Tuff Ghost

Q: WARNING: iCloud Music Library just destroyed my Mac's iTunes Library

I have a 13000 song library on my iMac. Installed iOS 8.4 on my iPhone this morning and had Apple Music and iCloud Music Library going...Everything was working fine on the device. Got home and installed 10.10.4 and iTunes 12.2 on my iMac. It asked to turn on iCloud Music Library and I accepted. All of the sudden it starts overwriting my album art with completely wrong art (example: Weezer showed art for a Radiohead album) on both my iMac AND my iPhone, screwing up metadata by putting random songs in albums where they didn't belong (there was a Cursive album where the first track was listed as a Foo Fighters song). Even worse, when I'd click to listen to certain songs, it would play the wrong song/artist, like the metadata was hijacked. What in the ****?  I've had this library organized perfectly for the better part of a decade and Apple Music screwed it up in minutes.

 

I was able to restore everything through a Time Machine backup and made sure NOT to turn on iCloud Music Library when I re-opened the .itl file. What a disaster. Hopefully someone from Apple reads this. Thinking it may have something to do with a iTunes Match account I had briefly a few years back. But yikes, can't believe how much damage it did in 5 minutes.

Posted on Jun 30, 2015 7:45 PM

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Q: WARNING: iCloud Music Library just destroyed my Mac's iTunes Library

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  • by swandy,

    swandy swandy Sep 21, 2015 7:50 AM in response to Cryptex-S91
    Level 4 (1,542 points)
    Apple Music
    Sep 21, 2015 7:50 AM in response to Cryptex-S91

    Cryptex-S91 wrote:

     

    I actually kind of worked out a solution to this. I already keep backups of my library on my OneDrive for Xbox Music streaming so whatever stuffed my library up the first time could be reversed. ANYWAY.

     

    1. Make sure all the music in your library is organised. Preferences > Advanced, tick the top two boxes (Keep folder organised and copy files to folder).

    2. Stop the album art madness by unchecking "Automatically download album art" in the Store tab of Preferences.

    3. Right click all music in your library and consolidate files to copy all the missing music into the iTunes Media folder.

    4. Go to that Media folder in Finder/Explorer and copy the Music folder. Basically make a backup.

    5. Turn on iCloud Music Library (Preferences > General, tick Show Apple Music and iCloud Music Library)
    6. CLEAR EVERYTHING IN YOUR LIBRARY. Control/Command + A and delete.

    7. Wipe the music on your devices by going to Settings > General > Storage > Music > Edit > All Music

    8. Activate iCloud Music Library on your devices, and open your Music app to make sure no music is on your phone and in the Music database file on your device. It should be EMPTY.

    9. Proceed to copy that folder you backed up into iTunes. Just drag it over your empty library. Needs to copy everything back into that iTunes Media folder so may take a while.

    10. Show the list view of all your songs and watch the outlined clouds slowly disappear. It'll retain all metadata and sync your custom metadata to your iCloud Library and hence all your devices as you expect. While Album Art still isn't showing properly on my phone, I can live with that. At least now I can add Apple Music albums to my existing library as I expect it to work.

     

    GG WP

    I am glad that your steps worked for your, but it does not solve the problem for everyone. I set up my ICML for a second time from my wife's iMac (her iTunes library is only a portion of my full library - 22,000 songs out of 60,000). And while after updated to iTunes 12.3.0.44 it did not "destroy" her library - all genres and artwork are still intact - when I turned on ICML on my iPhone 6, iPad Mini 2 on the other iMac that had a blank iTunes Library to start - there are still hundreds of cases where live albums and alternative versions were mis-matched and the artwork is still messed up.

    (And yes - the settings are basically the same as you indicated and yes, I did clear out the Music from my iOS devices also as you suggested.)

  • by Cryptex-S91,

    Cryptex-S91 Cryptex-S91 Sep 21, 2015 7:58 AM in response to swandy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 21, 2015 7:58 AM in response to swandy

    Oh that *****. I probably have the same problem but haven't checked yet. Oh well... Guess the only solution is for a "Fix Incorrect Match" option like Google Music... I've been using that quite successfully until Apple Music so yeah... Might have to just keep using it

  • by Kim Hill1,

    Kim Hill1 Kim Hill1 Sep 21, 2015 10:08 AM in response to Cryptex-S91
    Level 2 (169 points)
    Sep 21, 2015 10:08 AM in response to Cryptex-S91

    Cryptex-S91 wrote:

     

    2. Stop the album art madness by unchecking "Automatically download album art" in the Store tab of Preferences.

     

    I unchecked "Automatically download album art" ages ago. My album art still gets nuked.

