Getting downloaded tracks to play in the right order

Posted by: Goon525 on 12 February 2014

Would be very grateful if the brains trust here would help with this one. I have a downloaded album where the record company didn't do a very good job with track titling etc. It's classical, so it's vital tracks play in the right order or you get several works mixed up. I have retitled tracks so that their names and titles now make sense as viewed on my iMac Finder, and they look like they should play correctly - but they don't. They show up in a crazy order on nStream, and they indeed play in that order. Where in the titles etc can I find a way to correct this?

Many thanks

Paul

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Rich27

The two basics you should try using a metadata editor are:

1) Make sure all tracks have the correct track number tag, e.g. 1 of 20, 2 of 20 etc.

2) Make sure the files are actually named with the track number at the start, e.g. 01 xxxxxx, 02 xxxxxx etc.

This should make sure the tracks play in the correct order.

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Rich27

If you have an iMac I would highly recommend Metadatics, a relatively cheap download from the app store. It is updated regularly and you can communicate directly with the developer (I have done on a number of occasions and one of the updates even incorporated one of my suggestions, nice).

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Goon525

Thanks, Rich 27. The app you suggest is seven quid, which might be a lot to fix this one problem. On the other hand, it may come in useful over time. Though if someone knows of a cheaper solution, I'd be interested...

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Rich27

What format are the files? If AIFF then you can do it in iTunes but i am sure others will be able to suggest other Mac metadata editors. I am sure a search of these forums will also throw up other suggestions.

In my view though Metadatics is well worth the £7.

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Goon525

They're FLAC so iTunes won't help me. I accept your point and will probably blow the seven quid!

Thanks again for your assistance.

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by DrMark

mp3tag can fix these type of metadata issues for free -almost all my music is FLAC

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Goon525

Dr Mark

Looks like that is PC only - I need something for my Mac.

But thanks!

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by DrMark

Lol - sorry! I need to read more closely! (And truth be known I didn't know mp3tag didn't have a Mac version, although if you think about it, it kind of makes sense that they wouldn't.)

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by LeeTom

MusicBrainz Picard is a free Mac software that can tag these files.

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Goon525

For Rich27's benefit - I did blow the seven quid, and have found the Metadatics programme pretty intuitive. Anyway, it's fixed my problem! Thanks again for your help.

Paul

Posted on: 12 February 2014 by Zauberberg

A bit late for the OP, but I use something on OSX simply called "Tag" for basic metadata editing (version 0.4.1). Pretty sure I heard about it from this forum; it is free and always done the job.