Late night tagging queries

1. Bands that start 'The' ie The Beatles.
Is there a quick & easy option to reverse the artist name so 'The Beatles' becomes 'Beatles, The' or should I have been doing this all along manually?

An often discussed topic. If you do a search here or over at JRiver, you'll find ways around this -- I've included my preferred method here.

A couple of things you may not be aware of :

1. The iPod will ignore the definitive article so "The Beatles" will be listed with other artists beginning with 'B' -- of course, that still leaves you with the problem that MC9 will sort on the 'The' i.e under 'T'

2. In the "Clean Filename Properties" dialogue, there is an option to rename all artists so that 'The' appears at the end of the artist name. Which is all well and good except (a) I don't like it and (b) it does nothing for solo artists e.g. Leonard Cohen who I would expect to file under 'C' and so would have to manually alter the artist name to 'Cohen, Leonard'

The solution I employed (as suggested by a kind soul over on JRiver) was to create a new, custom field called "ArtistSort". Using a library option (apologies can't remember exactly where), I then copied all my Artist names to this new field and proceeded to modify this new field according to sort order so "The Clash" became "Clash, The" ; "Jeff Buckley" became "Buckley, Jeff" ; "Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds" became "Cave, Nick & The Bad Seeds" (all the while, the original "Artist" field remains as was i.e. Artist = "The Fall" ; ArtistSort = "Fall, The")

I then altered all my MC9 views to use this new field in collaboration the "Artist" field so that they are sorted alphabetically but still retain their proper name e.g. "The Beatles" is displayed under the 'B' group.

This method also has the advantage that when I play tracks, I'm not confronted by the ugly looking e.g. "Buckley, Jeff" but the more aesthetically pleasing "Jeff Buckley"

Unfortunately, this process is likely to be a time consuming process (although not as bad as you may fear) if you have 1,000s of tracks already ripped.

2. I have many tracks that have collaborating artists, ie Massive Attack & Portishead or white label mixes ie Dr Dre Vs Punjabi MC

I want to be able to index these tunes so that when I create a massive attack or portishead playlist for instance, these tunes will show up, thing is if I name both artists in the tag, it creates a brand new artist.

Again, I would create a new field called "Collaboration" or something (in fact you could use the existing "Comment" field"). For (e.g) a Tricky song remixed by Portishead, you would retain the Artist as "Tricky" and populate the "Collaboration"(/"Comment") field with "Portishead".

Your (e.g) "Portishead" smartlist rule would then include all Artist fields set to "Portishead" and all "Collaboration"(/"Comment") fields containing the word "Portishead"...that way you include their original work plus all the remix/collaboration stuff.

I've done this with Gram Parsons work with the Byrds. My Byrds smartlist includes these tunes as does my Gram Parsons smartlist.

I have done this where I can but is it ABSOLUTELY necessary to have an Album name? Will MC9 not just dump non-albumized tracks into the artists root folder?

I don't believe it is necessary. I can't remember how the iPod handles this but all tracks for an "Artist" will be available under a default sub-menu item of "All"

Creating the new field, I'm guessing is this within MC, & not a new tag field?

Yes. I should have been clearer. It's a custom MC9 tag. As Adam has said in another recent post, the iPod uses about 6 Mp3 tag fields (and is not configurable, tag wise)

Is it possible to add new mp3 tag fields? As this would make it a lot easier to re-index when I format my machine, it's XP pro so it gets done on a 6monthly basis...

You shouldn't have to do this. In fact, it's probably advisable not to -- not sure what you mean about "re-index"...but...

Can I store all my MC settings/tags/smartlists/whatever in C:\mp3z also? Would this give me 100% recovery if my OS drive got pooched & I had to reinstall MC?

You can backup your MC9 library (its database information i.e. smartlist, playlists, MC9 tags etc) to the drive of your choice...it's under Library Management under the File option if memory serves me correct (I'm at work at the mo)...so simply, make sure you save this backup your non-OS partition - I'm sure this gives you full Disaster Recovery capability. I hope so as I employ the same method.

Does that cover the previous question as well ?

This is all a bit confusing, MC seems to be a very powerful application & there's so much I can do with it, but it all seems stashed away so I have to search help files for it (and generally not find it)...

MC9 is very powerful and heaven sent, if you ask me. There is very little that's not achievable. The help files are pretty good but there's no way they can possible cover every nuance as the product is so flexible. Someone is always coming up with another clever way to do something smart via MC9 (unfortunately it's never me)

The easiest way to get by is to ask on this forum or the JRiver one. The community is very helpful and you'll almost always get an answer to your questions...just fire away, it's the best way to get to grips with the product.

I'm as much as a beginner as you. I'm sure that I'm not a 100% correct on everything I've said but if not, I'm sure Adam or someone else will correct me and/or suggest a better solution.

Have fun...

Create your new field first using "Tree & View Settings" -> "Add" (under Library fields list)...the create options are self explanatory...

Once created you need to go to "Tools" -> "Library Tools" -> "Move/Copy Fields". Source will be Artist, Destination your new field and you'll need to just "Copy (leaves source)"

Do a search for "ArtistSort" here (http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=MediaCenter;action=search) and you'll see the original idea from Doof.

I'll chime in here but Bob has been doing such a neat job.

Hey Bob, you actually taught me something. I never even have seen (or knew about) the Move/Copy fields option. All this time and I'm still learning.

OK Northern, step by step to make your custom field:

Tools>Options>Tree & View Settings
Click Add
In the Name field name your field. It's display entry will be defaulted to what you type, you can change it if you want. No need to really
That's all on this screen. Your field is created. The other options are to create different types of custom fields. Like you could create a drop-down list-box that has only 2 or 3 available options in it. There are fun ways to mess with this. But for now, just click OK.
Next you want to make the new field visable. In any view in MC9, click on the column header and select "Fields To Show>[Name of new Field]" (whatever the field name is)
Now, right click anywhere in a view, and select "Library Tools>Move/Copy Fields"
Select the Source field (Artist in your case)
Select the Destination Field (the new field you made)
Select Copy in the 3 drop-down.

That's it. The new field will be pre-populated w/all your Artist tags, you can then edit this new field as you see fit.

Hope that helps.

Adam

Thanks the pair of you!

Still having problems with the artistsort list tho, everytime I rename The Beatles to Beatles, The it keeps renaming it back...

I'll have another play tonight & see if I can fix it myself tho...

Thanks again!