F**ing Apple iCloud Music. Advice on a damaged MP3 library required.

[Colonel_Mad]

My daughter switched iCloud Music on on my iphone to set up an Apple Music playlist.

iCloud (as it will) has utterly ****ed with my music collection metadata, changing album artwork to all sorts of incorrect covers, even setting different artwork for tracks on the same album none of which are the proper album artwork. Why the **** do they think their customers want them to do this?

This is the reason I never switched on iCloud in the first place and am now worried because other Apple users who have been violated in the same way report rare or explicit versions of tracks in their collection being replaced with standard or censored versions. Also band names being changed when they were correct to start with.

I've googled a fix but can't find anything helpful. Anyone with experience know if there's a way to remove all Apple imposed changes?

Surely this counts as wilful damage of someone's data without permission. I am speaking as someone who only has non-Apple downloads and rips of their own CDs. Never used iTunes to buy music. Never will.

If I have to do this manually it could literally take weeks (like when they updated iPhotos and completely screwed my digital photo storage/cataloguing system).

 

[JensenHealey]

Can you restore the phone to an earlier date. Even without iclod (sic) music there should be cloud back up. If you near an apple store go in and get the geeks to help - the free wifi in the store means yo can hang around for as long as needed to restore the phone.

 

[Colonel_Mad]

Good thinking.

I'll check whether this is just my phone or whether the sh!tstorm has infected my iMac too. If just the phone I can restore the phone to the last sync backup.

 

[Whaleblue]

I'd start your Mac offline (no Ethernet or WiFi) - otherwise the issue might descend from the Cloud...

 

[hc25036]

Might be worth spending a few pounds on Bliss (https://www.blisshq.com/mp3-tagging-software.html) which has saved me many headaches over the last couple of years. The current version seems faultless to me.

 

[uncl_nigel]

Thanks for sharing - I shall be steering well clear of anything to do with the cloud for my music library - it is enough work finding and repairing my own mistakes after ripping ...

I use the iMac as my file server (with Asset upnp) but take the precaution of keeping my files on an external HDD that the iMac can read but cannot write to.

 

[Stuart Frazer]

I hope you get your iPhone back to where you want it. As you are, I was using an iPhone for my own music until recently and eventually just gave up and switched to Android. iTunes would not copy some songs to the iPhone and I got sick of the iOS closed-in architecture. iTunes just seems to get worse with every update. I'm not regretting the switch. I've also found the Google Cloud side of things much better than iCloud.

 

[Colonel_Mad]

Sadly my phone backed up this morning when I was charging it on the iMac.

The good news is the iMac metadata appears untouched. Hopefully now I'm logged out of iCloud for Music it won't sync the crap new stuff to my computer.

Does anyone know if I now Sync the iPhone and iMac which metadata set will remain? Mine or Apple's abomination? Knowing Apple I can probably guess, but if someone knows that the iMac library will prevail during a sync, let me know.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[Colonel_Mad]

Not joking. This is the artwork Apple iCloud has kindly associated with the track 'Are You Lonesome Tonight?' by Elvis on my iPhone in place of the original album artwork that was there before.

How is this acceptable in any way? If I didn't laugh I'd be crying!

 

[RickyC6]

I'm sorry but I laughed out loud at that!

 

[Tony L]

Apple have Teh Best Elvis!

 

[Stuart Frazer]

That artwork is a joke. It reminds me how bad apple maps was when it was introduced.

You probably need to upgrade to the new iPhone X in 256 GB format @ £1149

Good luck with iTunes.....

 

[hc25036]

In your place I'd be furious too, but in my place just now I'm wiping up the mouthful of tea I spat over my iPad!

 

[Colonel_Mad]

A few days on and I have a plan. This seems to only have affected my iPhone, not the iMac where the files are stored. Therefore tonight I will try unchecking all tracks for syncing in iTunes. I assume then when I Sync the iPhone will have all the music removed from it. I then hope that by re-ticking the music I want on my phone and Syncing again the music will be transferred back but with the correct artwork. Hopefully this will do the trick but I'm not convinced the evil powers in Apple HQ haven't thought of this an made provisions to destroy the MP3 collection of even the most wily of customers.

For your amusement here are some more screen shots showing what Apple have replaced the original album artwork with in my collection (NB Cockney Ewan is absolutely nothing to do with Chas and Dave). At Folsom Prison, perhaps one of the classic live albums of all time, is my favourite abomination.

Apple do seem to have a penchant for replacing original album artwork on MP3s you haven't bought from them with a cover band's album artwork. I am certain this is done on purpose.

Moral: Never, ever, ever use Apple iCloud Music if you are in anyway serious about your music.

 

[Tony L]

I'd advise doing a full backup of your iMac prior to docking just in case. iTunes can be weird on occasion. As a last resort you then could flatten the iPhone and dock as new, but there really should be an easier way to recover than that. I've not looked into it as the first thing I do is to ensure anything to do with Apple Music and iTunes Cloud is well turned off!

 

[Colonel_Mad]

It worked!

- Unchecked all selected music for syncing in iTunes on the iMac.

- Synced iPhone which then had no music on it (except that U2 album Apple force you to have even when you've tried many times to disinfect it from your collection).

- Re-checked songs/playlists I wanted back on the phone.

-Synced again.

- iPhone mp3s have proper album artwork back. Wooo hooo!

That's more like it.......

 

[JensenHealey]

Well done! Now to keep your daughter away from your phone....

 

[Tony L]

Fingerprint recognition exists for a reason!

 

[Stuart Frazer]

Glad you got back to where you wanted. We all love a happy ending.

Now, lets see a list of this special playlist tracks!

 

[Tony L]

The cover art you were fielded really was hysterical, I wonder if there is the option for folk to 'troll it up a bit' and deliberately asign the wrong art to a title? IIRC Apple uses Gracenote database or similar for track names, i.e. they are calling a third party/public domain resource. I'm just unbelievably picky in this regard to the extent I'll actually photograph artwork myself if need be, e.g. if the copy I have ripped is a MoFi, Japanese first press or whatever that is the artwork I want!