Does anyone do anything extra when they’re ripping the ‘hidden’ tracks that often appear at the end of CDs?
Currently, mine are just ripped as one final track. Does anyone go to the bother of taking out the dead air between the final track and the hidden one? Do you split them into separate tracks? What do you use for this?
(I’ll leave the case of tracks hidden before the first track to a separate discussion!)
I always thought hidden tracks were a pointless gimmick, but I could never be bothered to do anything about it!
Yes I do! Some of the hidden tracks (don’t see them that often these days) are quite interesting but can come after a long stretch of silence at the far end of the CD.
I did hear a while back that some ripping software strips out the silence automatically but I use Audacity which is a useful (free) tool to have, allowing me to do almost anything with the sound wave and re-file in the same format.
If you have ripped the CD, using Audacity, just find where the track is located, open it up, highlight the part of the sound wave you don’t want, delete it and re-file. Done in less than a minute.
Also worth doing a periodic track search for ‘unknown’, which is what they are usually called. You may find some you didn’t know you had.
I recommend to split the last track into two files (well, maybe depending on the tracks). And certainly cut the silence out.
I do whatever is needed to clean it up, & that is not limited to albums with these odd surplus tracks. I do whats needed & that includes junking the ‘added’ track if its not worth the listen.
I use dBpoweramp for all this type of work with the excellent build-in program. I also add to or reduce lead-in silences at the start of some normal albums as well.
I’ve modified the resent Beatles albums that included a large number of added tracks made up from studio out-takes. As interesting as they are at the right time, I don’t want them when playing just the original album, so I have these albums as the whole alum as per the new release & another copy album with just the original 1960’s release tracks.
Sounds like you deserve a co-producer credit with Giles Martin:grinning:
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