Music Editing Software

[Kirghiz]

Not really as complicated of a thing as it sounds. I'm looking for something to merge multiple tracks on a disc into one track. Sometimes artists make two songs run together on the album on purpose, but they are split on the disc. A classic rock example is Led Zeppelin with Heartbreaker and Living Loving Maid, but more recently Stone Sour did it with Gone Sovereign and Absolute Zero.The songs are made to go together, but when you put them on shuffle, whether it be on CD or iPod, they get split.

I have what amounts to a fairly significant Buckehead library, and he has this habit of breaking a 25 minute piece of music into 5 or 6 tracks. I blame it on download services wanting to charge 99 cents for a song, and his 40+ minute albums would only be 3 tracks.

What should I use to stack these tracks end to end and make them play as a single track?

[Kirghiz]

I used a free open source program called Audacity, and it seems to have done the job. I have no idea if it lost any sound quality in doing it yet. My computer speakers aren't going to tell me that. I'll have to wait to get in the truck tomorrow to find out I guess.

[ajaye]

I used a free open source program called Audacity, and it seems to have done the job. I have no idea if it lost any sound quality in doing it yet. My computer speakers aren't going to tell me that. I'll have to wait to get in the truck tomorrow to find out I guess.

Audacity will automatically open any format of audio as a lossless format (.aup file) with a 32 bit float word length and I'm pretty sure the latest version will use the native sample rate, unless you specify otherwise. This is all fine. The scenario that can get iffy is starting with an mp3 (mp3s in your case), opening them with audacity to edit them which automatically transcodes them to a lossless audacity project, then when editing is complete exporting the project and saving it as an mp3. I haven't done any in depth analysis, but I have looked at the before and after spectrogram to verify that you do in fact end up with different information after re-encoding to mp3. My guess is its mostly caused by quantization distortion. This can also have the adverse effect of clipping transients that are very close to 0db already in the original mp3.

So the short answer to your question about sound quality would technically be yes, you are if you are doing it as I described above. Is it gonna be noticeable? Depends on too many factors, some songs may be worse than others, some you may not be able to tell a difference. What I've always done is just save my edited files as lossless wav regardless of the format they started as. This way you at least remain at the same quality you started with. That's the only way I've come up with. Hopefully I didn't confuse you too much.

[Kirghiz]

So, I'm now in the process of importing a ton of CD's into Apple Lossless, and I have run across several old CD's that have never had any bottom end. I'm going to use Appetite For Destruction for the example, since this disc has frustrated me for 20+ years. Before you say, "If it isn't on the cd it isn't supposed to be there", if you have heard Paradise City or Night Train performed live by either GN'R or Slash, you know how those kick drums should sound. There are some "EQ Options" in itunes for each track, presets basically, and you can also dial up the track volume. I'm not a fan of setting tracks at anything other than "flat" and "0" volume, but the cd's I won't listen to unless it's fixed, like this one, I don't see it as hurting anything. If it doesn't work I won't listen to it anyway.

Is there a proper way to do this, with itunes or something else, or am I just dreaming?

[ajaye]

So, I'm now in the process of importing a ton of CD's into Apple Lossless, and I have run across several old CD's that have never had any bottom end. I'm going to use Appetite For Destruction for the example, since this disc has frustrated me for 20+ years. Before you say, "If it isn't on the cd it isn't supposed to be there", if you have heard Paradise City or Night Train performed live by either GN'R or Slash, you know how those kick drums should sound. There are some "EQ Options" in itunes for each track, presets basically, and you can also dial up the track volume. I'm not a fan of setting tracks at anything other than "flat" and "0" volume, but the cd's I won't listen to unless it's fixed, like this one, I don't see it as hurting anything. If it doesn't work I won't listen to it anyway.

Is there a proper way to do this, with itunes or something else, or am I just dreaming?

I am pretty much the same way. 99 times out of 100 I want everything flat. There are some recordings that are absolutely just poorly engineered. Fortunately, I haven't had this experience with Appetite. The original cd release was mastered by Barry Diament, one of the best ME's out there even still today. I imagine there are many releases out there since with sub-par post production and/or sourced from later generation masters so I don't doubt your experience.

