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[mesue]

I'm tempted by the discount offer on MC13 that was offered this weekend, but I've had one thing that has been holding me back. I don't like the new behavior where MC13 overwrites the BAND field with ALBUM ARTIST. Is there any way to keep these the way they were? I had my settings figured out where they were ideal for both MC and SqueezeCenter. This new way MC13 is doing the BAND field is messing things up for me with Squeezecenter.

[Alex B]

You are probably speaking about the MP3 format. During the last few years this tagging change was requested by many users because programs like Windows Media Player, iTunes and Winamp and many hardware devices have started to use the TPE2 (aka band/orchestra/accompaniment) ID3v2 tag frame for a named Album Artist. (Unfortunately the ID3v2.x standards do not specify a frame for the Album Artist.)

Traditionally MC used TPE2 for the Band library field and Album Artist (if tagged manually) was stored to a proprietary tag frame.

I used to be against a possible change, but the wide and growing popularity of the "Album Artist in TPE2" system made me to change my mind and join the "choir". After all it is just a tag frame in one file format. MC uses now another tag frame for the Band information.

Could you explain how you have "figured out where they were ideal for both MC and SqueezeCenter"? How do you use them and what have you configured?

If SqueezeCenter supports the "Album Artist" concept probably they must support a tagging system that is used by popular programs like WMP, iTunes and Winamp (and now MC) and a growing number of hardware players.

You can't change the physical tag frame mapping MC uses, but maybe you could change the settings in SqueezeCenter.

[mesue]

When I looked at extended tags in MP3tag, it looked like MC was overwriting BAND with the ALBUM ARTIST, but looking closer, I now see that there is another BAND tag. It shows as JR/BAND in MP3tag. I don't think SC is reading this one, but it seems to be working the same as before in SqueezeCenter. (I had to wait until it did a full rescan overnight before I knew for sure.)

The way I use it is for artists like:
Rob Thomas  / Matchbox Twenty
Ian Anderson / Jethro Tull
Tom Petty / Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers

I have it set up so that when I choose the soloist from the artist list in SC, it shows me all the solo albums AND the band albums. When I choose the band name from the artists list in SC, it shows me only the band albums.

I do this by making the Artist whatever is on the spine of the CD case, the album artist is the soloist, and Band is the band (if applicable). Then I set SC to show bands in the artist list and all is well. So for the Rob Thomas example, I would tag a solo albums as:
Artist: Rob Thomas
Album Artist: Rob Thomas
Band: <empty>

and a Matchbox Twenty album as:
Artist: Matchbox Twenty
Album Artist: Rob Thomas
Band: Matchbox Twenty

Since the change to MC13, Squeezecenter now shows this for a Matchbox Twenty album:
Album Artist:  Rob Thomas
Band/Orchestra: Rob Thomas
Track Artist: Matchbox Twenty

With MC12, SC showed this:
Album Artist:  Rob Thomas
Band/Orchestra: Matchbox Twenty
Track Artist: Matchbox Twenty


I don't really like seeing Rob Thomas listed as the band, but as far as browsing the artist list, it works the way I want it to and I guess I can live with it. I will play around with some SC settings on a subset of my library to see if I can get it any better. There is a setting:
Treat TPE2 MP3 tag as Band
Treat TPE2 MP3 tag as Album Artist

...that I can try changing. Currently I have the first option ticked.

Other suggestions welcome. Thanks for your explanation.