Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming What's up with Sticky Fingers?

I've been trying to import The Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers CD and for some reason Sooloos keeps reporting it as lossy. I've ripped FLAC from two different pressings of the CD, imported it directly, everything I can think of in fact. In every case it registers the album as having 13 tracks instead of 10 and misses out tracks 2 and 7 while doubling up on a couple of others.

Anyone else come across anything similar and is there a solution? Its driving me nuts.

Also what does Bad Media actually mean? For some reason it doesn't like the first disc of the deluxe edition of Santana III. Again ripped using XLD. should i just ignore it?

I haven't tried to import that CD and have no experience with XLD but I do know that when "bad media" is reported it will likely mean there will be problems with the playback. It happened to me in one or two cases. I just re-ripped those CDs in dBpa and it was ok. Not sure why the first rip (which reported all ok in dBpa) did not work. Perhaps something got messed up in the transfer to my TwinStore?

As an experiment I bought the recent iTunes version of the album and tried importing it with the same result. It seems to me it's a problem with the metadata. I can't think of a way to skip the Sooloos look-up, even un-albumizing it doesn't work.

This album has quite a few releases according to allmusic.com. I have had problems in the past where Sooloos didnt choose the 'right' one.

Have you tried importing the metadata directly by specifying a Rovi or AMG Id. Even saying that, a quick look at the allmusic database didnt show any versions with 13 tracks so it does seem odd.

When you say 'Bad Media' do you mean the album ripped without error in XLD but when you imported the FLACs you got a bad media message. I have had this sometimes when there are weird characters in the filename e.g. accented characters etc.

Cheers
Greg

Tried all that. On import it even lists tracks in the edit screen that don't have any corresponding files. Really strange.

I wouldn't mind if was a lesser album, but it's such a classic. It's annoying not being able to get it to import properly.

Yes that's exactly it. I'm not sure what's causing it in this instance. I just noticed it doesn't like disc 9 of the complete Roxy Music box either. Initially reported it as lossy so I re-ripped and now it acknowledges it as a CD, but comes up as bad media when I use focus.

One thing I've noticed is sometimes CDs get non sequential tracks on import and that causes problems. Sooloos won't let you completely ignore it's data so it's hard to find a work around that lets you re-tag and get a clean import.

FYI, I have a 10 track Sticky Fingers ripped ok @ CD quality.
Chris

Which pressing is it? Both my copies are the Bob Ludwig mastered Virgin re-issues. There was an earlier version on CBS and a more recent remaster on Universal.

I can't be certain, the info says Virgin and Bob Ludwig is not in the credits as Mastering.
Chris

The same as mine then, so that isn't it.

I think apostrophes are a complete no-no for Sooloos in the filename. If you look at the original files in Finder, check there definitely aren't any non letter characters. I would be tempted to just rename them to something very similar but with only letters.

On the Mac, try downloading a tag editor and have a look at the meta data on the FLAC files. Just check there isn't something odd looking. I have had Control:Mac throw some very strange errors if there is odd meta data, even though it is then going out and getting its own meta data. One set didnt have the number of tracks set correctly and that screwed it as well.

I have had some very odd errors in the past, but have normally got around them eventually, but its trial and error, unfortunately.

Cheers
Greg

A Workaround, not a Solution as such.

Using AllMusic.com, open as many Tabs as are required about the Album, including Tabs for Review and Credits etc.

Disconnect your Router from Internet Access i.e. you still have a Home Network, but no internet access.

Drag and Drop the Album Files onto Control:Mac.

Control:Mac will attempt to verify the Album on AMG but will return a message of "Cannot find Album" or similar, as it obviously cannot access AMG.

The Track File Names and other Metadata should stay as per the XLD Rip and you can Copy / Paste the Review into the Review field.

Import the Album TWICE!! Explained below.

Reconnect your Router to Internet.

Using ONE version of the Album, try using the "Update Metadata" option and see what AMG does with updating the Metadata; it MAY then Update the Artists and Credits etc. If you like the Results, keep that version, if not, you can delete the "Updated Version" and keep the other copy from above.

Thanks, I'll try the above suggestions. At the moment the only thing I've managed to do is split the album in two by importing five tracks at a time and then creating a set.