  • by Scot Hacker,

    Scot Hacker Scot Hacker Oct 11, 2015 10:35 AM in response to Tuff Ghost
    Level 1 (55 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 10:35 AM in response to Tuff Ghost

    I've written up a walkthrough for Medium.com detailing why many users end up with duplicate tracks and bad cover art, and how to fix those two problems in most cases:

     

    https://medium.com/@shacker/remove-duplicates-fix-broken-album-art-in-icloud-mus ic-library-d58cff364fb1

  • by jctez,

    jctez jctez Oct 11, 2015 11:01 AM in response to Scot Hacker
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 11:01 AM in response to Scot Hacker

    HEY MAN....great article. But do you really want to pay 10 bux a month to do all that work? So everytime you add an album you have to go thru all that? I gave up, did not pay after trial ended. The weekend before it ended, I spent an entire weekend trying one last time. I started a brand new empty iTunes library. The minute I enabled iCloud Music it filled up with all kinds of stuff, purchased music from years ago etc. Ok, so I spent hours deleting all of that. Then waited 24 hours and it still had not uploaded all my music, but enough of it. Alas, it was still a mess. Beatles and Stones albums, live stuff, rare stuff, alternate stuff, everything replaced with the studio versions. Not only the artwork I have painstakingly added thru the years, but even purchased artwork was messed up beyond belief. I even tried what someone on a board mentioned about renaming the live tracks, and that did not work.

    I'm sticking with Google Music and Radiant Player (google music open source player for Mac) Not one hiccup loading my rare/live/alt stuff and my artwork remains in place. Their curated lists get better and better as I like more songs and since they purchased Songza. I don't think Apple Music will ever be fixed. itunes Match certainly wasn't. But thanks for the great article, hope it works for you and others, just seems crazy to pay for a service that does not work.

  • by Scot Hacker,

    Scot Hacker Scot Hacker Oct 11, 2015 11:09 AM in response to jctez
    Level 1 (55 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 11:09 AM in response to jctez

    Every time? Oh gosh no - this problem only affected about 5% of my music - the rest was perfect right off the bat. I'll make that clarification in the article.

     

    And yes, $10/month is incredibly cheap for what we're getting here - I'm finding the combination of Apple Music + iCloud Music Library be musical paradise. I'm "all in."

  • by jctez,

    jctez jctez Oct 11, 2015 11:20 AM in response to Scot Hacker
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 11:20 AM in response to Scot Hacker

    need to read it again I guess. but did everything you did in iTunes on your main Mac sync properly on your iDevices as well? And did your ''rare'' stuff all sync correctly, ie track listings, versions, sequences, etc? That was the other mess it left me, The Beatles box sets are all messed up now. All track 1's are listed together etc. I went into ''get info'' and resorted and it won't work. Will have to delete and re-load all the cds. ***. I just don't trust Apple anymore. They screwed up all my photos and now this. Ugh. BUT I am tempted to try what you suggest and see if it works for me but I'm not gonna give them 10 dollars just to see if what they advertise actually works as they say it does. Which it doesn't. smh

  • by JazzmanJohn,

    JazzmanJohn JazzmanJohn Oct 11, 2015 5:38 PM in response to jctez
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Oct 11, 2015 5:38 PM in response to jctez

    Great post, Scot. I have several questions:

     

    1. I just have an iMac that I use as my music server. All in all, with my 17,500 music library, I am quite happy with Apple Music and the Cloud library. There are some weird things I don't understand however. For instance, just take one of my Beatles' albums. It was from my cd collection. I now see songs in this album intact on my computer, but right under the original a grayed out copy of it appears with the cloud next to it. What's that all about? This does not happen throughout my collection but sporadically with no real pattern.

     

    2. The artwork seems intact on my iMac as far as I can tell. I activated Apple Music and the Cloud library on my iPhone long before my Mac just to get used to it and see if I really wanted it. I figured it couldn't do much damage that way. I have noticed artwork changes on my phone. How could there be artwork changes on one but not the other?

     

    3. In iTunes/Preferences/Sharing, do you have "automatically download album artwork" and "share details about your library with Apple" checked?

     

    4. If you sign out of iTunes and the Cloud library, doesn't your music library go back to exactly the way it was before you signed in? Do you sign out daily or just leave it on continuously?

     

    5. Is there a way to view your original iTunes library while you are signed in to Apple Music? I was told there was in the "Playlists" area by an Apple advisor, but I have yet to see it.

     

    Your help is greatly appreciated.

  • by jctez,

    jctez jctez Oct 11, 2015 5:45 PM in response to JazzmanJohn
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 5:45 PM in response to JazzmanJohn

    My Beatles collections are a mess from this. A mess. Plus, the commercially released box sets are not showing up correctly. There is the mono box, the stereo box, the US mixes box. The sequences are all messed up and I am not even sure if the mono versions have not been replaced with the stereo versions via icloud library. When I reverted back all the versions seems correct but the sequencing is still messed up.

    Jazzman...I believe if you just click MY MUSIC tab at top of itunes you get your library, but if you have icloud library turned on you will get their versions and not your versions.

  • by JazzmanJohn,

    JazzmanJohn JazzmanJohn Oct 11, 2015 6:03 PM in response to jctez
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Mac OS X
    Oct 11, 2015 6:03 PM in response to jctez

    jctez,

     

    Can you just sign in and out of the iCloud library as you like without any problems? I.e., is that a good way to compare what is in the cloud vs. what was in your original library.....even the artwork?

