I know this is kind of baby pirate knowledge but ive always just used a downloader for my streaming service. I have since moved to Linux entirely (massive win BTW, patting myself on the back for that) but there is no Linux-compatible downloader for my specific service. At least not one with the bulk functionality I would like. Any downloaders for Tidal or other sources of high-quality audio, likely to have some relatively niche old death metal? I’m a nerd about the quality.
edit: Just looked at the megathread and there seems to be some tools compatible with Tidal. Regardless, are there any applications that are alternatives? I’d like to see ALL of my options <3
You must log in or # to comment.
relatively niche old death metal
I have no idea how much it should be “relatively niche” and “old” but here’s a few sources i’m using myself for such type of content:
Most of them require a sign-up
I’ve had about half my music on an SD card for the last 10 years but now I’ve finally canceled my streaming subscriptions and am comitting to having everything on there, are there any good front end apps for that? Rn I use poweramp but it’s playlist making options are awful.
Also sorry if this is the wrong place to ask, if so please just point me to the right place
Use Soulseek (you don’t have to use their app, there are alternatives like Nicotine+). Free yourself from a reliance on streaming platforms.
If you have a home server, slskd is very good. Modern web UI and there’s plugins to integrate it into Lidarr (Tubifarry)
X2. It can be a little janky because other people’s naming conventions are terrible but it’s a pretty great setup.
As soon as you said “Lidarr,” you had my undivided attention. I’m definitely giving this a try
Make sure you’re on the “develop” branch of Lidarr, as the stable one doesn’t have the plugins feature. If you’re using Docker, use the “develop” tag instead of “latest” (
lscr.io/linuxserver/lidarr:develop).
lidarr is still not working anywhere near as good. musicbrainz is a trash metadata provider.
Musicbrainz is fine; it’s just Lidarr’s usage of it that’s a problem. Lidarr uses its own mirror of Musicbrainz, plus its own custom search code, and it’s not as reliable.
Other apps that use Musicbrainz data, like Beets and Picard, don’t have the same issues that Lidarr has.
I just stick with https://github.com/V1ck3s/octo-fiesta and grab everything directly from qobuz
This is exactly what I was looking for, thank you
If you’re fine pulling with legit services then https://monochrome.tf/ is probably the easiest to use (or their backend service if you want to automate it).
Nicotine (soulseek) for rare stuff or live stuff is great; yt-dlp for popular stuff from popular music services. There’s also ytDownloader for a GUI interface.
Usenet. Plenty of music in lossless (FLAC) format. Use NZBGeek and DrunkenSlug as indexers. Sabnzbd to download. Lidarr and Prowlarr to automate everything. Add an artist, click to download an album, and it’ll search for the album, download the NZB file, send it to Sabnzbd to download, then tag and organize the files once it’s done downloading.
For music I’d just get a block account: https://www.reddit.com/r/usenet/wiki/providerdeals/. Essentially, you pay for some amount of data (can usually get 1TB for US$5-15), and they usually don’t have an expiry date, so it could last you for years. Some providers have monthly plans with unlimited data, but a block account will end up way cheaper if you just want music.
For rarer music, Soulseek is very good. It’s a peer-to-peer service from the KaZaA and Napster era, but somehow it’s survived until now. Since it’s peer to peer, downloads are quite a bit slower (you’re relying on the upload speed of individual users - each download comes from only one user) but it’s a great community.
fmhy.net for all your sailing needs.
Slskd
It uses the soulseek servers. Can run your own instance in a docker container. I listen to metal daily and you can find anything from other soulseek users.
Fun fact: you can write a Bash script to run yt-dlp on a playlist without much scripting skill
yt-dlp already supports downloading playlists. If it doesn’t work for a specific site, you might as well write it in python and contribute it to yt-dlp directly, that way everyone else can benefit as well.
Mind you, yt-dlp has a strict policy against cracking DRM, so I have my doubts as to if it will work with Tidal in the first place.
yt-dlp has a strict policy against cracking DRM
This is how it stays legal in the USA. Bypassing DRM is a DMCA violation (section 1201), but just downloading freely-available content is totally legal.
Its predecessor, youtube-dl, was subject to DMCA takedowns from the RIAA, and they had to get the EFF to help. yt-dlp doesn’t want to experience the same issues.