How can I use lame to encode wav files within a shell script?

I'm trying to set artist information via variables with spaces in them. Lame craps out. Maybe I'm being retarded with bash?

#!/bin/bash
year=2008;
artist="New Kids On The Block";
album="The Block";
bitrate=320;
lame="lame -b $bitrate --ta \"$artist\"  --tl \"$album\" --ty $year"

function first_half
{
    for (( i=1;i<10;i++ )); do
        $lame "track_0$i.wav" "track_0$i.mp3";
    done;
}

function second_half
{
    for (( x=10;x<18;x++ )); do
        echo $lame "track_$x.wav" "track_$x.mp3";
    done;
}

first_half &
first_pid=$!

#second_half &
#second_pid=$

Here's the output of the script.

user@host:~/ogg/noartist/unknown_disc$ ./encode.sh 
user@host:~/ogg/noartist/unknown_disc$ lame: excess arg The
lame: excess arg The

Lame complains for each loop iteration... of course.

I changed the script to echo out one of the iterations of the loop and this is what is outputted.

lame -b 320 --ta "New Kids On The Block" --tl "The Block" --ty 2008 track_01.wav track_01.mp3

This works line fine on the shell... I'm confused. What am I doing wrong here? I know it has to do with the spaces in my variables, but I'm not sure how to fix it.

Thanks :)

From stackoverflow

• I found a temporary solution that I used...

  It's a bit of a hack, but it does the job:

  #!/bin/bash
  year="2008";
  artist="\"New Kids On The Block\"";
  album="\"The Block\"";
  bitrate=320;
  genre="Pop";
  lame="lame -b $bitrate --ta $artist  --tl $album --ty $year --tg $genre"
  
  function first_half
  {
      echo "Encoding first half...";
      for (( i=1;i<10;i++ )); do
          echo $lame "track_0$i.wav" "track_0$i.mp3" > run1.sh;
          bash run1.sh >/dev/null 2>/dev/null;
      done;
      rm -f run1.sh;
  }
  
  function second_half
  {
      echo "Encoding second half too...";
      for (( x=10;x<18;x++ )); do
          echo $lame "track_$x.wav" "track_$x.mp3" >run2.sh;
          bash run2.sh >/dev/null 2>/dev/null;
      done;
      rm -f run2.sh;
  }
  
  first_half &
  echo $! > first_half.pid
  
  second_half
  echo $! > second_half.pid
  
  echo "Done!";
  rm *.pid -f
  

• The problem is the line

  lame="lame -b $bitrate --ta \"$artist\"  --tl \"$album\" --ty $year"
  

  because $lame later is evaluated more than once. You can run

  bash -xv ./encode.sh
  

  to see commands executed and variables substituted (instead of running "bash -xv" you can add "set -xv" inside the script).

• "lame" should be a function. Note: I ran "lame" in the same directory, "./lame", so I could use another script to test the results.

  #!/bin/bash
  year=2008
  artist="New Kids On The Block"
  album="The Block"
  bitrate=320
  
  function lame()
  {
  #local bitrate=$1
  #local artist=$2
  #local album=$3
  #local year=$4
  local in=$1
  local out=$2
  ./lame -b "$bitrate" --ta "$artist" --tl "$album" --ty "$year" "$in" "$out"
  }
  
  function first_half
  {
      for (( i=1;i<10;i++ )); do
          lame "track_0$i.wav" "track_0$i.mp3"
      done
  }
  
  first_half &
  first_pid=$!
  

  lame:

  #!/bin/bash
  
  echo ===============================================
  echo $0 $*
  echo "0 ==> \"$0\""
  
  CNT=1
  while true; do
    echo -n "$CNT "
    [ $CNT -lt 10 ] && echo -n " "
    echo "==> \"$1\""
    CNT=$(($CNT + 1))
    shift
    [ -z "$1" ] && break
  done
  
  echo ===============================================
  

  Sample output (partial):

  ===============================================
  ./lame -b 320 --ta New Kids On The Block --tl The Block --ty 2008 track_01.wav track_01.mp3
  0 ==> "./lame"
  1  ==> "-b"
  2  ==> "320"
  3  ==> "--ta"
  4  ==> "New Kids On The Block"
  5  ==> "--tl"
  6  ==> "The Block"
  7  ==> "--ty"
  8  ==> "2008"
  9  ==> "track_01.wav"
  10 ==> "track_01.mp3"
  ===============================================
  ===============================================
  ./lame -b 320 --ta New Kids On The Block --tl The Block --ty 2008 track_02.wav track_02.mp3
  0 ==> "./lame"
  1  ==> "-b"
  2  ==> "320"
  3  ==> "--ta"
  4  ==> "New Kids On The Block"
  5  ==> "--tl"
  6  ==> "The Block"
  7  ==> "--ty"
  8  ==> "2008"
  9  ==> "track_02.wav"
  10 ==> "track_02.mp3"
  ===============================================