How to extract music only?

[UncleBose]

I see a lot of guides on how to rip the audio from a DVD into MP3, but how do I rip the music track only, leaving out the sound effect and dialogue tracks?

[Baldrick]

The music is almost always mixed in the dialogue track so it 's very tricky to separate those with a good result. First demux the audio from the dvd with for example pgcdemux and then play around with advanced editors that has several filters like adobe audition etc.

Or just try find the sound track audio cd for just that movie.

[UncleBose]

Thanks...I'll try Audition. In case you're familiar, I'm interested in the music from the suicide scene in Last of the Mohicans from 1992. Neither soundtrack has the exact score from that scene.

Any other suggestions would be appreciated.

[mazinz]

If the dvd has a 5.1 audio mix you may be in luck. This common form of soundtrack ripping is called "rear channel ripping." Why? Because in a 5.1 audio mix most of the time the music alone is stored in the rear left and right channels. Many film score enthusiast have done this very successfully to get score music from a film that otherwise does not have a score released. Your best route, demux the 5.1 as mentioned, then use besweet and have it save the file as "6 separate waves".

Once this is done open up the waves in whatever editor you like. Combing the back rear channels will make a stereo track (a single track from a 5.1 are all mono) for you and 9 out of 10 times those channels are free and clear of dialogue and sound effects.

[diane31]

Hi,
I'm a complete newbie at audio (as in, first time I open an audio editing software!), and I've just tried to follow these instructions (so glad I found them too!). But I'm stuck ... I think I demuxed ok, but I don't know what to do with Besweet and all its options. How do I save the file as 6 seperate waves? (BTW what I've been trying to use is the ac3 file generated by pgcdemux... is that right?).
Thank you so much for your help!

[AlanHK]

I've been trying to use is the ac3 file

Try HeadAC3he.

Open the your AC3 and see what it says about the file.

Click on "options" to select which channels to output, mix.
You can save as wave, AC3, MP3, etc.

[diane31]

Thanks! I tried that (whether I did it correctly that's another matter), and I got a wav file out... now I take it I must find
an editor that can show me all the (6?) channels? Is there anything freeware/shareware that can do this?
Thanks a lot in advance!

[AlanHK]

Thanks! I tried that (whether I did it correctly that's another matter), and I got a wav file out... now I take it I must find an editor that can show me all the (6?) channels? Is there anything freeware/shareware that can do this?
Thanks a lot in advance!

I'd use Headac3he and save each channel out separately, listen to them and then go back and export a stereo mix with the channels that just had the music.

Audacity is a very good free audio editor, it may be able to handle multichannel audio, see its manual and wiki, but I just use it for stereo.

I also downmix using Avisynth scripts, but if you're not already using that it's not the easiest method. If you are, I can give some details (using Soundout, GetChannel, etc).

[diane31]

Thanks! That makes a lot of sense!
I must be doing something wrong though: it looks like the process always gets stuck at the end in Headac3he. I select one input channel and one output channel (either left of right or I get an error message), set the DRCs to no, and the downmix type to mono (since there's just one channel?). The bar at the bottom seems to indicate that the process is complete, but it just remains "stuck" there, and if I try to stop it, the wav file generated disappears. Any idea what's going on?
Again, thank you... I feel so lost at this kind of stuff...

[AlanHK]

Any idea what's going on?

Sorry can't guess, but did you select the "destination file" (folder and name), and "destination format" (probably wav is the default)?
Is "two pass mode" selected? I think that's for normalization) If so, unselect.

[diane31]

Yes, the "two pass mode" was selected! I deselected it and it reached the end and generated the file (I set it to wav file, I hope that's the idea for my purposes (?). Thank you so much!!!
Huh... when I try to play the file in media player as a check though, I don't get any sound... it says it plays but I can't hear anything. I tried to save the left channel seperately by selecting "input channel left" and "output channel left", with everything else deselected... ?

[t0nee1]

AlanHK wrote,

Audacity is a very good free audio editor, it may be able to handle multichannel audio, see its manual and wiki, but I just use it for stereo.

Yes, and with the latest version(s) you can import/process multi-channel directly from VOB, or your extracted AC3 as well..