That said, if I were you, I would do it in Audacity. For one, you can see exactly what your changes are doing to the waveform. For instance, if you wanted to apply a +3db boost at 75hz w/ 3db bandwidth starting at 50 and ending at 100, but the recording has transients peaking just below 0db to start, you could very well end up with clipped transients after your equing. With Audacity, you can take the entire recording down to say -5db peak, do whatever editing you'd like, then normalize back to 0db, so your levels will be essentially where they were when you started, but you gave yourself the headroom to push midbass up a few db without any (real) adverse effect. Two, you should have at the very least, the parametric eq plugin Audacity comes with (I think) vs being limited with the graphic in itunes. Third, you can quickly and easily pull up frequency analysis graphs vs. flying blind in itunes. Biggest thing to remember, boost wide, cut narrow.

The downside, it will take you a while to get a feel for the workflow of Audacity, and a lot of trial and error when you are first starting out. There are certainly better daw's, but for basic stereo editing and for free, I don't think you can beat Audacity, and it will run pretty much any plugin I have, albeit not in real-time like the other daw's I use. I'm no expert, but just in the last year the amount of info I've been able to learn and put into practical use for myself audio-wise makes me doubt you'd have a problem doing the same, just a matter of having the time and wanting to spend some of it learning some new shit. I'll be happy to help if I can, ask away.

I have a lossless high res flac of the original LP release and of the Back To Black LP Reissue if you want either of them. I think the Back To Black reissue would solve the problem for you in the case of Appetite. At least it takes your list down by one! lol

[ajaye]

I was fooling around with Audacity out of curiosity after responding last night. I think it may be even easier than I thought. Once you have a track opened, the first thing I do is change the view from linear to waveform db. That's in the dropdown to the left of the waveform window, it should say the name of the file you have opened. Then go under Edit -> Select -> Select All. That will highlight the whole track. Go under Effects and see if you have the Equalization plug-in I'm highlighting in the first pic. I believe you should have everything that's in my menu actually down to where my AU's start. (If you have a mac you probably have some of those too). If you open that Equalization plug-in, it should bring up the window like the 2nd pic. You basically just double click the blue line and you can draw whatever eq curves you want by dragging the line up or down. I just made some random curves so you can see what I mean. To do a simple bell, you have to make 3 drag points, where it starts to rise, where it peaks, and where it comes back down to 0, and I believe the Length of Filter slider smooths out the filter (thin green line). You can click the Graphic box and it will give you sliders like in the 3rd pic if you prefer that. There's also a few presets in the dropdown, but I'd steer clear of them. A +9db lowpass shelf from 100hz is a terrible idea lol.

If you have the plug-ins which I'm pretty sure you do/they came with the Audacity download, and the track you're starting with is peaking above -2/-3 db, best bet is to start with Select All, then under Effects and select Normalize. Leave the first 2 options checked, there shouldn't be any DC offset if you started with audio you took from a CD. In the box enter where you want your maximum transient peak to be, -6.0 db should probably be plenty for minor equing. Leave "Normalize stereo channels independently" UNCHECKED. That will maintain the original stereo channel balance of the recording. (If you check that box, it will make both channels max peak at the value you enter, even if the original audio has the right channel peak .2 db higher than the left.) Hit OK and you will see the new waveform shrink considerably. Do the Eqing as above, then do the Normalize step again when you're done, only this time take it back up to where it was peaking before you started, or if you want it as loud as it can be, normalize to -0.0 db.

[dbjury]

Just a quick note. There is a full music multi track editing software called reaper. It's free to use and evaluate forever.

Www.reaper.fm

[Kirghiz]

Very cool Ajaye, thanks! I'm working through some of these albums, seeing what I can do to them. My biggest complaint at this point is that my truck is in the driveway, and my headphones don't sound like my truck. I expect some trial and error until I get them dialed in, but this is a very easy to manipulate the tracks.

On another note, if one were competing in an SPL competition that required the use of a commercially available song, and one wanted to jack up the frequencies right around their tuning, this'd be a good way to cheat. LOL

[Kirghiz]

Have you messed around with the "Clip Fix" effect? When I imported Master Of Puppets, Battery was clipped all to hell fresh off the cd. I went "clip fix-Normalize-EQ-Normalize", and the track that audacity spit out actually had less distortion than the CD version. Kinda blew my mind. I won't know how it's going to sound in the real world until tomorrow, but on my headphones it sounded better.

