How to use the same track in different playlists with different hot cues?

So one thing I found that works well for this is the following:
1 In Rekordbox select the file you want to use in another playlist
2 Right Click and open the file location
3 look at the filename and change one character from upper to lower Case (or vice versa)
3a. Note that this doesn't Change the Filename except to Rekordbox.
4 Drag the File to your new playlist
5 set Hot Cues and Memory as you wish

Rekordbox now has 2 different entries for the Same file! I use this all the time if I want different beat grids or Cue points for the same track. Works great and no additional copies of the same song.

Hope That helps!

Many thanks for this. I followed the instructions, or at least how I interpreted them but when I included the file in a new playlist and then changed the cues in that playlist they were still being written back to the file in my collection.

Any chance you could make a short video clip, upload to YouTube and then share the link please?

So I should have asked if you use a Mac or a windows machine, and also it you Play with a controller connected to Rekordbox.

I only tried this on my Windows laptop while connected to either my DDJ-1000 Or my DDJ-SX2
But it works Perfectly.
In fact if you export to Rekordbox.XML and then open the file you will see 2 entries for the same track (they will be in different locations in the file)
The only difference will be in capitalization of the filename. All the Hot Cues and memory cues as Well as Beat Grid information will be there too.

I'll try and snapshot some pictures later.

So here is a screenshot of an old Rock Track from John Mellencamp.  The same track is used but it has two different entries and is in two different playlists.  You'll also see that there are different hot cues.  I will include the Rekordbox.xml entries so you can see them next.

Here you can see that the Path is to the exact same file name, but I altered the capitalization.  I started by adding the file to my collection once with the capitalization correct. Then I slightly changed the capitalization (same exact spelling - i.e. same file) and added it to another playlist.  Note the differences in Hot Cues and BPM, Rekordbox thinks its two different database entries but uses the same track for each.

Note that I haven't added a track like this for a while so this has been in my collection for many versions of Rekordbox.  Not sure if it was a bug they corrected, but it still shows up as two different tracks in my database.  I'm going to try it again in a little while.

Just tried it again. Still works for me!

And if you are familiar with the Rekordbox.xml file here are the entries into the database for the same track.  Track ID 9299 has 3 Hot Cues assigned, while Track ID 9300 has none.  The location field for each of these entries is the same track!

    <TRACK TrackID="9299" Name="Kiss Me Back (Extended Mix)" Artist="Kim Sozzi"
           Composer="Not Documented" Album="Club Anthems 2" Grouping=""
           Genre="Dance &amp; DJ" Kind="MP3 File" Size="8228570" TotalTime="243"
           DiscNumber="1" TrackNumber="12" Year="2013" AverageBpm="130.26"
           DateAdded="2019-06-28" BitRate="320" SampleRate="44100" Comments="Amazon.com Song ID: 239808548"
           PlayCount="0" Rating="0" Location="file://localhost/C:/Temp/12%20-%20Kiss%20Me%20Back%20(Extended%20Mix).mp3"
           Remixer="" Tonality="" Label="" Mix="">
      <TEMPO Inizio="0.066" Bpm="130.26" Metro="4/4" Battito="1"/>
      <POSITION_MARK Name="1" Type="0" Start="0.066" Num="0" Red="40" Green="226"
                     Blue="20"/>
      <POSITION_MARK Name="2" Type="0" Start="5.593" Num="1" Red="40" Green="226"
                     Blue="20"/>
      <POSITION_MARK Name="3" Type="0" Start="14.805" Num="2" Red="40" Green="226"
                     Blue="20"/>
    </TRACK>
    <TRACK TrackID="9300" Name="Kiss Me Back (Extended Mix)" Artist="Kim Sozzi"
           Composer="Not Documented" Album="Club Anthems 2" Grouping=""
           Genre="Dance &amp; DJ" Kind="MP3 File" Size="8228570" TotalTime="243"
           DiscNumber="1" TrackNumber="12" Year="2013" AverageBpm="130.26"
           DateAdded="2019-06-28" BitRate="320" SampleRate="44100" Comments="Amazon.com Song ID: 239808548"
           PlayCount="0" Rating="0" Location="file://localhost/C:/Temp/12%20-%20kiss%20Me%20Back%20(Extended%20Mix).mp3"
           Remixer="" Tonality="" Label="" Mix="">
      <TEMPO Inizio="0.066" Bpm="130.26" Metro="4/4" Battito="1"/>
    </TRACK>

A) Is there a way to save hot cue and memory point data within a playlist? 

