An Example of OCD
I frequently joke about being OCD. I believe everyone is actually to some degree, it's all a matter of degree. And after catching a few episodes of Hoarders (and that other show focusing specifically on OCD, Obsession? Compulsion? by Calvin Klein?), I'm happy to say I'm in no way a dysfunctional OCD type. But sometimes it really shines through.
I've been meaning to rip my CD collection for... oh, about a decade now? I have four or five hundred CDs, so it's not a quick task, but most people would be done in a weekend. I've procrastinated for years because I must "Do. It. Right."
Ideally, I want to archive my CDs in case something ever happens to the discs. That way I'll still have perfect copies to return to. I finally found a program (dBpoweramp) that is super, super anal about "getting it right" in a way that satisfies me. Not only does it compare my rips against other people online to verify that I did in fact get a perfect copy, it will agonize over trying to get it just right if there is an error. I'm hair-pullingly upset my copy of Angelfish's self titled CD has an unrecoverable scratch on track 1, but it spent an hour and a half on the 2:30 song to pull every bit of data it could.
One of the features that I like the most though has to do with the meta data. You know, Artist, Title, Album, song Titles, etc. See, it doesn't just pull from one source, it pulls from 4 different sources in an effort to get it right. If one of them has a typo or gets something wrong, generally the consensus is correct. But every now and then I get thrown for a loop.
See, I'm trying to rip Bouncing Souls' "Tie One On". First off, I had to research to break the tie between "Bouncing Souls" and "Bouncing Souls, The". That was easy. Really. Now I'm trying to decide on which of the three variations on the album title is correct. My choices are:
Now you might think this is easy: two sources agree. But... neither match what is on the CD. Those choices are:
So, to find something more official I end up on the label's website to come up with some final answer. And they have:
Fortunately, the band's website and Wikipedia both agree with Music Brainz and freedb, so I can finally choose "Tie One On" and be done with it. Ultimately none of this really matters, and I fully recognize that. But... some things you just can't let go of.
And if you read all of this and felt you wasted your time, or perhaps you're thinking "That's not that crazy", then let me share the fact that I just listened to a track that consists of 5 minutes of music, 10 minutes of silence, 2 minutes of "You Are My Sunshine" as played by an old LP record, 5 minutes of that LP record skipping and another 15+ minutes of that sound a record player makes when it's in that final groove after the music is over. Because the program said there was an error and I needed to listen to the entire thing to verify that the error wasn't audible. Seriously.
I've been meaning to rip my CD collection for... oh, about a decade now? I have four or five hundred CDs, so it's not a quick task, but most people would be done in a weekend. I've procrastinated for years because I must "Do. It. Right."
Ideally, I want to archive my CDs in case something ever happens to the discs. That way I'll still have perfect copies to return to. I finally found a program (dBpoweramp) that is super, super anal about "getting it right" in a way that satisfies me. Not only does it compare my rips against other people online to verify that I did in fact get a perfect copy, it will agonize over trying to get it just right if there is an error. I'm hair-pullingly upset my copy of Angelfish's self titled CD has an unrecoverable scratch on track 1, but it spent an hour and a half on the 2:30 song to pull every bit of data it could.
One of the features that I like the most though has to do with the meta data. You know, Artist, Title, Album, song Titles, etc. See, it doesn't just pull from one source, it pulls from 4 different sources in an effort to get it right. If one of them has a typo or gets something wrong, generally the consensus is correct. But every now and then I get thrown for a loop.
See, I'm trying to rip Bouncing Souls' "Tie One On". First off, I had to research to break the tie between "Bouncing Souls" and "Bouncing Souls, The". That was easy. Really. Now I'm trying to decide on which of the three variations on the album title is correct. My choices are:
- AMG - Tie One On!
- GD3 - Tie One on Live
- Music Brainz - Tie One On
- freedb - Tie One On
Now you might think this is easy: two sources agree. But... neither match what is on the CD. Those choices are:
- Front - Tie One On!
- Spine - Tie One On (Live)
So, to find something more official I end up on the label's website to come up with some final answer. And they have:
- Epitaph - Tie One On EP (Live)
Fortunately, the band's website and Wikipedia both agree with Music Brainz and freedb, so I can finally choose "Tie One On" and be done with it. Ultimately none of this really matters, and I fully recognize that. But... some things you just can't let go of.
And if you read all of this and felt you wasted your time, or perhaps you're thinking "That's not that crazy", then let me share the fact that I just listened to a track that consists of 5 minutes of music, 10 minutes of silence, 2 minutes of "You Are My Sunshine" as played by an old LP record, 5 minutes of that LP record skipping and another 15+ minutes of that sound a record player makes when it's in that final groove after the music is over. Because the program said there was an error and I needed to listen to the entire thing to verify that the error wasn't audible. Seriously.