[ajaye]

Have you messed around with the "Clip Fix" effect? When I imported Master Of Puppets, Battery was clipped all to hell fresh off the cd. I went "clip fix-Normalize-EQ-Normalize", and the track that audacity spit out actually had less distortion than the CD version. Kinda blew my mind. I won't know how it's going to sound in the real world until tomorrow, but on my headphones it sounded better.

I haven't used it in Audacity, I have izotope RX that has a Declip plugin that I've tried once or twice. Audacity is gonna recognize anything AT OR above 0db as clipping, so technically some of those peaks may not be clipped, but digital 0db full scale is still distortion. (That's partly why Audacity works as 32 bit float automatically, so you have the digital headroom to rectify the overs). Also, remember that a clipped analog waveform can be represented digitally. For example, the studio is making master tape dubs for oversees distros (common) and saturates the tape feed signal (not so common but for example's sake), then transferred from that master tape dub to digital with a few db headroom later, you won't show digital clipping in Audacity, but you'll still have analog clipping and the distortion that comes with it on anything made from that 2nd generation master dub or digital transfer of it. Confused yet?

This is what pisses me off about "digital remasters" of older albums, and even some first CD issues of albums recorded analog and originally engineered/mastered for LP/cassette. When they did the tape to digital transfers back in the day, if they fucked it up ie pushed it to 0db or brick walled it, every reissue that is made from that digital transfer after that is gonna be fucked up no matter what. It basically becomes how shiny can we make this turd.

This is why I end up trying to find an early issue LP, high res remaster, or boutique label remaster of albums like this. I don't buy for a second that a 24karat gold plated CD sounds better than the same thing pressed on a standard CD would, or that 24 bit/high sample rate frequency is some magic cure, that shit is certainly marketing for the most part. What usually makes the difference is that the boutique labels like Mobile Fidelity etc will only reissue albums they can get the original master tapes of to start with, they have the gear and the knowledge to do the transfers the right way, and they have a knowledgeable (insane) customer base that makes it worthwhile for them to preserve the original dynamic range of the masters as closely as possible. (I should note that I am also borderline insane about this shit sometimes, and a lot of times its not THAT big a deal). Its one thing if the original release is smashed from the jump (Californication is the most popular and terrible sounding example that comes to mind, and pretty sure there's a Rick Ruben Metallica project or two as well) but Master of Puppets wasn't and its gotten tortured on CD as time goes on, along with the rest of Metallica's catalog. If they are so concerned about piracy, they should give people a reason to pay for their music instead of playing right along with the loudness for the sake of loudness bullshit.

Just to illustrate for anyone that's like "wtf are you talking about?" The first pic is Battery from a 2010 remaster of Master Of Puppets. The second pic is from the DCC 24k gold CD remaster. Pretty freaking noticeable difference. I've done nothing to these files except open them, both lossless direct from CD, zero manipulation at all. I'll trade off having to turn my volume knob up a little higher for the 2nd one vs the first one being loud but sounding like shit any day. Kirghiz I'm happy to share the DCC reissue of the album, just PM me your dropbox if you have one. I've got the DCC Ride the Lightning too, the Warner 4 LP 45 RPMs of Justice and Black album, a early Roadrunner LP and Universal 2LP 45 RPM of Ride the Lightning as well. The DCCs are without question the best CD versions I've heard, the Roadrunner gives Ride the Lightning a run though.

[ajaye]

Very cool Ajaye, thanks! I'm working through some of these albums, seeing what I can do to them. My biggest complaint at this point is that my truck is in the driveway, and my headphones don't sound like my truck. I expect some trial and error until I get them dialed in, but this is a very easy to manipulate the tracks. :

I don't know what you're using now, but if you ever wanted to upgrade headphones, I highly recommend Ultrasone. I have used a lot of headphones, and for a few years there when I DJ'd full time I was listening to music through headphones for literally 6-10 hours a day every day. The model I have are more DJ oriented, I wouldn't classify them as "transparent" or "monitors" but very pleasant and not fatiguing at all, and I've only heard good things about their studio oriented models, especially at the price-point. The Sennheiser HD 25 are also a good choice between quality and listenable/enjoyable sounding.

Regardless, as long as you pay attention to how whatever you have translates you'll eventually just know how it needs to sound in the headphones to sound right elsewhere. Just a matter of time. ie any sub-$200 headphones aren't gonna dig super deep, so you know you don't have to overdo the bottom-bottom end at your desk for it to be good in the car, etc.