Mega collection question

MusicBrainz Picard
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I have a huge amount of unorganized digital music files.

I have a simple question.

How do I consolidate my collection using Music Brainz?

Specifically, what steps should I take in uploading my massive library that includes many duplicates into Music Brainz? How do I use Music Brainz in this application?

Do I use another program first to identify duplicates then use Music Brainz to fill in tag info and finalize the music into categorized folders?

Or, can I throw everything I have at Music Brainz and have it do all the work in one step?

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Quick answer - don’t do this as it will not work as you expect.

Longer answer - many threads on this. First tip - back it all up before you start as errors will be made.

Work in small batches so you can check results. No automatic system can be 100% accurate.

As you work through batches you’ll also see what kind of matching is happening and then learn to fine tune Picard’s matching algorithms.

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No comment other than that link to the old thread, I don’t want to waste my energy again.

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Kia ora! Welcome!

Some clarification (that you may already know): You don’t ‘upload’ anything into MusicBrainz, which is a music information database. However you might add new releases/information.

MusicBrainz is a music database. There are applications that use its data to tag/organise your music: the main one is MusicBrainz Picard.

This is definitely a common question! The easiest way is simply:

Picard will name files that are duplicates with a number on the end, eg:
01 Coffins.flac
01 Coffins (1).flac

Then you can search your whole music folder for ‘(1)’ (and (2) etc if necessary), and delete them.
Note: there may be songs that actually have (1) in the title. Make sure you’re only deleting duplicates.

As mentioned earlier, definitely back up your collection, or work with a small copy of albums/songs first. Changes to your tags or filenames can not be undone.

Then have a play! All you really need is the Picard quick-start guide:

You’ll probably have more specific questions once you’ve started, just post them in here.

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Thank you for your memory. Just looked back at that thread and realise we are about to be Trolled.

Quick answer - you don’t. It does not work in the way you expect it to. And nothing has changed in the last year. You made it clear long ago that this software doesn’t fit what you do with your collection so it is confusing that you keep coming back to abuse people.

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You shouldn’t do this, work step by step. Especially first try it with one or two albums to understand the workflow and see if the results fit your needs.

Picard does update your file tags and rename your files. So be sure to have a backup. Also Picard is very flexible, but that also means you likely will have to configure some things to get the results exactly like you want it.

There is documentation: Using Picard — MusicBrainz Picard v2.10 documentation

If you have a specific question, ask in this forum.

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You might also want to have a look at the Work Flow Recommendations section of the documentation.

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I suggest that you also think about what you are trying to achieve before you start

  • where will you play the music? - phone, kodi, pc? what metadata does your player on that device require? will you want different versions?
  • you mention you have duplicates, but what is a duplicate? are different formats for the same track a duplicate. what about same format, but different encoding levels?
  • what about artwork? do you want it embedded or not?
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