No, and the cues aren't saved to the track, they are saved tot he XML

B) Is there an easier workaround to the one I have described?

Copying the track you have and slightly renaming it will be the only way to achieve what you want. 

C) Could this be a feature request? 

I personally would not have use of having separate sets of cues for the same track. 

So you don't need to copy the track, just the change of caps works fine as i explained above.

How you use the tools are up to you, having them when you don't need them is better than needing them when you don't have them.

I'm just passing on some gained knowledge and paying it forward!

It seems that editing the location in the way you have described is not possible on a Mac. When you right click on a track and select "show information" the track location is on the information summary tab and is not editable. The track tags are editable, but they do not contain the location.

There is another way if you are using iTunes to organize your files. It's a bit convoluted but it works. You can take a finished playlist in Rekordbox and export it to a drive. You can go back to the original playlist in Rekordbox collections and delete it. Drag the exported playlist back into collections and it changes the location of the files to music/pioneerdj/imported from device/contents. You can then go back to iTunes, reconstruct a new playlist, set all of your new cue points, export it again and do the same thing. Rekordbox will rename the music files with the existing name plus -1 automatically. Not elegant, but effective. 

The different case sensitivity  is a useful bug to support multiple grids/cues for the same file.
However this causes havok when using OS folders only to organize your collection.

I also believe that V6 fixed this bug.

https://github.com/pestrela/music/tree/master/traktor#how-to-manage-your-collection-using-operating-systems-folders-and-without-dj-playlists-ie-using-only-finder-windows-explorer-etc

Hi All,

Before attempting any of this, please be sure you have a backup of your database(s)!

So I have tested this in RBDJ 5.8.5 and am happy to report this still works as expected there, but it also still works in RBDJ 6.0 too!!!.  I modified the steps from above to add an additional one for RBDJ 6. I highly recommend keeping 5.8.5 on your machine as well as RBDJ 6.0 just to be able to access some of these older capabilities now removed in 6.0 (rekordbox.xml export has proven indispensable to me - so sorry they removed in in RBDJ 6.0). Note I only tested this on a Windows 10 machine, and from the thread above it doesn't look like it will work on a MAC.

1. In Rekordbox create a new playlist and call it "Test"
2. In Rekordbox select the file you want to use in another playlist
3. Right Click and open the file location
4. look at the filename and change one character from upper to lower Case (or vice versa)
5. Note that this doesn't Change the Filename except to Rekordbox.
6. Drag the File to your new playlist (use the one called Test above)
7. Set Hot Cues and Memory as you wish

RBDJ  now has 2 different entries for the same file! You can now have different beat grids or Cue points for the same track. Works great and no additional copies of the same song.

For RBDJ 6.0

In RBDJ 5.8.5 Export the Rekordbox.XML (goto FIle -> Export the collection in XML Format)
Note the location of the file as you will browse to that in RBDJ 6.0

Close RBDJ 5.8.5 and open RBDJ 6.0 (note theses steps assumed you had RBDJ 6 import your RBDJ 5.8.5 database - I also assume you are keeping backups of everything so please do before trying any of this)

1. In RBDJ 6.0 goto the preferences->advanced->database tab and for the rekordbox.xml entry, browse to the file location of the rekodbox.xml file you just exported from RBDJ 5.8.5.
2. Next go to the preferences->view tab and in the Layout->tree view section make sure rekordbox.xml is checked and then close out of the preferences window.
3. In the Explorer tree you should now see an entry for rekordbox.xml, select that and you will see All Tracks and Playlists, go to the Test Playlist
4. In the Test playlist you should see the same song(s) that you created a duplicate for in RBDJ 5.8.5, right click on that and select import to collection. You might get a warning indicating the track already exists, if so just click ok (the track does already exist - this is a duplicate! it uses the same file but will now have different Hot Cues and Beat Grid information)

Anyway I hope this helps some of you out there!
CRSounds (Carlton Rubio)

Hi DJEstrela,

I have read many of your postings, and your github, so was glad when you reached out to me in this thread I posted a long time ago. 

https://forums.pioneerdj.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/115009203086-Rekordbox-Xml-Tricks 

I find your work very informative.  Since you use a different method for managing your music (i.e. you use your OS to manage songs, genres, playlist, etc) I am not sure this will help you.  Especially since filename capitalization matters in your organization style.

