Ripping CD with hidden tracks

[Drean]

I have been reripping my CD collection to FLAC. Some of my tracks that had glitches ripped just fine and I'm loving rediscovering my music.

A couple of my CDs have hidden tracks "DECEMBERUNDERGROUND" and "Songs in the Key of X". After ripping them the tracks are mislabeled track the hidden track is there but trying to play it will play the first normal track. All the tracks will be off by one. So playing track 3 will give me track 2.

Is there a way to rip the CD or fix the files to preserve the hidden track or drop it altogether?

[Jason Carr]

Hi @Drean, unfortunately this is just a relic of how CDs work. CDs define where the tracks start and end, which is then replicated in the resulting file. Hidden tracks are just added into the same track on CDs, so unfortunately they'll end up in the same track in the resulting file. There's not really a good/easy way to get around this without a lot of manual work.

[Daryn]

@Jason CarrI hate to jump in, but while what you said is true in most cases, other CDs have hidden tracks before the first track and not as part of the last track. Sometimes they even do weird things and hide the track in the middle of the disc. It's hard to spot these, but the only way that I know of is to look at the starting sectors. If Track 1 doesn't start at 0, you know there's something before it. Same goes if the gap between one track and the next's starting and ending sectors is a big one.

 Hope that makes sense.

@DreanI'm curious to see if this is the case here. Could you open up the log file that MBA makes and paste the TOC section for those two discs? It might not help Jason, but now I'm really curious.

Edited March 29, 2019 by Daryn

[Jason Carr]

Yes, there are many ways that hidden tracks can be encoded on discs. My point is only to say that if it's ripped as one track, then I'm almost certain it's one track on the disc, so that's irrelevant at this point.

[Drean]

These CDs do have a track 0. My problem is not really having the hidden track. it is that my track listing if off by a track now. What should be track one is labeled as the hidden track and the last track is labeled as the second to last track. Is there anyway to edit track names currently?

Thanks for both your responses. her is the TOC section for DECEMBERUNDERGROUND

TOC of the extracted CD

     Track |   Start  |  Length  | Start sector | End sector
    ---------------------------------------------------------
        1  | 00:18:18 | 01:34:34 |      1368    |      8451
        2  | 01:52:52 | 02:39:46 |      8452    |     20422
        3  | 04:32:23 | 03:26:44 |     20423    |     35916
        4  | 07:58:67 | 03:06:73 |     35917    |     49939
        5  | 11:05:65 | 04:16:60 |     49940    |     69199
        6  | 15:22:50 | 02:45:49 |     69200    |     81623
        7  | 18:08:24 | 05:28:51 |     81624    |    106274
        8  | 23:37:00 | 04:40:23 |    106275    |    127297
        9  | 28:17:23 | 04:18:40 |    127298    |    146687
       10  | 32:35:63 | 04:04:59 |    146688    |    165046
       11  | 36:40:47 | 03:55:16 |    165047    |    182687
       12  | 40:35:63 | 04:26:58 |    182688    |    202695

[Daryn]

9 hours ago, Jason Carr said:

Yes, there are many ways that hidden tracks can be encoded on discs. My point is only to say that if it's ripped as one track, then I'm almost certain it's one track on the disc, so that's irrelevant at this point.

From what I can tell by testing a CD I have with a Track 0, CueRipper sticks to what the TOC says and only rips that, which is really what you'd want to do anyway.

1 hour ago, Drean said:

These CDs do have a track 0. My problem is not really having the hidden track. it is that my track listing if off by a track now. What should be track one is labeled as the hidden track and the last track is labeled as the second to last track. Is there anyway to edit track names currently?

Thanks for both your responses. her is the TOC section for DECEMBERUNDERGROUND

TOC of the extracted CD

     Track |   Start  |  Length  | Start sector | End sector
    ---------------------------------------------------------
        1  | 00:18:18 | 01:34:34 |      1368    |      8451
        2  | 01:52:52 | 02:39:46 |      8452    |     20422
        3  | 04:32:23 | 03:26:44 |     20423    |     35916
        4  | 07:58:67 | 03:06:73 |     35917    |     49939
        5  | 11:05:65 | 04:16:60 |     49940    |     69199
        6  | 15:22:50 | 02:45:49 |     69200    |     81623
        7  | 18:08:24 | 05:28:51 |     81624    |    106274
        8  | 23:37:00 | 04:40:23 |    106275    |    127297
        9  | 28:17:23 | 04:18:40 |    127298    |    146687
       10  | 32:35:63 | 04:04:59 |    146688    |    165046
       11  | 36:40:47 | 03:55:16 |    165047    |    182687
       12  | 40:35:63 | 04:26:58 |    182688    |    202695

So by the look of it, MBA did what it's supposed to and ripped what it should have. I think the discrepancy coming from the CUETools DB which is giving back metadata that has the hidden track visible.

Maybe there should be a check to see if the number of tracks ripped matches up with the number in the cuesheet? A time check, maybe? I'm just spitballing.

As to how you can fix this on your own, there is a way to do it, but Jason is right, it's a lot of fiddling about. Still, if you want to do it, here's how.

This is the easiest way, it's possible to do this in other ways, but this is the most straightforward.

First, head to https://foobar2000.com and download this player. Foobar2000 is a great player, but it is literally the polar opposite of MBA. While MBA is all about ease of use, this is a power tool.

Install and launch foobar and then go to File > Open and point it to the flacfile that MBA created.  It'll appear in the UI and start playing.

Hold the Shift key and Right Click on the file. Then go to Utilities and pick Edit cuesheet.

You'll see all the track info there. You'll have to remove the block for Track 1, the hidden track, then renumber the rest, shifting them down one.

If you do this, it'll work, but your corrected track 1 will start 18 seconds in.  Here's a 12 track cuesheet for this album. Don't cut and paste that into foobar's editor, instead, just use this as a guide for setting up the track times.

PERFORMER "AFI"
TITLE "Decemberunderground (2006)"
FILE "AFI - Decemberunderground (2006).mp3" MP3
  TRACK 01 AUDIO
    TITLE "Prelude 12/21"
    INDEX 01 00:00:00
  TRACK 02 AUDIO
    TITLE "Kill Caustic"
    INDEX 01 01:37:23
  TRACK 03 AUDIO
    TITLE "Miss Murder"
    INDEX 01 04:17:42
  TRACK 04 AUDIO
    TITLE "Summer Shudder"
    INDEX 01 07:47:28
  TRACK 05 AUDIO
    TITLE "The Interview"
    INDEX 01 10:56:55
  TRACK 06 AUDIO
    TITLE "Love Like Winter"
    INDEX 01 15:17:36
  TRACK 07 AUDIO
    TITLE "Affliction"
    INDEX 01 18:06:64
  TRACK 08 AUDIO
    TITLE "The Missing Frame"
    INDEX 01 21:46:11
  TRACK 09 AUDIO
    TITLE "Kiss and Control"
    INDEX 01 26:27:01
  TRACK 10 AUDIO
    TITLE "The Killing Lights"
    INDEX 01 30:45:17
  TRACK 11 AUDIO
    TITLE "37mm"
    INDEX 01 34:50:29
  TRACK 12 AUDIO
    TITLE "Endlessly, She Said"
    INDEX 01 38:47:06

I hope that helps.

@Jason Carrapologies for being obsessive.

[Drean]

That worked. I did have to remove my music folder and re-add it.

@DarynThank you.

[Daryn]

Happy to help. You said you had another CD that did the same thing. Here's a place where you can find cuesheets.

https://www.regeert.nl/cuesheet/

You should be able to find an appropriate cuesheet there that has the right number of tracks.