Music File Metadata and OCD

If I am importing a CD I always check the information several times before I begin the rip. Afterwards I double check the information again just in case. If I purchase a download I simply check the information immediately and fix whatever tag issues that may exist. By the time I play it all issues are fixed.

 

One of the things I love about ripping CDs. I could happily check and alter the metadata all day ( and have on many occasions)

 

The only thing that sucks about ripping a brand new, or obscure CD is that no one has ever previously entered metadata, and you have to do it yourself, and the tracklist is long or complicated.

The good thing about that is you are the first to enter the metadata and you can be assured it will be correct, and to your own tagging standards.

 

I long ago moved on to:

Album - 1

no disc, no CD, no Disc or any of that redundant junk. Just a nice clean dash, space, and number. How simple and clean

 

Have you run your rips through dBpoweramp's Perfect Tunes?

PerfectTUNES

 

My friend and I joke that we are iTunes DBAs (database administrators).

I used to care about such things then decided to only fix the obvious messes. Listening is more important, perhaps.

 

Thanks. I'm not sure if that would help or make it worse. A lot of this comes down to what you want your library to look like and how you want it organized. I may download the free version and see what it can do. May make it a little easier anyway to see things to fix.

 

I use

Artist Pink Floyd
Album The Wall
Disc 1/2
Disc 2/2

No Disc, Album whatever in the name of the Album - it is called The Wall! A number of players (not all), will then automatically play multi CD sets continuously without having to create playlists.

With a good naming string, most of the hard work can be done automatically: the hard part is deciding how we want things organised.

I do think that tagging has the potential for bringing out the OCD in many of us!

Using dBpoweramp, for all genres excepting Classical, I use Capitalise All. This capitalises the first letter of everyword, so gives a consistent look with minimal effort.

 

I try to be pretty meticulous about this when ripping new CDs, always checking existing entries in my library by the same artist or composer (for classical discs) to make sure the names and titles are consistent.

Even so, I keep coming across errors after the fact - sometime LONG after the fact. I try to always correct these errors as soon as I notice them. Otherwise, I’ll forget, and a couple of days later I’ll be wracking my brain trying to remember what it was that needed fixing.

 

It gets much more complex than your The Wall example. One will need much more than just that album title by itself. It gets into big box sets with multi discs and multi volumes. Check out the STAX Singles boxes and Bear family sets.

I wish it were so simple.

 

The Velvet Underground, Velvet Underground or Velvet Underground,The ???

Don't get me started on the many permutations of Frank Zappa (with or without the Mothers)

 

I wish you would get started and show us that you know what you are doing.

There are two fields for Artist. There is Artist and Album Artist. This gives you the flexibility and control to do it correctly.

There are:

The Mothers
The Mothers of Invention
Frank Zappa / Mothers
Zappa / Beefheart / Mothers

and the master folder called Frank Zappa which all these albums correctly tagged should into to.

Do you know how to do this correctly?

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It is Velvet Underground, The btw, first grade class teacher taught me about not leaving The at beginning in a titled list ever.

 

Some great box sets!

From a ripping point if view, it makes no odds if the multiple discs have two or nine in the set; the naming string treats them the same.

So it comes down to the album name and how you prefer the syntax, or worse case not using illegal filename characters. I use dBpoweramp which takes care of those illegal characters, so although I entered the album name as say:
The Complete Stax / Volt Singles: 1959-1968, Vol. 1 the folder will show as
The Complete Stax - Volt Singles; 1959-1968, Vol. 1
The filenames are irrelevant, and not the same as metadata.

Obviously there are many possible naming variations in the above example, which is to a degree to a degree personal choice, but like the Wall example, there is still no Disc 1, Disc 2 in the album name. If there are any variations in the album name, they are obviously treated as a different album, so to avoid typos, I simply copy and paste
The Complete Stax / Volt Singles: 1959-1968, Vol. 1 and add
Disc 1/9
Disc 2/9
Disc 3/9 etc.

To avoid variations in Vol. 2, again copy and paste and alter only the number.

As I see this as a Compilation, the Compilation box is checked, Compilation set to 1.

My naming string replaces Various Artists to Compilation, so the tree is:

Compilations
The Complete Stax / Volt Singles: 1959-1968, Vol. 1
Disc 1, Disc 2, Disc 3 etc.

Some prefer, or their player needs all the discs in a single folder, so the naming string can be changed accordingly and some prefer continuous track numbers - this is less automated and it is easier to make mistakes. Number offset +29 or however many tracks on the previous disc.

If it has to be continuous numbering, I think I would use +100, +200, +300 etc. so disc one has tracks 101-129, disc 2, 201- 227, disc 3, 301-328 etc.

There is no one way to do it right, but several to do it wrong!

None have any variation of (Disc 1), or whatever in the Album name, so it is as simple as the Pink Floyd example. The only variation is the disc number.

It is a personal library, so as long as we can find and play all of the music, anything else is purely personal preference. That includes correcting or ignoring typos and inconsistencies!

 

Album Artist and Album Artist Sort are so useful! Frank Zappa and Neil Young are prime candidates....

The Velvet Underground. I presume your teacher means sorting by Velvet Underground, The? I certainly wouldn't want to display as anything other than, The Velvet Underground.