That said this still works and since your structure allows for multiple file copies of the same song it probably doesn't matter. 

For those of us who want one file (track) with multiple Cues, Grids, etc. - in multiple playlists - this is very useful especially if you use RBDJs indexing and file management (RBDJ has some very powerful tagging and intelligent playlists).

Anyway you asked me to document my findings, so I posted them here!

Hope they can help you and give you some ideas for additional capability.  For me the RB.XML structure was initially painful to understand (it was in italoenglish) so some of the entries didn't make much sense.  Once I understood it, modifying beat grids there for hard to grid tracks, or getting creative with cues became much easier. 

(As a side-note I imagine the Rekordcloud team would also agree...)

Would love to discuss further...

Regards

CRSounds

@CRSounds, I tried to use the solution you listed but for the life of me I cannot seem to get it to work or maybe I'm just not understanding it correctly.

Are you supposed to show the file in explorer or show information?

Thanks

So, I am not sure how to help you, because you gave no information.  It works for Windows 10 Machines, and For RBDJ 5 and 6 if you follow the steps above.  It only works for controllers connected to your laptop (DDJ-SX2 or DDJ-1000 in my case).

It is pretty simple, if you have a track already in RBDJ and you change the capitalization and then add the file again, RBDJ will see it as a new entry, even though the actual file is the same (capitalization does not matter on a Windows machine).

Anyway if you want more help please provide some more information!

Regards

CRSounds

My bad, I thought when I changed the filename and it created a new file in rekordbox I was doing it wrong as I thought thought it did not create duplicates. But if it is meant to do that then it worked perfectly. My main issue was just not understanding what was meant when you said file location, I assumed it meant where it was located in the PC, but when I changed that I got a new file and thought I did it wrong.

Thanks for your help.

Hi Sebastian

I am still not sure if I understand (maybe it is a translation issue - I'm in America), but the idea is that the file remains the same, it is in the same location on your hard drive.  So as long as you just changed the capitalization in the name, you can have a clone of the track in Rekordbox DJ.  There is only one file on your hard drive but to Rekordbox there are two (or more) entries for the same song each with their own beatgrid and cues.

If you exported to xml and searched on the filename you would see it twice in your Rekorbox,xml file, even though it is in the same file location.

Anyway if it worked for you great!! wishing you the best!

Regards

CRSounds

I don't understand, can someone make a video?

The easiest way is to copy the song to another folder on your drive. Import it to rekordbox again. Create new hot cues.

"
The easiest way is to copy the song to another folder on your drive. Import it to rekordbox again. Create new hot cues."

it is not a solution to have the same songs on the disk several times

I agree, and the original solution allowed for one song on the disk and several different sets of beatgrids and hot cues for the song. Unfortunately that was on an older version of Rekordbox and I'm not sure if the same level of accessibility (and the same bug that allowed this) is available for the new version.

I will have to look into this. Also if you look at my original response you will see that I use a Windows Machine, if you use a Mac it will probably not work the same. You can also look at editing the Rekordbox.xml file directly to see if that helps you...

It's not the ideal solution, but the definition of a solution is a means of solving a problem... which my answer does.

With the ability to set 16 per track, and a bunch of memory points, I'm curious as to the need.

It's just perspective. True your solution works, but it just adds a duplicate of the track to your collection.  Having an "aliased" beatgrid, and cuepoints, to the same track just provides additional flexibility without creating a duplicate track on your disk. 

One example is where you can have a track with a beatgrid that's normal speed with requisite cues, and an aliased beatgrid at half speed with a completely different set of cue points.  Your way can do the same thing but requires a copy of the track.  

It's obvious that the software doesn't care vis a vis the Rekrodbox.xml allowing either solution so its just a preference.  I have entries for the same track with multiple beatgrids and cue sets for different styles, from beat juggling to cue juggling.  I still only have the one track on my disk though.

I think this is really good option to add this in rekordbox.

Just click on track->create new "rekord/cues/...." and recordbox Can add nrw record to xml file for this track.

I think it is so simple.