Introduction#

Why MusicMuster?#

In January 2022 I started my show on Mixcloud <https://www.mixcloud.com/KeithsMusicBox/>. Until then, my show had been on an internet radio station which required me to use a Windows playout system. As I only use Linux, I had to set up a Windows PC specifically for that purpose. The system I had to use had what I felt were shortcomings in various areas.

Once I moved to Mixcloud I searched for a Linux equivalent that didn’t have the same shortcomings but was unable to find one that met my criteria. I decided to see how practical it would be to write my own, and MusicMuster was born.

What is MusicMuster?#

It is a Linux-based music player. Whilst it could be used as a general home music player, there are much better applications for that role. MusicMuster has been specifically designed to support the production of live internet radio shows.

Features#

  • Database backed

  • Can be almost entirely keyboard driven

  • Open multiple playlists in tabs

  • Play tracks from any playlist

  • Add notes/comments to tracks on playlist

  • Automatatic colour-coding of notes/comments according to content

  • Preview tracks before playing to audience

  • Time of day clock

  • Elapsed track time counter

  • Time to run until track starts to fade

  • Time to run until track is silent

  • Graphic of volume from 5 seconds (configurable) before fade until track is silent

  • Optionally hide played tracks in playlist

  • Button to drop playout volume by 3dB for talkover

  • Playlist displays:

    • Title

    • Artist

    • Length of track (mm:ss)

    • Estimated start time of track

    • Estimated end time of track

    • When track was last played

    • Bits per second (bitrate) of track

    • Length of leading silence in recording before track starts

    • Total track length of arbitrary sections of tracks

    • Commands that are sent to OBS Studio (eg, for automated scene changes)

  • Playlist templates

  • Move selected or unplayed tracks between playlists

  • Download CSV of tracks played between arbitrary dates/times

  • Search for tracks by title or artist

  • Automatic search of current and next track in Wikipedia

  • Optional search of any track in Wikipedia

  • Optional search of any track in Songfacts

Requirements#

Note

MusicMuster has only been tested on Debian 12, “Bookworm”; however, it should run on most contemporary Linux systems.

The Installation page explains how to build MusicMuster in its own environment which will automatcally install all requirements except the database. The current version of MusicMuster uses MariaDB version 10.11; however, any recent version of MariaDB should suffice.

MusicMuster is a Python 3 application and requires Python 3.8 or later.

Feedback, bugs, etc#

Please send to keith@midnighthax.com

Keith Edmunds, July 2023