This is a the second part of a multi-part series on metadata for MP3 music files such as those used in iPods and other portable music players. Part 1 can be found here.
So, the music is the data... which begs the question, what is the metadata?
Getting the metadata correct can be one of the most
important aspects of setting up your iPod (or any MP3 player) for maximum
enjoyment. You see, the music is the data. It is the reason you bought the
device in the first place, right? The whole purpose of the device is to
entertain you by allowing you to carry around and listen to songs. Of course,
newer devices also allow you to transport and watch video, as well, but let’s
focus on music for the time being.
Accurate and up-to-date metadata makes the iPod experience
more enjoyable. What type of metadata? Well, most people, at a bare minimum
want to know the song name and probably the artist performing the song. This
information – this metadata – makes the music on your device accessible by some
means other than random playing. If you make sure that the metadata about the
music is accurate when you move it to your device then you can pick and choose
the songs you want to play using the device’s interface.
Now there are some MPs players – like the iPod shuffle –
that have no user interface so all they can do is play songs randomly. But I
bet you had the metadata before you downloaded the songs to that player? In
other words, you didn’t just populate the player with a bunch of random MP3
files without knowing what songs they were. So even these type of devices
benefit from metadata as you populate them with your music.
So what type of metadata do you need? Think about it before
you go about downloading music. As we mentioned earlier, at a bare minimum
you’ll want artist and song name. You’ll probably also want to know the album
name the song is from, especially if you want to be able to listen to entire
albums on your iPod. And it can be crucial if you have different versions of the same song, for example a studio version and a live version... If you know the album name, such as "Frampton Comes Alive!" you can probably safely assume that that version of "Do You Feel Like We Do" is the live one.
And the Artist metadata field can be problematic.How would you handle the group Panic! At the Disco? The exclamation point was in their name for their first album, but removed for their second. Or how about Matchbox Twenty, which has also gone by Matchbox 20? I suggest choosing one spelling and using it consistently regardless of the actual name used on the recording. That way the songs will group together nicely. Of course, there are other issues with the Artist field, but let's move on for now...
Probably the next piece of metadata you’ll want is one of
the most vexing to get: genre of music. At least it has been troublesome for
me. Why? Well, the term is not rigorously defined. Is there a difference
between Rock and Hard Rock? What about Hard Rock and Heavy Metal? Do you want
to slice genre even finer so that you’d have Thrash Metal, Death Metal, Rap
Metal, Hardcore, and maybe even Hair Metal? It might make all the difference in
the world to you if you are a metal fan. Or would you classify Led Zeppelin,
Judas Priest, Poison, and Slayer all as simply Heavy Metal? Or maybe you don’t
care enough about metal music at all, so you’d classify anything even remotely
metal-ish simply as Hard Rock… or maybe just Rock.
That is not the only example either. How would you classify
Pink Floyd? Rock? Hard rock? Progressive? Some might even classify it as
electronic.What about Pop, Power Pop, Bubblegum, and Glam? And the how would
you classify Sweet? And would “Little Willy” be classified the same as “Fox On
The Run,” or “Love is Like Oxygen,” for that matter?
You really do need to put some thought into the categories
you want for genre. If you download all of your songs from online stores like
iTunes then the metadata should be set up for you. But it might not agree with
what you want. One of the most frustrating things I’ve found is genres like
“General Country” and “General Alternative.” Why would anyone want the word
“General” in there – making it simply Country or Alternative makes it easier to
search later when you are looking for songs by genre. And it seems like every Punk song is classified as "Alternative & Punk" instead of just Punk, which also annoys me.
And be careful about automatically populating your metadata
from online databases because the information is not consistent, nor is it
always accurate. But I’ll leave that discussion for my next post…
But before I leave today’s post, I want to elaborate on
other pieces of metadata you might want.
- You
might want to know the Composer
of the song – that is, who wrote it. This comes in handy if you are
looking, say, for all Lennon & McCartney songs, even if they aren’t
done by The Beatles.
- Album Artist can come in handy,
too. For example, you might have the song “The Saints Are Coming” by U2
and Green Day (Artist), from the Album “18 Singles” by U2. In this case,
the artist is U2 and Green Day, but the Album Artist is U2.
- Another
piece of metadata I like, but that isn’t usually associated with MP3 files
is the number from the spine of the album or CD. I store this in my
Filemaker database of CDs, but not with my MP3 files or in my iPod.
Let’s stop here for today. Future entries will discuss the
benefits and problems with automatic music metadata services, metadata sorting
and display issues, dealing with duplicates, using metadata to create
playlists, and more. So stay tuned.