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Author Topic: Smartlist to nest Artists under Custom Artist Tile (from Multiple Artist, etc.)  (Read 1651 times)

HiFiTubes

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Does anyone have any thoughts on how to create a view scheme that would do the following:

Custom Artist (tile) > Album (display all albums by that Custom Artist) + shows all files/album tiles from Multiple Artist albums/Comps with a rule: If Artist field contains Custom Artist = include.

I use the Artist field to preserve misspellings on old 45s, for duets, different incarnations of artist's/band's names, etc. and this results in incomplete Artist browsing. You drill down into an Artist tile and it does not contain all their works.

So, any of these situations, or tracks relegated to Multiple Artist due to comps. must be manually changed in Album Artist, a big task. I have been using a Custom Artist filed for years - I copy Artist > Custom Artist, and then manually go through and rename 5 different tiles to one Custom Artist. I don't think I will ever finish with the 400K files I have.

I'm guessing my meager understanding of Smartlists has prevented me from discovering a much simpler solution.
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vagskal

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It is a bit hard for me to understand what you want.

If your custom field is always filled with one name for each artist, i.e. John Mellencamp in the Custom Artist field even when the Artist field says John Cougar or John Cougar Mellencamp, why not just use Custom Artist as the first category and then group the second Album Category by Artist - Album?

As I said I can have misunderstood what you are doing or want to do.
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rick.ca

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Just use [Custom Artist] as a category instead of [Artist] or [Album Artist (auto)]. Or create an expression field [All Artists] = If(IsEqual([Album Artist (auto)], [Artist]), , [Album Artist (auto)]); [Custom Artist]&DataType=[List] and use that as the category—so tracks from multiple-artist albums are listed under those albums as well as the individual artists.
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HiFiTubes

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Thanks Rick! I'll try it.

Sorry it is confusing. I do use the Custom Artist field as a Category to view, as opposed to Artist.

I just like browsing my "artist" tiles and drilling down to see ALL their albums/tracks in one place; rather than 50 tracks of theirs that are on comps. hidden in the Multi-Artist Tile.


Problem is, it is a lot of work to re-tag everything. You can imagine how messy the un-tagged Custom Artist view looks when you have just copied every single artist field; you don't get that Multiple Artists filter like the Artist view....
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HiFiTubes

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Just use [Custom Artist] as a category instead of [Artist] or [Album Artist (auto)]. Or create an expression field [All Artists] = If(IsEqual([Album Artist (auto)], [Artist]), , [Album Artist (auto)]); [Custom Artist]&DataType=[List] and use that as the category—so tracks from multiple-artist albums are listed under those albums as well as the individual artists.

I need something like uses contains but probably with fuzzy logic.

e.g. If(Contains([Album Artist (auto)],

I think... ;D

Artist example:

Abyssinians, The
The Abyssians (misspelling)
The Abyssissians
The Abyssians and Michael G.
The Vectors (early incarnation of band)

I end up manually lumping these under one time by tagging Custom Artist = Abyssinians, The.

I don't think there is any way to automate something like this currently.
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rick.ca

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Quote
I don't think there is any way to automate something like this currently.

Right. In particular, no kind of 'fuzzy logic' is going to associate Abyssinians, Vectors and Michael G.

This may be a case where it would be more productive to examine the question carefully before expecting any answers. It's important to first be very clear about what you want. That's easier said than done when dealing with something as flexible as MC. But there is something fundamental that needs to be decided first...

In the context of a collection of files naturally organized by Artist and Album, what, exactly, is an Artist? Using your example, I suspect you're happy thinking of that list as one Artist—The Abyssinians. Or maybe two, if you consider The Vectors is really a completely separate band. Or maybe three, if it really was The Abyssinians and Michael G. (as in a collaboration substantially different than either of it's participants) rather than with or featuring. My point is, there is unlikely any right choice in these matters. You have to make the one that makes the most sense to you. And accept that may change. For example, The Vectors is just an "early incarnation of band"—until you discover, say, they recorded 6 albums more in a rocksteady than roots style. Then you may wish to recognize them as a completely separate Artist (and probably use some other method of associating the two).

Having some very specific idea of 'Artist' in mind is helpful because so does the design, logic and features of the program—when it comes to handling the association of Artist and Album. It will group any way you like (as I suggested before), but I would recommend sticking with the standard provided if at all possible. Now that [Artist] can be a list, it's more flexible in supporting different ideas of 'Artist'. But bear in mind you don't have to do that. Your decision as to what an 'Artist' is may be driven more by the preference that albums be listed only once under one Artist. KISS. Which leads to the next consideration...

However you define 'Artist' and choose to group albums, you'll want other means for associating other artist names, individuals or other entities with the same Artist, Album or Track. In doing so, it will be much more effective to assume you may want to do anything with the data, not just something in mind now. The data will therefore be more useful the more specific it's definition. In other words, use separate, clearly defined fields for AKA (perhaps including misspellings), Band, Members, Featuring, Related, etc. Whatever fields you decide on will depend on what makes sense to you and your collection, and available data sources. Use Artist- and Album-related fields wherever possible. Not only is that easier, it helps keep the meaning of a field specific and consistent. (Beware, however, Artist-related fields will only be related to the primary (first) artist.)

Having such fields—and confidence in the data—it's easy to use them alone or together (using an expression) in a view. For example, use ListBuild() to define a pane or category with a combined list of Artist, AKA, Band, Members, Featuring and Related, and use that to locate files with any one of those terms. In a pane, that has another equally useful function—displaying names associated with the selected files (e.g., members of the group). Those, in turn, can be selected to view other albums the term is associated with. This provides an effective means for browsing the collection without having to rely solely on the chosen meaning for 'Artist' and the related grouping.

For me, using single (and only rarely multiple) Artists works best. That way, I'm not confused by whatever appears in a view. If it's unexpected, I generally know it likely because I don't fully understand what a particular pane selection is doing. (I do have some complicated ones that take time to troubleshoot and learn.) I'd much prefer any complexity in my library be concentrated in a handful of expressions—even if some of them can make my head explode—rather than in poorly defined fields (of which there could be many) in many thousands of records.
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