Keeping your music managed with PN, MIK, iTunes & Rekordbox

[Mitch]

PRO TIP ALERT

Most DJs suck at organising music. Nothing makes me cringe more than seeing "Track 1 - Uknown Artist" in someone's collection.

I have never met anyone more OCD than myself for keeping my music collection perfectly tagged & sorted (Gandy would come close/equal), so I thought I'd share how i do all of this. I have devised this method around DJing in clubs using Pioneer CDJ players with USB functionality. This assumes you are using MP3 files, however is still applicable to using WAV or AIFF, just a couple of extra steps

Software I use:

-Platinum notes 4: to equalise the volume of all the tracks

-Mixed in Key 5: write the key of each track to the song tag

-iTunes: library management, playlist creation & general listening

-Rekordbox: exporting to USB

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PART A: configuring program preferences/settings (Initial configuration - only need to do once)

1 - Platinum Notes

I have platinum notes write to a predefined folder in my Music Folder (~/PN Analysed). Every file I scan through Platinum Notes gets saved to this folder. To do this

-Open platinum notes

- Click personalise

- Output location -> specific folder -> select the "PN Analysed" folder you've created

2 - Mixed in Key (MIK)

I have MIK overwrite to my comments field for easy viewing in iTunes, as well as the key field for easy browsing and sorting on my CDJs & rekordbox. To configure this:

-Open MIK

-Click personalise

-Update tags -> copy settings as per pic below

3 - iTunes

I have iTunes copy files into its folder when adding files to library, as well as self-sort all music into the folder structure "[Artist] -> [Album] -> [tracknumber] [Tracktitle].mp3". This allows for easy retrieval of files and saves the worry of manually creating folders and moving files around inside your music folder. To configure this (assumes using iTunes 11):

-Open iTunes

-Open preferences (command + , on mac || edit menu -> preferences on windows)

-Advanced tab -> tick "Keep iTunes Media folder organised" & "Copy files to iTunes media folder when adding to library"

-Click OK

-view Menu -> Show sidebar

-view Menu -> column browser -> show column browser

-view Menu -> view options -> ensure artist, album, genre, year, beats per minute, time and comments are ticked

Your iTunes now looks more like it was in previous versions, with the playlists on the side.

Now - for each genre of music you will be adding/Using

-file -> add playlist folder -> name it as the genre

-inside each folder, create a playlist in the format "yyyy-mm" (e.g. 2013-05 for May 2013). This ensures they show up in correct order when sorted in alphabetic order

-Create a folder called "unsorted" with a playlist inside it

You should now have a list of genres as folders on the left hand side of your iTunes, + an "unsorted" playlist folder (I also have a mixes playlist folder I export to my iPod).

4 - Rekordbox

I essentially only use rekordbox as an interface to get the tunes onto USB so they are nicely formatted for use on the players. Also set predefined cues/hot cues & loops so they are ready for when you load the tracks up on your player. To configure rekordbox:

-Open rekordbox

-file -> preferences

-on the GENERAL tab -> make sure you UNTICK "enable key analysis on import" - this is so rekordbox won't overwrite the camelot key you just spent adding in using MIK with a standard notation key

-on the EXPORT tab -> CATEGORY sub-tab -> ensure artist, album, playlist, key, genre, year, bpm, track, history, search and folder are in the active categories

-On the EXPORT tab -> SORT sub-tab -> Ensure Artist, Album, BPM, Key, Genre & Time are in the active categories

-On the EXPORT tab -> COLUMN sub-tab -> select key as item shown next to track name on CDJ

-On the EXPORT tab -> my settings sub-tab -> select settings as to how you like to use the players. I personally like to ensure master tempo & vinyl mode are on in there settings

Setting all those allows for nice browsing by key and playlist on the players

-Go to playlists

-Right click on playlists and create a playlist folder for each genre you wish to import/play

Now check you've configured rekordbox, for each USB you're going to use:

-Insert USB

-Give them an appropriate name in Windows Explorer/Mac Finder (e.g. DEEPHOUSE-1)

-Open rekordbox

-Say yes to any prompts regarding importing your settings to the usb.

-Open devices screen in rekordbox

-Click your USB.

-Give your usb a device name - This will be what shows up when you're using link and have multiple devices to choose from

-Go to category tab on the right, and check to see you have the following. Arrange them into whatever order you'd like them to show up as on the usb

OK, the hardest Part is done! now for Part B....

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PART B: Processing / Sorting Music (Do this each time you download a bunch of dope new tunes)

1 - Downloading the tracks

-Tracks go to your downloads folder

-You can move them to another folder inside your downloads folder, such as "new music". You can also set up scripts to do this automatically if you're really keen (like me).

2 - Analysing through platinum notes

-Open platinum notes

-Drag all tracks you just downloaded into the window and click "Start Processing"

-Wait a few minutes, and all your tracks will now have a new copy of them in the "PN Analysed" folder we created earlier.

-You can now archive / delete the original copy you downloaded. I used to keep the original downloaded copy until i'd listened through the files to make sure platinum notes had made no mistakes - however I don't bother anymore as the program is a lot more stable.

3 - Analysing with Mixed in Key

-Open your "PN analysed" folder

-Open Mixed in Key

-Drag all the songs you just analysed from PN into the mixed in key window

-Wait a few minutes until all of those are processed

-Quit MIK

4 - Adding to iTunes & sorting

-Open your "PN analysed" folder

-Drag all the songs you just analysed into the playlist you created inside the "Unsorted" playlist folder.

