And when I moved to a Macbook in 2008, mp3tag and I parted ways. I also dug its shell integration: right-click on a folder and select mp3tag to edit the files’ metadata.īut there was a catch: mp3tag was Windows only. Its Discogs, freedb and MusicBrainz integration made it easy to pull down metadata for an entire album with just a few clicks.
Sometime in 2006 (or 2007?) I stumbled across mp3tag – a metadata/tag editing app whose spreadsheet-esque layout suited my needs just so. Between 20, I streamed locally stored FLACs (and MP3s) using the Squeezebox platform: it added no metadata layer of its own so I had to add (or tidy up) the metadata stored in those FLACs and MP3s manually. Streaming platforms like Roon and Plex use digital fingerprinting to identify the albums and songs in our library to add their metadata layer that sits on top of our library. Metadata is also crucial to proper cover art display. Metadata - it’s not the sexiest subject in audio but it’s fundamental to albums and singles appearing in our local libraries with the correct artist name, album title, release year, song title and track number and for us to filter and search our libraries according to that data.