Tracks for CDs

[b0b]

When building tracks for a commercial CD, should there be silence at the beginning of the track, or should it start with the first sound? If there's silence, how long should it be?

Also, Cakewalk Pyro allows me to set the amount of space between songs. Is there an industry standard for this? Is it okay to have some tracks closer together than others?

[Steinar Gregertsen]

I usually leave about 0,5 second on each end of the track. I believe the 'standard' gap between tracks are 2 seconds, but there's no hard rules here, a pro mastering program will allow you to adjust the gaps as you wish in their 'audio CD montage',- if you want to crossfade two tracks and drop a track marker in the middle of the crossfade that's perfectly okay, etc...

Steinar

[b0b]

Maybe I wasn't clear. I've been putting about half a second of silence at the beginning of each track. It seems less jarring that way. Would radio people object to that? We'd like to get some airplay.

[Will Holtz]

I've been told by one mastering engineer that he always sticks half a second of silence at the start of a track, because some older players don't correctly cue up. These players actually start playing a little past the index marker. Thus if you put half a second of silence, you will certainly get all of the song, even if the player has an offset in where it cues up.

[Jack Stoner]

I did some CD's for Mike Gross' "Swingin West" broadcast. They had .5 sec on the beginning of each song and the 2 seconds between. He complained that it wasn enough lead time so I remade them with 2 seconds at the beginning of each song and he was happy.

[Leroy Golden]

The Roland program that I use recomends .5 sec. before the start point and whatever you like on the end, and I've not had any problems with the comercial duplication process...the only problem I had was a master being rejected for being recorded Track-at-a-time instead of Disc-at-a-time, so I make sure to do it Disc-at-a-time now!

[Steinar Gregertsen]

Maybe I wasn't clear. I've been putting about half a second of silence at the beginning of each track.

Yep, and that's what I wrote that I usually do too.
A half second 'blank' at the beginning and about the same as a 'tail' at the end.

Steinar

[Buddy Lewis]

Red Book is supposed to be the industry standard on gaps between tracks. They say that it's two seconds. Of course if your track is not properly truncated that two seconds can last a lot longer. The main thing is that the track markers are in the right spot. Many mastering engineers say that the amount of gap between songs depends on the songs. With ballads they use a longer gap and shorter for more upbeat songs. They say that the proper amount of gap is part of the artistry of their work. I say use at least two seconds and provide an accurated track marker and your going to be pretty safe.