Below you’ll find a tutorial/instructions to automatically get lyrics to ALL OF YOUR SONGS on an iPod and PC using WinAmp and some plug-ins.

The idea is basically this: 

• I don’t like iTunes, so I want to manage my iPod with a different program: WinAmp
• I like to have lyrics on my iPod, but this is a tedious process if done by hand or via iTunes
• Using some plugins for WinAmp this can be done fast and automatically

First we have to enhance the native functionality of WinAmp for the iPod. This is done with the plug-in ml_ipod (see for hyperlink below). We now want to automatically get our Lyrics, this is something Leo’s Lyrics plug-in can do. The settings of this plug-in should be set to export to ID3v2 tags. Each time you play a song for the first time, the plug-in will search the database on Leo’s Lyrics for the song playing and it will then store the information i.e. the lyric inside the ID3v2 tag.

Now it’s time to play all your music files, ehmm no wait!  Because you’ll have to wait a long, long, time (in my case more than a month) to play all your files.

That’s where ‘Intro Play’ comes in. If installed you can look it up in the preferences screen of WinAmp under plug-ins > general purpose. Turn ‘Intro Play’ on, this will make WinAmp play each song for the first [#] seconds (minimum 2, in order to give Leo some time with his Lyrics). Select all your songs and put them into a playlist. Think of something else to do for the following

 {# of songs} * {# of intro seconds} / 3600 = … hours.

After your several hours break, you can make a playlist in WinAmp which you can synchronize with you iPod, when you are then listening to a song on your iPod press about five times on the center button, and if Leo’s Lyrics found a lyric, it will be there. Provided of course it’s not some obscure Dutch music you’re listening to…! Don’t forget to turn of ‘Intro Play’ in WinAmp’s preferences, otherwise you’ll be listening CD’s in seconds.

Download locations

• ml_ipod [plug-in @ sourceforge]
• Leo’s Lyrics [plug-in @ winamp.com] skin fits to modern skins in WinAmp
• Intro Play [plug-in @ winamp.com]
   

Hardware & Software

• iPod Nano 3rd generation
• WinAmp version 5.541 (skin: modern black)