The Great Music Collection, part two: Existing Structure

I've been buying music for a long time. One of my first cassettes was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie soundtrack. I also picked up the Batman movie (1988 Burton) soundtrack. Keep in mind that this was the score to the movie: there was no Prince on here at all. It was one of the first CDs I bought, as I was in HMV with my dad and sister - who were buying lots of music - and I felt a bit left out, so my dad let me get that album. Then, in high school I got into "real" music, so to speak. I got a three disc all-in-one stereo for Christmas, a few albums and I was off to the races. Over the next few years I would buy albums constantly. Album buying would slow down quite a bit as funds dried up during university, but that just meant I had to apply more strict criteria to my purchases.

High school was also the time that MP3s came out, and I took an immediate interest in. Keep in mind that we're talking about the days when the legalities were not set. You didn't need file sharing software because songs were hosted on websites all over the place. After a couple of years it because clear that it wasn't going to fly, and all the sites were taken down, to be replaced by Napster (and you know the history there). I never really got into that type of file sharing, and I think a big part of it was because I was more interested in the entire album, not just individual songs. Over the years I would accumulate a lot of music, be it through digital download or buying the album and ripping it myself. I got so much that I didn't know how to sort it out, and the problem of what I actually wanted to listen to popped up: a lot of those albums I bought in the 90s were just terrible now, and I question my younger self on his taste in music.

Such as it is, I currently have this file structure, seeing in the image below. I'm going to give a brief overview of what each one contains.

5.1 | This is when I dabbled in surround music. I own quite a few special edition albums that have surround mixes, but found it tough to get them into the main collection. There's only a few albums in this folder and they are not easy to play back. I've basically given up on them.

Albums | This is the core collection, 247 albums right there. If an album has made it in here, then you know I've spent the time to make sure the file names are proper, there is artwork in the folder and I have an interest in the album itself.

Albums B | Not very creative name, but these are mainly CDs I've ripped myself and have no interest in anymore. There's a lot of 90s music in there.

Compilations | For those mix CDs you could buy, like Big Shiny Tunes. Only a handful of compilations are in here, as they are more "singles" based.

Lossless | Music I've ripped in lossless format. Representative of my favourite music that is worth the extra space, and is primarily what I listen to on the home theatre.

Movie Soundtracks | For quite some time it's all I could listen to and get; movie scores, sound tracks and what have you that I haven't listened to or opened in half a decade.

New | Should indicate newly acquired music.

Podcasts | For downloading podcasts outside of iTunes whenever possible.

Singles | Very few singles exist here; as I mentioned before I was and still am more interested in full albums

Soundtracks | Seems a bit redundant, and definitely a case in point for the neglect my collection has been (not) receiving. There are two albums in here, both for Tron Legacy. Perhaps it's meant for a modern movie soundtrack collection that I have an actual interest in.

Staging Ground | The bane of my music collection. This is newly acquired music that has to pass through my non-existent organization process. Here you find folders of music that are not tagged properly and missing artwork. These should be moved into Albums one day, but it's been years since that's happened.

Staging Ground Lossless | Same as the regular staging ground but for new lossless encodes.

VG Remix | Yes, I was once a fiend for video game remixes. I could go into a long history of that, but just know that I've downloaded these since the early 90s from Compuserve. A guilty pleasure if there ever was one. Hasn't had an addition to it in years.

Video Game | For the full albums of video game music. 

So there it is, as the collection stands right now (early March 2012). It's a pain, it's a hassle and organizing music in this way has become too much for me to handle. It is definitely showing its age and is just begging to be replaced by something modern. In part three, I'll discuss my experience with importing this collection of misfits into iTunes.