Cost Efficient Way to Acquire Music Tracks?

[michaelm101]

Old schooler here and I hate MP3s.

But, they're ok for listening to songs I plan to cover...

I need to be able to (in order of priority) : 1) Load them onto a flash drive, 2) load them onto a portable playing device or iphone, 3) burn them onto CD.

What is the ticket for acquiring songs/files I do not have?

Thanks in advance!

[Doug Young]

Loading files (regardless of whether they're mp3, wav, high res flak, or whatever) onto a flash drive is a matter of sticking the flash drive into the computer and dragging the files onto the drive, just as if you're copying them to another place on the computer. Then you can stick that drive into something else that can read/play the disk, like maybe your car.

Loading them into a portable device kind of depends on the device. With an iphone, you can put them in iCloud and just access them from any Apple device. Or you could load them into Apple Music, and have them instantly on your Mac, iPhone, or iPad. If you don't have a Mac, I don't know, but I assume there's still some way to transfer files to the iphone from Windows. Once you get the files on the phone, the easiest thing is probably to open them in Apple music, so you have them in a player, ready to listen to. Other devices, you can likely search in the internet for instructions for transferring files to whatever gizmo you have.

To make a playable CD requires a burner program of some kind. If you're on a Mac, you can make a playlist in Apple Music, and then choose File->Burn Playlist to CD. You'll also need a physical CD burner (mac don't generally even have CD players these days, let alone burners). If you're on Windows, I'm sure there are other programs that will burn CDs, if not by Microsoft, then by 3rd parties.

[Doug Young]

By the way, I assumed you had the mp3s available. Just realized your "cost-efficient" part of the question may mean you are listening to a streaming service like Spotify and don't actually have the files? That's kind of a different topic. Where are these mp3s you want to "acquire"?

[michaelm101]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

By the way, I assumed you had the mp3s available. Just realized your "cost-efficient" part of the question may mean you are listening to a streaming service like Spotify and don't actually have the files? That's kind of a different topic. Where are these mp3s you want to "acquire"?

Yes. Thanks for your detailed reply. I'm pretty good at grabbing any files and sticking them in different places.

What I need is a place/website where I may acquire files of songs that I do not have.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by michaelm101

Yes. Thanks for your detailed reply. I'm pretty good at grabbing any files and sticking them in different places.

What I need is a place/website where I may acquire files of songs that I do not have.

The most cost-effective way is probably a subscription to Apple Music or Spotify. A few bucks a month and you have the worlds library at your fingertip, ready to play, searchable, and you can create your own playlists and organization and play them anywhere (other than a CD player). Hard to beat for cost, convenience and comprehensive availablity of virtually every song recorded.

If you must physically own the files, that is unlikely to be "cost-effective", but I'd suggest buying the CDs from the musicians or sites that sell them. There are also places like Bandcamp where musicians sell both physical CDs and downloadable files.

[Rudy4]

Originally Posted by michaelm101

Old schooler here and I hate MP3s.

But, they're ok for listening to songs I plan to cover...

I need to be able to (in order of priority) : 1) Load them onto a flash drive, 2) load them onto a portable playing device or iphone, 3) burn them onto CD.

What is the ticket for acquiring songs/files I do not have?

Thanks in advance!

Higher bit rate mp3s sound very much like CDs. Most listeners who generally "hate" mp3s are used to 128kbs and lower bit rates.

If you haven't listened to 320kbs mp3s then do check out how good they sound.

The bottom line of this for you is some devices are much easier to select, play, and manipulate mp3 audio.

[michaelm101]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

The most cost-effective way is probably a subscription to Apple Music or Spotify. A few bucks a month and you have the worlds library at your fingertip, ready to play, searchable, and you can create your own playlists and organization and play them anywhere (other than a CD player). Hard to beat for cost, convenience and comprehensive availablity of virtually every song recorded.

If you must physically own the files, that is unlikely to be "cost-effective", but I'd suggest buying the CDs from the musicians or sites that sell them. There are also places like Bandcamp where musicians sell both physical CDs and downloadable files.

I remember years back, purchasing music (MP3s) from itunes. I stored them on my PC. Is this still available? I understand the streaming thing, but I want the file for myself to store and place where I want. I hope this makes sense. Thx!

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by michaelm101

I remember years back, purchasing music (MP3s) from itunes. I stored them on my PC. Is this still available? I understand the streaming thing, but I want the file for myself to store and place where I want. I hope this makes sense. Thx!

You can download from itunes/apple music. It's an m4a file.

[rick-slo]

Of course you can record anything you are streaming on the internet.
That's cheap.