  • by jctez,

    jctez jctez Oct 11, 2015 6:45 PM in response to JazzmanJohn
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 6:45 PM in response to JazzmanJohn

    you can turn it off and your original library--hopefully--will be there, but with some stuff still messed up, like my Beatles stuff as mentioned.  but then when you turn it back on, depending on the size of your library, it will take forever and all your stuff will be messed up again. Unless you do what he mentioned above I guess. But that is why I think you would have to keep doing all that, but he says no. Not sure he has tried that far though. See if he answers. But that is what happened to me. I am not trusting it. Not paying for it. I would love it to work, was so excited for it, but not at this cost.

  • by Scot Hacker,

    Scot Hacker Scot Hacker Oct 11, 2015 10:21 PM in response to jctez
    Level 1 (55 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 10:21 PM in response to jctez

    @jctez: Yes, sync to my iDevices is identical to the sync on my 2ndary Mac.  The vast majority of my "rare" stuff is perfect in the cloud because Apple couldn't find a match, and so used my content and metadata exactly as I've stored it. In the case of your Beatles boxes, that's not what I would consider rare content - there are probably a lot of users who have uploaded the same or similar, and I can imagine that causing problems if either: 1) Those users' copies were badly tagged or 2) Yours were. That would indeed be a gray area.

  • by Scot Hacker,

    Scot Hacker Scot Hacker Oct 11, 2015 10:26 PM in response to JazzmanJohn
    Level 1 (55 points)
    Oct 11, 2015 10:26 PM in response to JazzmanJohn

    @jazzmanjohn:

     

    1) That sounds like the scenario described in my article. You need to select ONLY the tracks with the plain cloud icon and right-click Add to Music Library. They should then consolidate as a single unified set.

     

    2) Correct - your original tracks on your "master" machine should not appear altered *unless* you sync them to the cloud and then alter them from a second computer. So you're seeing your original art on the host Mac and badly art-matched versions on your phone. The fix for this is described in the article.

     

    3) Yes

     

    4) I wouldn't dream of signing out - wouldn't want to risk any of this work being undone, and wouldn't want to have to wait for it to re-process. Why would you want to sign out?

     

    5) Your host Mac will continue to show your original library *unless* you use a 2nd Mac to alter tracks that are already in the cloud.

  • by Kim Hill1,

    Kim Hill1 Kim Hill1 Oct 12, 2015 1:15 AM in response to Scot Hacker
    Level 2 (169 points)
    Oct 12, 2015 1:15 AM in response to Scot Hacker

    Scot Hacker wrote:

     

    …And yes, $10/month is incredibly cheap for what we're getting here - I'm finding the combination of Apple Music + iCloud Music Library be musical paradise. I'm "all in."

     

    I agree that $10/month would be cheap — if Apple Music could be trusted with my curated collection. But it can't be trusted. I'm basically heartbroken that Apple Music's problems prevent me from using it- i.e. album art and metadata being completely messed up. If it weren't for that, Apple Music's integration of private collections and public cloud library would be alsolcutely unbeatable. Ironically, it's Apple's effort to integrate the two that lead to this problem. It's a hard problem to make the two coexist in a predictable way.

     

    Thanks for your research and for having the patience to explain it all so that others may benefit. But I don't find this to be a solution for me, because in essence you're hacking Apple's system (although not in a bad way) to solve the problem. If Apple changes something on their end, your solution might break immediately and completely. There's no guarantee that it will work next month, or even tomorrow. It would be a huge job for me to do this with my library. I have 8,400 albums. 5% of them would be 420 albums that I'd have to "massage," and without knowing whether it will last, it's just too much work. Also, if their system changes, it's possible that my years of curation would be at risk.

     

    Apple talks a lot about "passion" for music, but sadly, a large number of Apple's most passionate music fans can't use Apple Music. I let my subscription lapse, and I won't be renewing unless they can fix these problems. Which I unfortunately find unlikely.

  • by jctez,

    jctez jctez Oct 12, 2015 4:34 AM in response to Scot Hacker
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 12, 2015 4:34 AM in response to Scot Hacker

    @Scott....did not mean the released Beatles boxes were ''rare content'' and no mine are not ''badly tagged" and what I mean by rare content are live and/or alternate and/or not commercially released, therefore not in iCloud. But instead of Apple doing what they say,ie, upload those tracks to the cloud, they replace all of them with studio versions. I even tried the ''tag them as live 1,2,3, etc" and still got the studio versions. I reread your article and you talk about using right click to cloud for duplicate tracks etc, have you tried this to replace apple's versions of tracks to your own distinct versions? And do they stay that way? I cannot imagine how long it would take me to do that, especially with how slow it takes already for icloud to sync. And yes I have fast internet. I am not trying to be negative, I really wish it would work. With so many all over the internet calling Apple out on this you would think they would at least acknowledge, but they don't and they won't. Eddy Cue is a rich, out of touch windbag who should be fired over this. Hate to say it, but Steve would never have let this beta of a mess have been released. Funny how all of a sudden they are not trumpeting the number of subscribers since the end of the trial like they did before the trial period ended. Tells me the numbers are way low, and this is surely a big part of the reason why.

    @Kim Hill--I agree completely.

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