Reclaiming Digital Music with Apple Spatial Audio and Lossless

I've been an Apple Music subscriber since the service was first launched, and I have used iTunes and the iTunes Store since the time of the second-generation iPod. I've always had a love/hate relationship with it. Back in the days of audio players like Winamp and RealPlayer, and organizing my hard drive of MP3 files obtained from questionable sources, iTunes came along and made things easy. Not only did I add those MP3s to the library - I also ripped much of my CD collection using the app. I also started to buy music in the iTunes Store. Still, syncing was difficult and time-consuming. My iPod's hard drive died. I spent a year in the Microsoft Zune ecosystem. I don't like to talk about that.

Things continued to be a challenge until the iPhone had been out for a few years. At that point, wireless syncing started to be a thing in iTunes, and it got easier - except when sync errors occurred and it didn't. Then came the streaming services. I used Pandora. I used Spotify for a time. I ended up on Google Music for quite a while and made the switch to Android for a few years. I liked Google Music but didn't particularly like the phones that were on the platform at the time. Finally, in about 2014, I returned to the iPhone and haven't used anything else since.

Through all that, the best audio system I had was a powered set of computer speakers with a subwoofer. I started getting back into vinyl record collecting around that time - bought a turntable again (hadn't had one since the early 1990s) and started to slowly upgrade my home audio system. I enjoyed the sound of the vinyl I was playing on that system and remember proudly proclaiming to my friends that there just was no substitute for the sound of vinyl records. I had never once considered that the quality of the digital files I was listening to, and the sub-par sound system I was listening to them through, may have had an impact on that.

The iTunes Match Years

Around the same time, Apple came out with a service called iTunes Match. For around $25 a year you could upload your owned music library to their cloud. The difference was that Apple would analyze the tracks before they uploaded. If they had a match already in their system, it would save you the upload and just give you the matched version. In many cases, Apple's version was of higher quality and bit rate than the one from your hard drive. That was certainly the case for many of my older files. The hack for this was that, once your tracks were matched and in the cloud, you could remove your old files from the library, re-download them from iTunes for free, and you'd have higher quality 320kbps AAC versions. That was great! I didn't think it could get any better, except when, in a lot of cases, iTunes would match half of an album, upload the other half, and you'd be left with an album of inconsistent quality. For some people, iTunes incorrectly matched their libraries - particularly for more rare recordings and live tracks - leaving them with a complete mess. In some cases, files were lost forever. Thankfully that didn't happen to me, but I still had some issues.

Then came Apple Music, a subscription service similar to Spotify and Google Music. There was a match component built into the $10 a month service so that you could mix your library of owned songs with their growing streaming library. I started to use it because it was pretty well integrated with iOS and all my devices were Apple. I didn't love it. Navigation was sometimes hard. It was hard to tell what was from your library and what wasn't. The owned music library that I had carefully curated over nearly 20 years was now kind of a big mess.

Converting CDs to FLAC

Then came 2018. I was buying records right and left. I was continuing to upgrade my audio equipment - nothing fancy. I still don't have anything fancy. It's just better, considering where I started. Thanks to Apple Music and iTunes Match my digital music collection was in disarray. It was at that point that I decided to start over. I would have a library of digital music that I owned, but I'd keep it separate. I'd stream from Apple Music on the go. I'd listen to my library of digital files at home.

I created a Plex server, which is a system that allows you to serve up your digital media (video, audio, photos) to other devices. I kept my files that were of the highest quality, generally 320kbps or higher, and started re-ripping my CDs into lossless FLAC files. Since then I've been ripping those CDs in my spare time - I've gotten about 60% of the way through my 700+ CD collection - and buying new music at 320kbps or higher when something I liked came out. That might include digital MP3 downloads that you get when you buy a new record. Occasionally I'd even buy a new CD and rip it into FLAC files.

That's about where I'm at now. I still love collecting vinyl records and listening to music on vinyl while drinking whiskey is one of my favorite pastimes. I'll get into that more in another post. This week Apple introduced a couple of new features into their Apple Music service that, at first look, may change my digital music behavior yet again.

Apple Lossless

When the announcement was first made, the announcement that the entire streaming library of Apple Music would be available to stream at CD quality or better seemed like the biggest development. Sure, there are streaming services offering lossless music like Tidal and Amazon Music. Spotify announced it back in February but it hasn't rolled out yet. Apple Music is my primary streaming service and I'm in the Apple ecosystem. Also, it is offered at no additional cost. For Tidal and Amazon, it's a higher tier.

I felt this was great news. I was right. I was perusing the streaming library today, listening to some of my favorites. If you have the equipment to play lossless files - meaning a DAC (digital to analog converter), good wired headphones, or a good amplifier and speakers, then you're getting great-sounding CD quality audio on demand. You also get a large number of tracks that are part of their "Apple Digital Masters", meaning, in their words, "virtually indistinguishable from the original 24-bit studio masters." I listened to a few of those today too, and they sound great.

