Music Library

[catretriever]

A Mate of mine has just taken delivery of a bespoke cabinet to house his music CD's and it got me wondering about the optimum way to order the collection (see "High Fidelity"). So how do you do it? Personally I prefer a stratight alphabetised order ( with band name taking precedence over any solo work), but obviously there are other sorting options out there like Genre, or even Record label.

So how do you sort yours?


p.s. anyone telling me to get an ipod will be told to insert it analy

[lotuslad]

Get an iPod

[catretriever]

Well I hope yours is a 'mini' my lad

>> Edited by catretriever on Friday 7th January 15:20

[MilnerR]

I have my CDs in a sort of pile. They are in order of the ones i use most i.e. those at the bottom i hardly listen to, those at the top i listen to a lot. Just to make things a bit more interesting about 50% of the CDs are in the wrong boxes.
Same with my DVDs come to think of it.......

[jimothy]

When girlfriend is not around:

Alphabetically by group/solo artist surname.
Anything by various artists goes under Various...

Albums by each group/artist are then sorted in chronological order.

When girlfriend gets her hands on them:

In order that they get put away, with not necessarily the right CD in the box. Might even be an empty box with another box having 2 CD's...

At least she can't muck up the order on my iPod!

[catretriever]

MilnerR said:

I have my CDs in a sort of pile. They are in order of the ones i use most i.e. those at the bottom i hardly listen to, those at the top i listen to a lot. Just to make things a bit more interesting about 50% of the CDs are in the wrong boxes. Same with my DVDs come to think of it.......

Stop it.....you're scaring me!

[GetCarter]

iPod (seconded)

[docevi1]

I have my CD's alphabetical on the first name (i.e. L for Lene Marlin). It works and I know where all my CD's are.

I then have an iPod and the collection of MP3's on my PC as well .

I would post a picture of my CD's, but there is only 300 or so of them beside about 30 DVDs so it's not really that impressive

[dds1]

MilnerR said:

I have my CDs in a sort of pile. They are in order of the ones i use most i.e. those at the bottom i hardly listen to, those at the top i listen to a lot. Just to make things a bit more interesting about 50% of the CDs are in the wrong boxes. Same with my DVDs come to think of it.......

exactly my approach! except its more like 65% in the wrong cases..

[selmer]

According to genre.
From the top left hand side of my room starting with early blues and sixties blues based bands going through r&b (proper stuff that is, not MTV r&b!!) through bluesy rock and into proper rock. Then alt rock and...bugger it this could go on forever. Anyway it gets complicated but it all ends up at contemporay European folk inspired jazz á la ECM and ACT labels.

[MilnerR]

This thread could be a good way of finding out PHs most anally retentive member

[simpo two]

Heavy metal on the left, classical on the right and all points in between.

[JulianHJ]

Top 50 favourites (most fav. at top of rack) on a wire rack. The remaining 300+ in no particular order on some shelves, while I try and find a storage method I'm happy with. When I do it'll be storage by genre, favourites most accessible.

[gopher]

The most listened to work their way to the front, less listened to work their way to the back (deep shelves), but in reality the ones I really like get copied to HD and listened to from there. Sorted by preference.

[900T-R]

The first 30 or so LP's that I bought went into some early '80s plastic holder - after that everything got piled to the sides of that in more or less chronological order of obtaining them, except for a couple of artists/bands of which I have something halfway aproaching a collection, in which case I put them all together.

CD's -mostly chronological, apart from the 10-15 I play most which go from one car to another and when not in use, are laid somewhere where I can grab them...

[fatsteve]

MilnerR said:

This thread could be a good way of finding out PHs most anally retentive member

Hmm, it's highly addictive though. My CD's (800+) have always been filled in Artist order (alphabetically), and then a various section (identically to jimothy).

I've switched from evil bloatware MusicMatch to itunes (finally buying an iPod was the catalyst) and have really cleaned up my MP3 collection (again 800+ albums). The scary bit is that you do become obsessive over the naming and titles. I'm refining it all the time, generally:

1. Ensuring all CD's have a cover thumbnail (nice for generating playlists and a catalogue for :cough: sharing with friends!!)

2. Ensuring common songs (on different albums) have the correct title (especially dance tunes with different mixes).

3. Case - really anal about that!!, uppercased first letter

4. Sorting multi-disk albums out with proper ID3 tags (rather than having "Album X - Disc 1", "Album X - Disc 2" etc).

I'm booked into see the shrink next week BTW!!! LMAO!!

Steve

[selmer]

MilnerR said:

This thread could be a good way of finding out PHs most anally retentive member

haha...I set about producing an Excel doc on my collection about 2 years ago (had a look at some 'professional ones online but didn't fancy paying for the software). Thought, "this'll be great fun", about 6 months later I was still leafing through sleevenotes and discographies to find out when exactly that alternate session was recorded and what the engineer was called, in order to input every-bloody-thing.
Now I just have the problem of deciding what do I put on my iPod.
High Fidelity only just scratched the surface for most blokes I think.

[neil.b]

Not particularly glamarous: 1500+ CDs in cardboard boxes in a non-descript storage unit

All my music has been MP3'd and now resides on a 500gb firewire drive attached to my iMac running Squeezebox server, piping music wirelessly to the lounge and the bedroom.

Must admit, there was something cool about having all the CDs on display, it was like an art installation.

[matt_t16]

900T-R said:

apart from the 10-15 I play most

"Fat of the land" being one of them?

I have a really great system for organising my CD's, purchase CD and rip to PC, lose/misplace/lend CD never to be seen again, when required simply burn album to disc

[fatsteve]

neil.b said:

Not particularly glamarous: 1500+ CDs in cardboard boxes in a non-descript storage unit All my music has been MP3'd and now resides on a 500gb firewire drive attached to my iMac running Squeezebox server, piping music wirelessly to the lounge and the bedroom. Must admit, there was something cool about having all the CDs on display, it was like an art installation.

Would agree with that entirely. Despite listening to my music via iPod or Slimserver, and not needing to have CD's available, there is still something greatly satisfying about rows of CD's "on show". I guess it's the same as having an extensive book library, show's that you are "well read!".