03:11:55 PM by frankz

lgcas

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You should never select your entire library and do anything all at once unless you're sure you know what you're doing, which does not appear to be the case.  You should do it in groups.
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but would this be groups as in albums (for both track and album gain)? I have a lot of tracks and, although I am not opposed to doing it album-by-album, it would take a lot of time; just don't want to mess anything up.
Thanks again.

frankz

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No. You don't need to select album by album.  As I said last time, Musicbee will go through whatever files you select and break them into albums automatically using the tags you use to define an album. 

Obviously, don't do half and album in one group and half an album in another group because that'll calculate the wrong album gain.

The chances of "messing anything up" scanning and tagging replay gain are very small. It's just like writing an artist or album tag into your files. It's just another tag in the file.

lgcas

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I see, how would you suggest processing everything/grouping everything? From a check all of my songs have their respective album tags; although I do have some singles with no album tags. Under this case would it not be suitable to do the whole library?

hiccup

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Tracks without an album tag won't get an albumgain tag.
This would probably be a good moment to start doing some testing yourself on a selection of your library?

lgcas

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Tracks without an album tag won't get an albumgain tag.
This would probably be a good moment to start doing some testing yourself on a selection of your library?
I've just finshed doing some testing, I added 3 albums to a new playlist and recorded their before/after volumes using a db meter when using track gain:
Before
all songs from all albums on 0db (9 songs, 3 from each album)
After:
All the volumes with track gain seem to to have changed, but aren't too consistent.
Album 1:
Song 1: -10db
Song 2: a peak of -7 but moreso hovering around -10 to -12db for the majority of the song
Song 3: -10db

Album 2:
Song 1: -6db
Song 2: -6db
Song 3: -6db

Album 3:
Song 1: -9db
Song 2: -6db
Song 3: -6db

Does this seem weird? It has mostly made things quieter but some songs more quiet than others, album gain is consistent however.

hiccup

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Each track will get analysed individually, using an algorythm that guesses a loudness as perceived by the (average) human ear.
So every track will usually be different.
The albumgain will obviously be the same for all tracks of an album.

Have you learned about replaygain playback settings?
You can set if you want MusicBee to use albumgain, trackgain, or smartgain for playback.
Or to simply ignore these tags completely.
Last Edit: January 23, 2021, 05:20:35 PM by hiccup

lgcas

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Each track will get analysed individually, using an algorythm that guesses a loudness as perceived by human ears.
So every track will usually be different.
The albumgain will obviously be the same for a whole album.

Have you learned about replaygain playback settings?
You can set if you want MusicBee to use albumgain, trackgain, or smartgain for playback.
Or to simply ignore these tags completely.

Yea, I used track gain to test the volumes after analysing, I never really tend to listen to albums in their entirety when using MusicBee, 99% of my use is just shuffling.
Would what I have done be considered a usual outcome? The main thing I wanted ReplayGain tags for was to avoid having to tab out of other applications to make adjustments to volume.

Quote
Each track will get analysed individually, using an algorythm that guesses a loudness as perceived by human ears.
Ah, this makes more sense. I'm guessing this follows the same logic as perceived loudness? There were some songs that, despite being the same volume, sounded harsh; after applying ReplayGain these don't seem as bad and the entire playlist seems more evem (although this could just be due to the volume reductions applied and/or placebo I guess).
Thanks

hiccup

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The algorithm (EBU R128) is designed to be very good at estimating the perceived loudness of an audio track for the average human ear.
Not only for a 3 minute pop song, but also for a 45 minutes avantgarde classical work.
And for movie scores (gunshots, long silences), commercials, podcasts, audiobooks, etc.
In my opinion it is doing a fantastic job in general.
But you can always make adjustments per track if you feel the need.

lgcas

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Yeah, I guess I was just a bit confused when it turned the tracks down more than I thought. Thanks for the help!

hiccup

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You're welcome. All this 'loudness business' is not that straightforward. Books have been written about it.
Just do some testing yourself, maybe then read back what frankz and others suggested, and I'm sure you'll get it under control.

lgcas

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One quick other question, I have been going through my library and applying tags to my songs and noticed some had clipping warnings. To fix this is it as simple as just re-analysing the problematic tracks and adjusting the calculated values (and would I need to restore original volume first)?

e.g.:
Last Edit: January 23, 2021, 11:32:24 PM by lgcas