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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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625 replies

Jun 22, 2018 1:05 AM in response to Tuff Ghost

If your music file tags are a total mess and you don't have a backup and you want to start manually fixing them, I suggest you start by using the TuneUp application version 2.5 (don't use the version 3.0 because it's a mess). TuneUp doesn't do a perfect job in fixing tags and album art, but it's a start. For each song it analyzes the music file data in order to determine what song it is (just like iTunes Match does when determining whether a song can be "matched" with one in iTunes store). You can download TuneUp trial from the official site www.tuneupmedia.com/download/mac-64-bit and then upgrade it to the full version by using the following license key code:


TuneUp 3.0.5 license key:

913-KFUA-ZGSB-677


(Grab it while it lasts. I know I would be devastated if my meticulously crafted music file tags were corrupted)


If your library has more than 10,000 tracks, read this note about TuneUp: http://support.tuneupmedia.com/hc/en-us/articles/200441098-Library-Size-Limitati ons

Oct 10, 2017 2:10 PM in response to jhibbs2002

Here’s the thing.


Earlier, it was only the artwork and some metadata.


Today, I import a bunch of CDs into my iTunes, and if iCloud Music Library is turned on, it actually replaces the original songs with completely different songs on other devices.


Worse, I still can’t actually edit the songs that are on the cloud. Even if I edit locally, there is no guarantee that it will be consistent with the cloud version.


This is a nightmare.


I really hope someone from the management is reading this, because I’m fed up with iTunes. I really hope they take this seriously.

Oct 11, 2017 5:42 AM in response to hone_u2

When it comes to computers, don't ever give anyone else control of anything. Stay in control of everything yourself. If it's too complicated for you or too much trouble to use, it's just not worth it at all. I've had to learn this for myself, but it is true. If you can't deal with it yourself, leave it alone. Stay away from things that are too good to be true. I learned the hard way myself with the iCloud Music Library, and it took some effort to restore everything.

Oct 11, 2017 8:18 AM in response to Tuff Ghost

I have also been having this issue basically since the time you have posted this. Since then, I’ve contacted Apple Care several times and have spent several hours on the phone. The results have been shocking-


I have iCloud Music Library and iTunes Match both turned on, and yes, I’ve been having a problem with the metadata and artwork being replaced as well. In fact, earlier this year I complained to Apple Care again, because it basically started replacing the songs with completely different songs on my other devices.


There is no doubt that the Matching is far from perfect.


The responses from the Apple Care Service have me flabbergasted.


Apple Care that i spoke to are completely unaware of this issue, in fact even senior advisors are unaware of this issue. People confused iTunes Match and iCloud Music Library and Apple Music. They were just not aware of their products. As a person who has been an Apple and iTunes customer since 2004, this is the worst service I’ve ever received. Apple Care used to be phenomenal.


Anyway, I was called back after several days and one of the first advisors told me, that it’s happening on his devices as well, so that’s how it’s intended to work. I was like huh?! He even refused to escalate it to engineering. After completely being let down by them in 2015, I just let the matter slide.


Earlier this year, I went out and bought a bunch of CDs and started imported them. When the same albums showed up on my Apple TV, I played them, and I realised that they weren’t the same songs as the ones I originally imported. Of course the artwork and stuff wasn’t accurate either. It was actually replacing the songs themselves!!!


Earlier it was just the metadata, now it’s also the actual content! This is unbelievable!!! How is Apple actually making this product worse let alone fixing it?


I called Apple Care again, and the same countless hours on the phone with people having no idea what I’m talking about, I finally get contacted by a person from customer relations. Initially he was very kind and I believed he would try his best to at least tell me what the problem is.


Today I get a call from him with a completely different and stern tone, telling me that there is no resolution that Apple can provide to me at this time, and he said the conventional, “We have taken your feedback on board”. He further went on to say that if Apple believes that there is genuine improvement needed they will do it, but I cannot be told about the internal operations.


Of course I don’t want to know how they deal with this, that’s their business, I just care about the problem being solved. But the attitude doesn’t give me the impression that Apple genuinely cares about this being fixed. Why else would it escape the training of these Apple Care professionals? Furthermore, there was some talk of iTunes Match causing a problem when its enabled in conjunction with iCloud Music Library. It amazes me that they would not tell customers that before, especially when iTunes Match is a paid service. I have reset my iCloud Music Library so many times!!! it’s just annoying it isn’t fixed yet. iTunes is generally just so buggy!


