You may be interested to see that abcde now has the capability to download album art, I apologise for not using the approach that you suggested! The eventual successful patches came from the same thread on GoogleCode where your patch was suggested... Currently available only in the git version but it will go mainstream when 2.6.1 is released. The abcde FAQ in git has some detailed information on how to get it all working although sane defaults should guarantee a good result anyway. I am planning a web page with more detailed information, this will come out in a week or so...