2022-08-08, 11:24
After posting some configuration advice in the Lyrics add-on sub-forum I thought the same advice might be of interest to more people using Kodi for music playback. So here's how I setup Kodi to use the Metropolis skin for full-screen music playback assuming you are starting with just the default Estuary Kodi skin.
In Estuary, Kodi’s current default skin, go to Settings, Media, Music, and enable Switch To Visualisation On Playback. Estuary will then switch to the full-screen display when music is played.
I personally don’t like Estuary so I then install the Confluence skin which used to be the default Kodi skin.
In Confluence I then install the CU LRC Lyrics add-on. The only CU LRC Lyrics configuration I require is to set it to Search for and save LRC lyrics and TXT lyrics in the song folder.
Secondly in Confluence I go to Settings, Interface, Configure Skin, Add-on Shortcuts, Music OSD and set the Lyrics Add-on to be CU LRC Lyrics.
If you have correctly named lyric files stored alongside your music tracks then Confluence will display them whenever music tracks are played and you can test this is working correctly before moving on to the more complex Metropolis setup. I don't use Confluence any more for music playback because Confluence doesn’t display CD Discart ie. a rotating image of the actual CD (assuming you have one) during music playback and on all my systems the lyrics page number display in Confluence is corrupt. To solve these problems and give my a really excellent user interface and full screen music playback display I then install the Metropolis skin.
Metropolis I then configure as follows.
In Settings, Metropolis, General, enable Video/Album Art Overlay.
In Settings, Metropolis, General, enable Auto scrolling for text….
In Settings, Metropolis, Scripts/Extras, set the Default Lyrics Script to CU LRC Lyrics.
In Settings, Metropolis, Music Settings, enable Visualization, Show Player Position and Time in Info Overlay.
In Settings, Media, Music, General, make sure it’s set to Switch to Visualization on Playback.
Also in Settings, Media, Music, General, I set the Track Naming Template to
[%N, ]%T
This works well with the way my music files are named which is xx-songname where xx is the track number.
When configured as above you will have a really great full-screen music playback display which will include the album artwork, a rotating image of the actual CD plus of course the synchronised song lyrics. All assuming you have LRC lyric files with timing tags, the album artwork and an image of the actual CD saved alongside the music tracks. The album artwork should be named Folder.JPG. The CD image should be named Discart.png and be precisely 1000 pixels square.
My first example shows how it looks with this configuration and one of the tracks from Alison Moyet's album The Minutes:
My second example shows how it looks with a track from Simon Phillips Protocol V album. This is an instrumental so I make use of the LRC file display facility to put up details of the players which makes for a handy reminder as to who played what.
I hope some of you find this useful,
JB
In Estuary, Kodi’s current default skin, go to Settings, Media, Music, and enable Switch To Visualisation On Playback. Estuary will then switch to the full-screen display when music is played.
I personally don’t like Estuary so I then install the Confluence skin which used to be the default Kodi skin.
In Confluence I then install the CU LRC Lyrics add-on. The only CU LRC Lyrics configuration I require is to set it to Search for and save LRC lyrics and TXT lyrics in the song folder.
Secondly in Confluence I go to Settings, Interface, Configure Skin, Add-on Shortcuts, Music OSD and set the Lyrics Add-on to be CU LRC Lyrics.
If you have correctly named lyric files stored alongside your music tracks then Confluence will display them whenever music tracks are played and you can test this is working correctly before moving on to the more complex Metropolis setup. I don't use Confluence any more for music playback because Confluence doesn’t display CD Discart ie. a rotating image of the actual CD (assuming you have one) during music playback and on all my systems the lyrics page number display in Confluence is corrupt. To solve these problems and give my a really excellent user interface and full screen music playback display I then install the Metropolis skin.
Metropolis I then configure as follows.
In Settings, Metropolis, General, enable Video/Album Art Overlay.
In Settings, Metropolis, General, enable Auto scrolling for text….
In Settings, Metropolis, Scripts/Extras, set the Default Lyrics Script to CU LRC Lyrics.
In Settings, Metropolis, Music Settings, enable Visualization, Show Player Position and Time in Info Overlay.
In Settings, Media, Music, General, make sure it’s set to Switch to Visualization on Playback.
Also in Settings, Media, Music, General, I set the Track Naming Template to
[%N, ]%T
This works well with the way my music files are named which is xx-songname where xx is the track number.
When configured as above you will have a really great full-screen music playback display which will include the album artwork, a rotating image of the actual CD plus of course the synchronised song lyrics. All assuming you have LRC lyric files with timing tags, the album artwork and an image of the actual CD saved alongside the music tracks. The album artwork should be named Folder.JPG. The CD image should be named Discart.png and be precisely 1000 pixels square.
My first example shows how it looks with this configuration and one of the tracks from Alison Moyet's album The Minutes:
My second example shows how it looks with a track from Simon Phillips Protocol V album. This is an instrumental so I make use of the LRC file display facility to put up details of the players which makes for a handy reminder as to who played what.
I hope some of you find this useful,
JB