I’m thoroughly let down by Apple and after over a decade of using iTunes, I’m considering moving. How can an issue like this go unnoticed and not dealt with for over two years? Are people who actually care about their music curation and metadata accuracy lost? Or is Apple just not bothered? iTunes was what made Apple great at one point.


Here I was hoping for High Resolution Music, turns out Apple can’t even fix their 256kbps AAC song matching.


I sincerely hope and wish that someone from Apple reads this thread. Has anyone tried contacting Eddy Cue or Craig?

Oct 13, 2017 1:33 PM in response to hone_u2

Not long after I started this discussion, I gave up and restored my iTunes library to its original state. I unsubscribed from Apple Music and the iCloud Music Library. The only new music I imported to my library was from my own cd collection or from iTunes purchases. I decided I would rather own my music library and have it backed up to my own external storage drives. I also subscribed to Spotify. Now I quickly peruse iTunes and Spotify once a week or so for new music and purchase what I really want. I can listen to most anything I want on Spotify until I either buy or delete it. I have been a happy camper since going to this system. My best advice is to never give anyone else control over anything that is important to you.

Oct 13, 2017 3:08 PM in response to JazzmanJohn

Man, I feel your pain. Thanks for posting. Makes me feel less idiotic.

I too have had apple 'destroy' my tediously created organizational schemes. I posted this few years back thanking all who took the time to post:

thanks for posting! kinda made me laugh to see the mismatched art work,

and helped me get a grip and come back to my senses.

clouds clearly not for me 🙂

thanks to all for the warnings!


A few years ago, there were unspoken agreements amongst us .....as to what constitutes 'civilized' behavior in various social settings. So, I was 'stunned' when Apple, without notice, simply deleted the predecessor iCloud service ...and all my files with it. Seemed so 'uncivilized' of them. Fortunately, I had external hard drive backups. Sure, there could have been advantages to clouds ...but too ethereal for my needs.

For some of us, 'our' files, and how we have customized them for 'our' ease of use, is super important. I still read album covers and study the lyrics, the sidemen, etc. My kids' and grandkids' generations are just not that attached to that sort of detail. Not saying 'our' way is better....just a different focus is all. I could be too attached to 'facts' and need to let that go too ..... and come to accept that the current 'business model' is really not suited to what interests me....it's up to me to 'guard' what is 'sacred' .... [recently upgraded Snow Leopard to El Capitan; wisely had all sorts of backups ...but a mess to sort out errors to excel spreadsheets dates ....jeesh....]


So now we know ... anything automatic/running in background ..ya just have to research it ad nauseum before you relinquish control. Sigh, I feel your pain, man. Hang on to those CDs ....iTunes is only going to get worse for consumer [better for apple].

I

Jun 30, 2015 7:50 PM in response to Tuff Ghost

I am having exactly the same problem. I just thought it was the album artwork that was messed up but after reading your post I went back and tried playing some of the songs. It seems that the artwork matches each of the songs, but all the metadata, including title, artist etc. is incorrect. I'm not sure how Apple are going to fix this, but it is pretty frustrating.

Jun 30, 2015 9:10 PM in response to Tuff Ghost

I'm having the same issue and am incredibly frustrated. Literally years worth of work – collecting music, creating playlists, tweaking metadata, downloading album art and more. After "upgrading" to iTunes 12.2 my library is now showing 2 or 3 copies of some songs/albums, my playlists have been gutted, some track metadata has been changed to be incorrect, and old albums that I deleted from iTunes Match have suddenly reappeared in my library as "in the Cloud." What a disaster.

Jun 30, 2015 9:51 PM in response to Tuff Ghost

Same thing happened to me. If you don't have a backup, look for a "Previous iTunes Libraries" folder next to your iTunes Library.itl file. iTunes at least backed up your previous library before wrecking it, so you can just drag that one back over the ruined one to get back to where you were. Turn off iCloud Music Library first, of course, or it'll just get trashed again.


Awesome job, Apple.

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

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