-If you are using MP3 files -> highlight all tracks you just imported (command + a for mac, control + a for windows) -> right click -> convert ID3 tags -> choose 2.4 -> click OK. This updates the tags so they are all standard, can solve some compatibility issues and strange tag encoding on some tracks.

-FIX ALL THE LABELLING ON THE TRACKS - it is important you do this now, for a number of reasons. 1) if you don't do it now, you never will. 2) it makes you listen / familiarise yourself with the tracks (even if you only skim through and listen to parts of it). 3)if you fix the tags at a later date, iTunes moves them into a different folder as per the automatic sorting rules, making them show up as missing files in rekordbox

-After you've labellled all your tracks, sort the playlist by genre

-Batch highlight and move each genre into the current month's playlist (e.g. highlight all deep house tracks and move into the deep house folder -> 2013-05 playlist)

-Remove all the tracks you just sorted from the "unsorted" playlist

5 - Adding to Rekordbox

-Open rekordbox

-Open iTunes

-For each genre you added tracks to in iTunes -> create a playlist inside the genre folder you created earlier (essentially mirror iTunes playlist structure). see below:

-For each genre, click on the current month's playlist, select all (command + a for mac, control + a for windows), then drag the tracks into the corresponding playlist in recordbox

**NOTE: IT IS IMPORTANT YOU DON'T USE THE BRIDGE FUNCTIONALITY OF REKORDBOX, AND PERFORM THIS STEP AS STATED. IF YOU DO USE THE BRIDGE FUNCTIONALITY, THE CAMELOT KEYS WILL NOT DISPLAY IN THE KEY FIELD CORRECTLY****

See below as example for what i mean as how to do this:

6 - Exporting to USB

I personally have 3 usbs for each genre - This is mainly due to me owning 3 850s and this makes it easier to manage. If you always use 900s or 2000s with the larger screen and link, you could get away with 3 usbs in total (always carry more usbs than you need, so you have backup in the unlikely event one doesn't work).

-Plug in USB

-Expand playlists folder

-drag the playlist folders you want onto the usb

-say yes to overwrite the old folder and update the playlists

-Let songs copy, eject your usb from within rekordbox & enjoy

[russell]

Epic post

[GREMM1S]

lol certainly OCD, but a helpful OCD.

[Mitch]

Also note you can apply the similar steps for use with traktor / serato, as they both also integrate with itunes

[GREMM1S]

I do the same bar no PN and i go straight to Rekordbox.

[yizzle]

great thread Mitch, i don't use Platinum notes 4 or Rekordbox but when i get around to Rekordbox thanks in advance.

should be sticky, awesome read and know-how thread

[Cupe]

Holy actual fuck

+rep

[Sentinel]

Nice! Great to see it written up like this

How do you find PN4? Been contemplating upgrading from PN3 but don't know if it's worth it.

[Mitch]

Well it now outputs to AIFF or FLAC which makes it worth it IMO, so much easier to process and maintain those tracks.

Also probably a bit more stable - I had the odd track which didn't encode properly on 3, haven't had that trouble in 4

[Mitch]

Added converting the ID3 tags to v2.4 (Part B step 4) which i forgot to put in there originally

[AlexJ]

epic read.

top post

will sort out soon

[Addi]

Wow, epic post mitch!

ADJF needs a 'like' function or something haha

[Mitch]

Once upon a time we had a rep system.

We just haven't been able to integrate it again since we upgraded the backend a couple of years ago.

[Tomy]

rad post man, interesting to see how other people organise their music and strangely i almost do it the same way. The only thing i don't do is "Copy files to iTunes media folder when adding to library" mainly because it takes up so much extra space because i have gigs of music.

[Mitch]

Yer i still delete the original after it's copied into iTunes.

It's the equivalent of just putting it in your music folder really - I just like having iTunes sorting it into its folders automatically

[mattus123]

epic post man

seems pretty similar to how i do things, except i havent got platinum notes yet

what does writing hte key to the tags do? is it any different to just using mixed in key to put it in the comments?

[Mitch]

writing to the "initial key" tag allows you to browse by each key easily when using CDJs with usb. Just took a couple of pictures of my CDJ screen to explain. Phone is flat, so using 1 megapixel tablet camera:

main selection screen, you can select key

browsing through each key

once selected a key, all the tracks that are that key show up in alphabetical order by track name. If you are on a cdj 900 / 2000, you can press the menu button and change how these tracks are sorted on the fly (e.g. change to sort by rating)

[GREMM1S]

It should by default in MIK add the tag info for rekordbox yeah?

You just have to add the key sorting field on your usb.

[Mitch]

Yes - the steps are:

-Check MIK settings to ensure it is writing to key field

-Enable key field on your usb(s)

-Disable rekordbox key detection so it doesn't overwrite it

[Hobberz]

Good post, exactly how I organise my tunes.

[mattus123]

hey mitch, would u be able to share the secret on how to automatically send files to a specific folder when downlaoded?

Is there a way that i can just send all audio files to a specific folder?

[Mitch]

It's easy on mac.

For windows, Ill need write you a script.

You normally just have your browser save to the downloads folder inside your user profile?

[Adrian]

Great post, thanks Mitch. This will definitely save some time searching.

[GREMM1S]

Isnt that hard to just copy from the downloads to music folder?

[Mitch]

I like to automate where i can as it saves time