Hi All! , Happy New Year!
There’s a previous MUSIC/Artwork thread but this question is not exactly that (I use MATCH and
store everything Local as well) - My artwork, which I know was really together on my previous machine got totally scrootched by an upgrade to Ventura. Talks with Apple about what happened - and how to fix wwent up the ladder so far have fallen off a cliff.
I have a backup - but I’m uncertain - as were the Techs I talked to (who confirmed that, yup, they see this problem) if i could restore my old artwork (I haven’t even erased the old iMac yet!) -even some apple purchesd stuff is broken with wrong covers - sometime - not always - delting artwork and trying to Fetch it works but often it does not. There doesn’t seem to be rhyme or reason here.
So where is this stuff kept - there’s an artwork folder -sure - but Apple likes to put some stuff in weird places in containers. It’s bad enough we don’t get many liner notes (hey I’m always doing something with music-writing -playing - creating) and I’ve spent years- decades - fixing artwork only to have it ludicrously inconsistent. Any pointers to where I can restore my OLD High Sierra Music Artwork.Thanks, in advance !
-ben
“Music is the Best” -FZ
I’m not sure which thread is being referenced so I can only say that for your own imported music from CD’s for example, if the art is embedded in each file properly then it should show up fine when importing to iTunes or Music. While iTunes or Music maintains a database, it has to get that information from somewhere in the first place and if the music file has the art embedded, then it will show up consistently. I don’t use Match and I don’t purchase tracks so all of my files are from my own CD’s or digitized LP’s and I’ve never had any issues with iTunes and art. Some have suggested that the Music app is the issue but since I never really bothered with it extensively, I can’t say. When I did try it years ago, it looked like all of my art was there.
You can still use older iTunes apps by downloading the Retroactive app and that might be one way around the Music issues:
HI,
Thanks for replying. My question is largely about where this artwork is stored. Apple does a lot of the work and if my music was only local - then this would not be an issue (i would hope) Some stuff I added is replaced, some stuff was replaced by apple badly due to the database updated by Ventura/Music. I don’t need to run old apple apps (i have plenty of old machines- one even has N2mp3 on it!)- just trying not to spend another 20 years fixing something as mundane as artwork that I already had. The sync between Apple cloud and my machine for this is mysterious to me.
Best,
-Benjamin
I understand your frustration. My point on using older iTunes apps is that they seem to work better than the Music app and in some cases have features missing from Music.
That article just reinforces my previous point on using older iTunes apps instead of Music. Album browsing has always worked just fine even in older iTunes versions like CoverFlow 10.7 so it’s really sad how far back the Music app has regressed.
Hi,
I could/have written that linked post ! I have frustrated escalated apple techs before because at times I know more than they do (because I’m purty old). However, Match and random play in Apple Music is excellent. I have 190 gigs of music in various formats, of artists and stuff I cultivated which i stream to wherever on my phone.iMac,iPad.laptop etc. Like liner notes, Artwork is poorly handled by apple where it should be (and had been) part of required meta data. (Back when it started DRM was part of the meta). I could run plex, but Match is way less maintenance (i adopted it right away when it come out) and all my cds were transferred over in the 00s. It’s just annoying. I’ll ask Tim about it if I’m ever in the same room with him, Happy IPhone Anniversary
Cool, thanks, I’ll check it out. Looking around i noticed some other Music anomalies due to moving to Ventura (and a few plugin issues in Logic as well to work out). Actually playing music is not a problem though ( sounds even better since i had to upgrade my audio interface).
Cheers,
ben
Hey I thought I would update this issue with my current situation - : since I upgraded my computer I also updated my audio interface (I record music stuff all the time! ) to Clarett+ which is really awesome however - for some reason the midi part of the Clarett disappeared…so after a littel ping pong between focusrite and apple - i decided the heck with it- backed up my mini (made a copy of the desktop folder) - and did a nuke and repave (TimeMachine restore wouldn’t start from Recovery) and i was able to use a restore point from a few days before the midi disappeared. What does this have to do with Album art?
In the process the Music Folder recreated fresh and empty (because of Naming schemes - what was an iTunes folder is now a Music folder…) . One of these folders “submerged” my original Album art and thus created a new one. So, with the fresh (empty) Music folder - I re-established the iTunes Media Folder from my external dfrive - into the Apple Music App Settings/Files and that did the trick. - the Itunes “media” app like the photo library is Package now (no-one told me this at Apple ) and everything including some custom Album Art is restored.
This brings me to two conclusions of this story:
Hierarchy matters! when something is missing after an update/upgrade it’s usually because it’s not in the right place.
You can’t download Patience. (that’s my business motto too)
For others who might run into issues with Apple Music/iTunes artwork, a few of “Doug’s AppleScripts” can be very useful in diagnosing and treating problems. I’ve found these to be particularly helpful:
There are others that may help in specific cases. Simply search for “artwork” using the website’s search tool. Doug really has put together a remarkable set of tools for the community.
Indeed. I actually had moved my “home” music library to a computer running iTunes on Windows, simply so that I could avoid moving to the “new” Apple apps. Unfortunately, it looks like Apple soon will be replacing iTunes on Windows 11 with separate Apple Music and TV apps. It’s unclear what will happen with Windows 10.