Rating Songs in iTunes

[acousticlady]

Re: Rating Songs in iTunes

When I first read this thread, my reaction was - "I never use the ratings." However, after taking a long road trip this past weekend, I realized I do have my own system of categorizing. I tend to get into genres rather than specific favorite songs. Some days I'm into alternative pop, other days, the blues (but only when I'm happy....) other days I'm into classic jazz or smooth jazz or whatever. I tend to be genre specific depending on where I am, too. For example, in my office, I'll play more laid back softer stuff like Jack Johnson and in my car more head bopping upbeat kind of stuff. I'll also put together songs that are in my key so I can sing along with them in the car. Around the house - it's more jazz oriented and I do enjoy going to listen to a classical orchestra, but almost never listen to classical outside of a concert setting. For the most part, I can tell you who is playing (ok, with a few exceptions), but what the name of a song is (with almost no exceptions) I don't have a clue.

For the record (yuk, yuk) I almost never listen to music directly off the computer. I do have my stereo system at home run through the computer (or is it the other way around???) I much prefer to decompress anything in iTunes and burn it onto a disc. Even at school, I play it through a decent system.

Is that nerdy geeky enough for ya?

[mel]

Re: Rating Songs in iTunes

I have lots of playlists (my favorite iPod feature) but I still do the drag and drop routine! I'm probably as obsessive about my playlists as you are about your ratings but I still make playlists the old fashioned way!!!

That's the way I manage all of my music in iTunes as the 16,400+ tracks are spread through playlists to 5 different iPods.

I have 2 iPod Shuffles, 1st generation models at 512k each - one does current hits the other, 1970s oldies. All from playlists tailor made to fit the 512k iPod.

For my iPod Mini - which I bought for $30 out of a thrift store 2 years ago - I have 4 GB of oldies, various playlists which include various artist mixes by time frame (years, decade, 60s oldies, 70s oldies, classic rock) and a smattering of albums from those days.

For my iPod Nano - 2nd gen - 4GB worth of "current hits" which consist mainly of music released in the last 2 or 3 years, plus a smattering of 90s tracks. This is where the playlists previously mentioned "top 100 hits", "top 100 recurrents" and "catalogue tracks" go in addition to smaller playlists of "current country", "alt rock" and individual albums.

My last iPod is a 40GB iPod Photo, which in addition to a small collection of photos, has all of my playlists from the iPods above, plus more mixes and plenty of individual albums, selected podcasts and a few radio shows (recorded from old tapes or hijacked from streaming audio) in that. That iPod mostly stays at home connected to the big stereo with the traditional tape deck, CD player, DVD, VHS and turntable.

I think 80% of the time when I listen to music content, it is always a mix from the playlists. I was a huge fan and made plenty of "mix tapes" on cassette for about 30 years through the 70s to the early 2000s.

So my listening habits favor the mix, and I guess if I were rating my music as extensively as Scrivener is either doing or wants to do, then most of my favorite music appear on those iPod or older cassette mixes... many songs over and over again through different mixes, which for me probably says, those are my favorites!

I use Last FM to track my songs and artists. I just posted my top 25 most listened to artists here:

http://www.hawaiithreads.com/showpos...&postcount=168

[mel]

Re: Rating Songs in iTunes

It certainly does. I mentioned in the first post that I was slow to jump in the iTunes bandwagon. Part of that was my love for albums: the thrill of peeling the cellophane off the jewel case, the concept (already fading at that point, obviously) of the album side, the liner notes, the album art. I admit I was amazed at how iTunes in shuffle mode added a new dimension to my listening: it helped me rediscover old favorites and hear songs in new contexts. While I love all the new ways of listening to my songs, I have to say that my old habits have stuck with me for most of my listening. I almost ALWAYS listen to entire albums, and in their published order. I seldom purchase singles (which was true even when I was in high school) and when an artist I like comes out with a new song, I don't think, "Wow, U2 has a new song," I think, "I need to get that album."

As I stated in my previous post, I usually listen to mixes. For me the ability to create many, many custom mixes using the iTunes Playlist function is the best thing about the software and the iPod. Surely I have hundreds of mixes but I do also have playlists for individual albums, because sometimes I also like to listen to an album from beginning to end.

I can relate to your analogy of going through the album art and all that... and for me it goes back further to well... vinyl LPs when the artwork was bigger and you got extras like posters or even a bonus 45 thrown in with some albums. I liked gatefold vinyl albums like Elton John's "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" which was a nicely packaged product.. that and his 1975 "Captain Fantasitic..." album that had a gatefold, two booklets and a poster... all big, easy to read text and graphics... certainly beats CDs and definitely beats a digital album if you like album art.

Usually when I buy a CD I listen to the whole album at least once through and if I like it many times later. But first thing after that, the CD is ripped the songs redistributed to a playlist so that I end up only playing tracks I like through iTunes/iPods.

From kid time I was usually a singles buyer because they were cheaper, plus my first few loads of 45s came from my Dad's friend who had a jukebox business and unloaded the old records on us.... for free. So my bias for singles have stayed with me all my life even into the digital age.

Fact is every digital album now contains a single for every song as iTunes and Amazon allows users to buy songs one track at the time... and many people will often skip most of the album and buy only those tracks they like. That's how it is set up these days.

Then there are those artists who only released some songs on singles... even major album artists like U2 from the time they started.. they had interesting tracks that were first released on singles only... usually the A side was the hit, but often their B-sides had non-album tracks that were quite interesting like the cover of "Dancing Barefoot." Those tracks never made it to a regular album for years until either the artists or record label wanted to create a new album using "B-Sides".

And yes, the iTunes/iPod shuffle modes are great. I use them all the time.

The only time shuffle turns music into a mess is when it breaks apart those few albums that just have to be listened to as a whole... Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" comes to mind on this.

I once inherited an old iPod from zztype (it has the touch wheel but only a Firewire port for transferring data and for charging) and he left his music on it. He had a playlist for every album on there, and no other playlists! So I know I'm not alone.

There are Mac utilities that can pull music out of used iPods and allow you to save them to your iTunes. These come in handy too if your main hard drive dies with all your music on it and your iPod is the only avenue you have to save that music.

Bottom line: Back up, back up, back up.