In the past couple of weeks, I've found and started using four very cool CD/audio-related OS X apps. If you're running OS X, go check them out. If not, ask yourself "WHY? WHY? WHY?"

Audio Hijack - similar to Total Recorder on Windows, grabs and encodes the audio from any source. Unlike TR, however, Audio Hijack worked for me. TR didn't work for shit. Like any Winblows app that has anything to do with anything more technically complex than opening a file, it quickly got very complex. I was asked to specify which of three equally unrecognizable audio drivers I wanted to use, which stream encoding bypass flange to configure, and how did I want to configure the equanimous bipolar input sprocket? The best I was able to get was working (barely) audio that was ve-ry ch-op-py a-nd br-ok-en up. Unusable. Trash. Audio Hijack, on the other hand, was piss simple. Install, tell it what app you want it to attach to, and bingo. Hijacked audio. Shareware, $16.

Amazing Slow Downer - aka "audio Quaaludes" - independently vary pitch and speed over a wide range of values. Despite the name, it slows down or speeds up tracks without changing the pitch, or vice-versa. A bit expensive for what it does, but the capabilities in the demo version may be all you need. Available on OS X, Mac OS 9, and, for the afflicted, Winblows. Surprisingly, this program worked on Winduhs without requiring a reboot, intimate knowledge of interrupt vector 0x7FE, or the target address of DMA channel #5478902749832. Shareware, $40.

Ask the DJ - give this program a list of songs, and it will sequence them and cross-fade them pretty much seamlessly. Matches beats, tempo and rhythm to give extremely slick, pro-DJ-style mixes. Saves to AIFF or burns straight to CD. Does its own BPM count of the music which I've only managed to confuse once, but when it is confused, you can always turn to the next program. Shareware, $29.

iTunes BPM Inspector. "iTunes-BPM adds a simple floating window to iTunes that allows you to set the beats-per-minute value for the currently playing song by tapping along to the music" - that's what it says on the website, and that's what it does. Blacktree also does the ever-popular iTunes-LAME encoder, which "combines the simple interface of iTunes with the high quality of the LAME encoder" and will, for example, rip AACs and protected AACs to MP3 (it's not a lossless transcoding, but I'll be damned if I can hear the difference). Freeware, but donations are welcomed.