Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[brickf]

I'm looking for ideas on how others tag DJ music, the main problem being that the DJ mixes another song by another artist. In Media Center a DJ custom field would be an obvious choice, but I also want to make the music easy to browse on an IPOD, or on a folder based player.

Previously I would put the DJ as the 'artist' and then under 'name' I would add the artist name of the song being covered after the track name, so that it's all viewable in one field.

I was thinking of using Composer for the DJ, or for the covered artist.

Thanks,
Ryan

[Alex B]

A natural field for the DJ's name would be the Album Artist field. After my first fifty or so "Multiple Artists" albums I decided to write something useful in that field instead. If a compilation album doesn't have a named creator I have used something else like the name of the compilation series or just dublicated the album name. I have Album Artists like these: "DJ Tiesto", The Bodyguard (OST)", "A Tribute to Ramones", "20th Century Masters" and "MOS - Disco Classics".

If compatibility with other applications is needed the Composer field or just the standard Comment field can be used besides the Album Artist field.

[dNj]

MC has been a serious time saver for me when trying to compile music either for a mix or what I might bring out with me to play that night.  The initial custom tagging of music is very important, but the critical time saver will be your smartlist(s). 
I'm someone who has 15+ genres of music in my library on top of 4-5 sub genres.  Here are some of my custom tag fields.

In the comment field I mark if it’s an instrumental (and which genre of instrumental).  If its not an instrumental in the comment field I mark if the track has female or male vocals, and even Male Chill or Female Chill (the M/F chill tag makes for a great smartlist for night time music). 

In the mood field I mark if it’s chill House or more uptempo house (or the mood of whatever genre the track is). I also mark if it is a build up record or peak time record.
 
In the People field I indicate what crowd would better appreciate that music.  A posh crowd, after hours crowd or girls

The only two custom fields I've created are "label" and "Country". The label is for record label and country obviously for where the artist is from. 

As I said earlier it comes down to your smartlist. My most useful smartlist for DJing is built around the BPM range I select, genre, bitrate and the Male or Female Vocals tag. 

Hope I provided some help.

[hit_ny]

Album Artist = compiler or DJ name else just VA (don't like muliple Artists)

Artist = the orginal artist of the track.

Name = (feat. artist y) can also include who did the mix (artist z Mix)

The harder part is when a DJ mixes more than one track at the same time and it's considered as one track in the compilation/mix, in which case

Artist = Artist X / Artist Y
Name = track by Artist X / track by Artist Y

[brickf]

Thanks all for the ideas. I'll have to start using the album artist field more. I've avoided it because of integration with portables, but it makes sense. I guess I could use both the album artist and the composer field simultaneously so that the IPOD will integrate.