Part of the downside of lossless, however, is that right now, you're pretty much tethered to your player. Wireless protocols like Bluetooth, although it's gotten better, are not capable of transmitting lossless files. Additionally, I happen to own a set of Apple's AirPods Pro and have been underwhelmed by them. They're not able to handle lossless files either (though there's an indication that may change at some point with a firmware update).

Some of this may be moot. Unless you're 17 years old with excellent hearing and a well-trained ear, most experts will tell you that you're not able to tell much difference between a good quality lossy (compressed) file and a lossless one. At my age and after a lifetime of listening to loud music, performing music, going to concerts, driving tractors and lawnmowers, it's very unlikely that I can pick out the extra information that gets omitted from a lossy digital file.

I'm going to tackle that subject, as well as the subject of vinyl sounding better, in more detail another day. I have some strong thoughts about it.

What I can tell you is that the next announcement coming from Apple turned out to be the one that surprised me the most.

Apple Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos

Spatial Audio was the gimmick that made me buy the AirPods Pro over the regular AirPods. I heard people on podcasts talking about how amazing it was to listen to some of the movies that were mastered in Dolby Atmos, hearing the soundtrack all around you like you were in a high-end digital movie theater.

When I finally got the AirPods, in addition to the left one not staying in my ear no matter what size of tip I used, I thought, "Wow, that sounds cool." Then I never did it again.

When Apple released the new files with spatial audio this week, I put the AirPods Pro into my ears (I've since fixed the left-ear problem with new memory foam tips).

On the front page of Apple Music, they presented two examples, both by DJ Zane Lowe introducing Spatial Audio. The first, he played a song by The Weekend in stereo, then played it again in Spatial. I could hear some differences and it sounded good. The second demonstration was "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye. Lowe played the original mono version. Then he played the stereo. Finally, he played the Spatial Audio version. The strings sounded better. Gaye sounded amazing. The background vocals were all around me. It was almost like I was in the middle of the studio while the musicians performed around me. I was very intrigued by this.

Next, I scrolled through the albums that were available on day one in Dolby Atmos Spatial Audio. I stopped on Goats Head Soup from The Rolling Stones and scrolled down to "Angie". I'm not sure if it is Mick Taylor or Keith Richards playing the acoustic guitar opening but whoever it was, it sounded like he was standing behind me. I listened to it twice more. Every part was distinct, clear, and happening around my head. Jagger's whispers of "Angie" in the middle of the track were haunting. It's a great song in stereo. It's alive in this format.

I listened to several others, ranging from Kenny Rogers' the Gambler, to The Allman Brothers Band's "Jessica", to Bon Jovi's "Wanted...Dead or Alive", to Billie Eilish's James Bond theme "No Time to Die". I also checked out a couple of classical tracks, including "Jupiter" from Holst's "The Planets".

Right now as I write this I've got Queensryche's "Silent Lucidity" in Atmos in my head. It's not my favorite Queensryche song. If I never heard it again I'd be ok. Except this is awesome. Geoff Tate's deep vocals, the soaring strings, that acoustic guitar. It's brought the song back to life for me.

I'm working on a piece about reasons I listen to vinyl records other than their sound. As a spoiler, one of the big reasons that I prefer that format is the experience of active listening - sitting down, putting on a record, and listening rather than just having it on as background music. Digital music has always been background music for me. It's too soon to say, but this may change that.

From my understanding, Apple's AirPods Pro and Max, and some of the Beats headphones, have a chip in them that support Dolby Atmos and they give you one of the best experiences, but your current iOS device does too, so any set of headphones should work - even Bluetooth.

Here's the thing. Spatial Audio is not lossless (which is why you can plug in any set of headphones to listen). It doesn't matter. It's so much fun to listen to.

I have a feeling that the library of digital music I own and maintain on my Plex server may get used less and less for the foreseeable future, in favor of some combination of vinyl and Apple Music lossless, digital masters, and spatial audio.

It's also been the first thing to make me feel ok about the money I dropped on my AirPods Pro.

I'm not an audiophile. I don't spend thousands on audio equipment. I have equipment that I like and I think it sounds good. I'm also a fan of Apple's products and services. I understand you may differ. Finally, I know that Apple isn't the only company doing spatial audio or supporting Dolby Atmos, however, they've got the most compelling offering at the moment in my opinion.

It's too soon to tell what this will mean for the world of digital music. It may or may not be a game-changer. I feel like it's going to be a game-changer for me.

If you’ve got Apple Music, you can check out this playlist of some of the tracks I’ve enjoyed most in Apple’s Spatial Audio offering thus far. Remember, you need headphones for this - or a really fancy surround sound system that does Dolby Atmos. If you listen to nothing else, whether you enjoy opera or not, do yourself a favor, close your eyes, and pretend you’re sitting on the stage as Pavarotti performs “Nessun dorma!” from Turandot to a captivated audience.