Rate tracks differently in different playlists

I play two different types of event and there are lots of cross-over tracks, but 5* tracks for one event, may only be 3* tracks for the other.

I'd like to find a way of rating tracks differently depending on the playlist - how can I do this?
e.g. Can I have two entries in Traktor for the same physical file?

 

The color coding scheme. Mark you tracks by the colors for the events.

 

You can only have one set of tags per file...so only one entry for ratings. The same tags/ratings/comments will appear in all playlists.
A track in a playlist is just a path to the original file.

 

Thanks for the replies.

I'm well aware that the tags are simply a pointer to the original file - hence my question.

It seems like an absolutely enormous hole in the capabilities of the software- I can't be the only DJ who plays different events and needs to categorise the same track differently in different playlists. Colour coding won't help since again that is a per track setting, NOT a per playlist entry setting.

e.g. Take a song such as "It's Raining Men". For a wedding event, that's a top rated (5*) song - almost always guaranteed to go down very well with the ladies, but then I go DJ a dance event where the song is occasionally requested, but it's not really a floor filler, so I have it in my list as a 3*.

I've tried to think of alternate ways of arranging my music -

1) Make separate playlists for different ratings, but then the number of playlists I have massively proliferates and browsing for the next track becomes more piecemeal.

2) Create separate libraries, each pointing to the same physical set of audio files - this works at an event as I'd just load up the library for that particular type of event, but then it massively increases the work needed to work with the collection - I get a new track - it works in 3 different settings, so I have to separately import the track into 3 different Traktor libraries!!

 

Having different libraries won't work. The rating is embedded in the track.

 

Well that's not really true since I can set the audio files to read only if necessary ( i do this anyway since Traktor occasionally decides to corrupt my audio files and I have to reacquire them) - the rating is then stored in the traktor tag file contained within each library.

 

Traktor is very limited when it comes to music management. You could use a dedicated music management tool that supports smart playlists and allows for adding as much information to music files as you want.
I'm using MusicBee (Windows) to tag my music and to group tracks into smart playlists based on arbitrary attributes. MusicBee can export these smart playlists to an iTunes library which can then be imported in Traktor.
With regard to your "It's Raining Men" example you could tag the file by putting [wedding] in the comment or use the "occasion" field of MusicBee directly. A corresponding smart playlist "Wedding" with condition "comment contains [wedding]" or "occasion contains wedding" will then group the right files for your event.

 

As TakTraum says, I use the Comment, Comment 2 & Catalog tags to file tracks in multiple playlists. It's not ideal but I get by.
I also do weddings, clubs and bars and I can see the advantage of a 'per playlist' ability to tag tracks but I also think that it might get a bit confusing and you would end up with a filing system that is hard to manage.

 

Thanks for that - looks interesting but not sure it solves my problem though which isn't identifying the track as a "wedding" track, but rating it differently in the "wedding" and "dance" playlists.


It looks like my options are either to use separate libraries as mentioned above, or to rate tracks using the comments field so that I can have e.g.
Wedding: 5; Dance: 3

 

How about using one of the Comment fields and entering asterisks or 'X's in the same way as star ratings.
That way you can have 2 star ratings per track and sort as desired.

 

The obvious solution here would be access to custom/user-defined tags... in which case you would be able to store multiple ratings in file, or whatever else makes sense to you...
i.e. the OP could make a custom field for (if Traktor would be able to read these.... instead of using a bad/restrictve/limiting & cumbersome work around...):
TXXX:Rating_Wedding: 5
TXXX:Rating_Dance: 3

I maintain instrumental/riddim, instruments, energy, mood, & many more custom tags on my files (and have a built system that works with these and is accessable by Traktor as well as SSL/SDJ & RB)... yet none of the big 3 (NI / Searto / Pioneer) is allowing access to these within their 'professional' DJ software - and this has been a sore point where NI & Serato were pushing their own archaic agenda 10 years ago when custom tags & multi-value tags have been established across most formats. i.e. for mp3 the TXXX frame, which, funnily enough, both NI & Serato use to store THEIR own custom data, yet haven't given us access to these yet to allow us to maintain, access or even see the tags each of us would REALLY care about - and these by nature are slightly different from person to person).
My 0.02cents that I have been repeating for a good 10 years now as well.
c.