Need to combine A LOT of audio MP3 files in to a single file

The title of the thread says it all.... I have 25 or 30 audio MP3 files; they are all in sequence and should flow seamlessly from one in to the next. However, whoever encoded it spliced it into chunks of seemingly random lengths: one chunk might be 32sec, another might be 12min, etc; the cuts unfortunately do not occur in logical places (like between songs for example; EVERY cut is right in the middle of a song, or conversation). I'd like to SIMPLY join every file in "folder X" to end up with one long MP3 file (or WAV or whatever). The files are now in MP3 format. I took a quick look at Audacity and I don't see a SIMPLE EASY way to do this. I can do it with Nero by checking the "No pause between tracks", but the entire set of MP3s is over 150 minutes, so I'd like to join it into one long file, then make cuts as appropriate to fit it all on to std audio CDs (it should come out to roughly two and a half CDs).

Any suggestions will be appreciated!

 

Do you get pauses inserted if you try to do playback through media player etc? If not set up a playlist with all your files, set audacity to record from your stereo and start it recording then play your playlist and leave it.

Otherwise you will have to import each file into Audacity and line them up (Shouldnt be too much hassle with snap on) then mix down to MP3

 

Yes. Fortunately though, the timings were misrepresented. The cuts and pauses aren't nearly as bad as I thought. But there are still some things that should NOT have been cut in to 2 or 3 parts and should have stayed cohesive.

Unfortunately, it seems that with Vista/7, then "record what you hear" option is not longer available. I'll have to go thru the entire 3+ hours and find where the cuts should and should not be, make notes, and then manipulate as needed.

 

Well, the files that were the reason for starting this thread turned out OK, but now I have a bunch of audio files that are EXACTLY as I described above:

So I have 7 seconds of a song, followed by the next 24 seconds, followed by another 12 seconds, followed by 4 minutes, followed by the final 3 minutes of that song and the first 45 seconds of the next song, etc.

So- I really NEED something that has a "batch mode", or something like "Append file" as in the video editor Virtual Dub. HEY! Maybe VirtualDub will append audio w/o the video track!! I'll try it, but if anyone has a program that will take every MP3 in a folder, and simply join them into a single MP3, I will be ETERNALLY grateful!!! I'd like to simply point the program to a folder, and tell it to "join every MP3 together in the same order they appear in the folder". It seems like this would be a very popular app, esp for recordings of live concerts by "jam bands". Nothing is worse than listening to a righteous jam from Phish or the Grateful Dead just to have it stop in mid-jam because whoever recorded/encoded it decided that they would say "this is the 'end' of song A, and then song B starts a second later, so I'll cut this jam and label the first half of it as 'song A' and the second half of the jam will be 'song B'"... this is unacceptable. Why not just let the jam run from one song in to another, let it flow w/o the cut, then make a "notes" TXT files explaining the song list and jams. DUH!!!

I don't have the time (or patience) to learn Audacity. It's like learning how to use Virtual Dub the first time. Both are very un-user-friendly, but once you figure it out, it's simple. Well, I have neither the time or patience now to figure out how to use Audacity (unless someone can post/link a STEP-BY-STEP guide on how to QUICKLY join multiple MP3 files; they don't need to be edited or recoded, just joined together).

(OK - Yes, I have a bunch of live music from "the archive" that has been all cut to all hell and I want to fix it . . . . HELP!!!)

 

Not sure if this is what you are looking for.

http://shchuka.com/software/mergemp3/

 

That looks like it will be absolutely perfect! THANKS!!! I'll check it out later tonight or tomorrow and let ya'll know....
:-D

 

@ tgell: well, I just tried that app you linked above, and it's FREEKIN' AWESOME! It's really fast! I was figuring on 10-30sec to join together five MP3 files with a combined size of 15.5mb and a combined length of just under 17min. This little app combined the five sections in less than a second! Seriously - I clicked on "Merge" and it was instantaneous. I'm sending an email to MajorAttitude right now recommending this app for hosting here at MG. It's free, it's portable (meaning no install required, just launch the EXE), and it's quick, and it FREEKIN WORKS PERFECTLY!!!

Thanks tgell . . . I owe you one.

:major

 

Glad it worked for you. I see your request to put it on MajorGeeks was done. :-D Thanks for that PM.