 

OMFG, now I have to add ALBUMARTISTSORT to everything. This never ends.

 

You don't have to! It is your library, your choice.

But you certainly can use Album Artist Sort to display Frank Zappa in Zs, Neil Young in Ys. I now do it as a matter of routine whenever I rip a CD.

Of course you could add tags at anytime in the future, whenever that rainy day comes.....

 

I tag with MusicBrainz Picard which kind of helps take the decision making (since I would always be going back and forth) out of my hands. Although I do use scripts extensively to customize some things.

If I find errors in the MusicBrainz database for capitalization, etc. I correct them, which benefits not just me but the entire community of MusicBrainz and MB Picard users.

 

I use Tag Editor (Mac App Store) for bulk tag fixes. It allows you to drop a folder on it and shows everything in a nice spreadsheet view. I don't think there is any way easier than viewing it all in a list.

OTOH, you're all nuckin futz!

 

I use my own tagging system that is short, simple, and it works for me. All I need is artist, album, year, genre, and artwork that is as accurate to the original as possible.

 

"The Velvet Underground" is how I would write it. But I do use the Artist Sort Field to disregard "The" when it comes to sorting. But I don't use it to sort by the artist's last name (Jane Olivor would be sorted as "Jane Olivor" not "Olivor, Jane").

To illustrate how confusing putting "The" after the group/act name can become:

• On the soundtrack album for A Mighty Wind there are the following groups (the groups consist of actors who actually perform the music):
  • The Folksmen
  • Mitch & Mickey
  • The New Main Street Singers
• On one track all three acts perform, so if I used a following "The" the artist would look like this: "Folksmen, The, Mitch & Mickey, and New Main Street Singers, The" which makes for a very confusing artist.

Something I didn't mention previously when it comes to artists is how I dealt with an artist singing in character (such as in an animated movie). If the artist is singing in character, I list the character's name followed by the artist's name in brackets. Some examples:

• "The Rainbow Connection" by Kermit The Frog [Jim Henson]
• "Reflection" by Mulan [Lea Salonga]
• "I Won't Say I'm In Love" by Megara [Susan Egan]
• "Hello, It's Me" by Todd Woods [Paul Giamatti]
• The Smile Song" by Pinkie Pie [Shannon Chan-Kent]
• "Just Got A Letter From Mama" by Charlie Weaver [Cliff Arquette]
• "The Flim Flam Cider Song" by Flim [Samuel Vincent], Flam [Scott McNeil] And Granny Smith [Tabitha St. Germain]
• "Babs Seed" by Apple Bloom [Michelle Creber], Sweetie Belle [Michelle Creber] And Scootaloo [Madeleine Peters]
• "The Ballad Of Ranma And Akane" by Ranma [Kappei Yamaguchi] And Akane [Noriko Hidaka]

This only applies if the artist is singing as the character. With the song "Galaxy In My Hand" (the closing theme from Key The Metal Idol) although Nicole Oliver (the voice actor for Key) sings the song, I list her as the artist rather than "Key [Nicole Oliver]" because she's not singing as the character Key.

 

Everyone's needs and apps work differently, but you have those magic words - "and it works for me".

Perfect.

 

Couldn't agree more about displaying The after the group name: it quickly becomes very ugly. It is one of the things I learnt the hard way, but where Velvet Underground, The was just about tolerable, Danny And Juniors, The is horrendous!

Use of The is confusing, because some apps can be set to ignore it (mine can) so sort tags aren't necessary, however, for future compatibility I've used them anyway.

Sorting by Christian or surname is purely personal choice, and it is obviously quicker and easier not to use them. However I tend to look at covers when deciding what to play, and I've displayed them exactly how I do my vinyl, which is by surname. For me it makes sense for John Lennon to be next Julian Lennon in Ls, but displayed as John Lennon. So obviously:

Artist - John Lennon
Artist Sort - Lennon, John

Album Artist and yes, Album Artist Sort are extremely useful, not only for Frank Zappa and Neil Young, but newer albums with featured artists on a number of tracks: these are not compilations.

Artist - The Black Eyed Peas; Justin Timberlake; Timberland
Album Artist - The Black Eyed Peas
Album Artist Sort - Black Eyed Peas, The

I use the semi-colon [;] for featured artists, which works on all the players and apps I use, but unfortunately there really aren't many standards when it comes to tagging.


Some CDs you simply leave for that rainy day!!

 

Well, the thing is that I don't use apps to catalogue my music files.

 

I went:

Peter Gabriel 1 (Car)
Peter Gabriel 2 (Scratch)
Peter Gabriel 3 (Melt)
Peter Gabriel 4 (Security)

Your naming works perfectly. Going back to original LP releases I've always called them with the addition of the number and added the names more recently. Three of those are original CDs, and one the remaster, which does have the number.

 

One last piece of OCD tagging behaviour that I'll own up to, I have recently edited CDs that have bonus tracks, using the excellent Mp3tag, adding [Bonus Track] where applicable.

Sometimes it is good to simply play the original album, and on albums I don't know inside out, this additional information helps. At other times, I may want to play the non-album singles, B-Sides, and whatever bonus tracks that have been included.