# Artist vs Album Artist?
**URL:** https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [October 30, 2007, 12:46am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659 "2007-10-30T00:46:32Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@pilaar39](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/pilaar39)
#### Post date: [October 30, 2007, 12:46am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/1 "2007-10-30T00:46:32Z")
I had this weird problem bringing music into my iPod.. normally, all tracks of an album are grouped together, but for this one album, it fragmented over several albums.
I examined the orphaned tracks and could not see anything out of the ordinary when I used MP3Tag: they looked identical to the others. Even looking at the tags with Windows Explorer, they looked the same.
Then something caught my eye: in iTunes, the orphaned tracks had a different artist listed under the artwork! When I went back to Windows Explorer, I noticed something different: when I hovered the mouse pointer over the file, it showed something called "album artist" near the bottom (ref: [screencap](http://www.trenmore.com/images/bad_artist.jpg) ) - yet, when I opened Properties for the file, I never saw this, nor in MP3Tag.
Sooo.. how the heck does one change this 'album artist' tag?
In my case, I was able to fix it directly from iTunes with the Get Info box, but surely there is a way to change this with MP3Tag?
(using v2.37d)
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### Author:  [@Mizery\_Made](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Mizery_Made)
#### Post date: [October 30, 2007, 2:10am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/2 "2007-10-30T02:10:40Z")
The Album Artist field used by WMP and several other programs (I think iTunes aswell, but since I don't use it, can't say with certainty) shows up as "BAND" in MP3Tag.
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### Author:  [@pilaar39](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/pilaar39)
#### Post date: [October 30, 2007, 4:22am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/3 "2007-10-30T04:22:39Z")
Thanks!!
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### Author:  [@Moonbase](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Moonbase)
#### Post date: [November 2, 2007, 4:13pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/4 "2007-11-02T16:13:21Z")
I'd love to see a "Mp3tag dropdown-name vs. MP3 frame name" table for Mp3tag like [this one](http://wiki.musicbrainz.org/PicardQt/TagMapping) - or did I miss something?
I agree that the TPE2 frame (BAND) is commonly used for "album artist".
For iTunes, it might be needed to also set the (non-standard) TCMP frame (i guess it's called ITUNESCOMPILATION in Mp3tag). "1" means compilation, "0" normal album.
I wonder what frame the "VA ARTIST" refers to?
The Album "Disco 4" by the "Pet Shop Boys" is a nice example for using Album Artist, my tags currently contain this info for the "Atomizer" remix:
_ALBUM = Disco 4
ARTIST = Atomizer
DATE = 0510
ITUNESCOMPILATION = 1
TITLE = Hooked on Radiation (Pet Shop Boys Orange Alert mix)
TRACK = 6/8
VA ARTIST = Pet Shop Boys
YEAR = 2007_
Interestingly enough, TPE2 (BAND) isn't used at all, and I don't know about TPE4 (which I would use since it's a remix). Since it's a remix, it's correctly credited to the original artist "Atomizer", not the remixer "Pet Shop Boys".
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### Author:  [@Florian](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Florian)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2007, 6:19pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/5 "2007-11-04T18:19:15Z")
Mp3tag's help file has a [list of tag mappings](https://docs.mp3tag.de/mapping).
Kind regards,
Florian
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### Author:  [@pilaar39](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/pilaar39)
#### Post date: [November 16, 2007, 12:23pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/6 "2007-11-16T12:23:36Z")
> [@Moonbase](#):
>
> I wonder what frame the "VA ARTIST" refers to?
>
> The Album "Disco 4" by the "Pet Shop Boys" is a nice example for using Album Artist, my tags currently contain this info for the "Atomizer" remix:
>
> _ALBUM = Disco 4
> ARTIST = Atomizer
> DATE = 0510
> ITUNESCOMPILATION = 1
> TITLE = Hooked on Radiation (Pet Shop Boys Orange Alert mix)
> TRACK = 6/8
> VA ARTIST = Pet Shop Boys
> YEAR = 2007_
I would think that VA ARTIST refers to Various Artists, commonly used in a compilation disc,, ie, an album with multiple artists. I know iTunes has a tick box to indicate this to keep all the tracks together in one album.. however, in the example you give, it does not seem to apply. Try it with a compilation disc and see if it contains various artists' names.
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### Author:  [@Moonbase](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Moonbase)
#### Post date: [December 4, 2007, 7:15am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/7 "2007-12-04T07:15:03Z")
Florian, thanks for the list - I must have overlooked it somehow.
Would you be interested in expanding the comparison list for other "well-known" pieces of software?
- SpacialAudio's SAM Broadcaster (v4.2.2)
- MusicIP's MusicIP Mixer
- MusicBrainz' Picard Tagger (v0.9.0beta1)
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### Author:  [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2025, 3:05pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/artist-vs-album-artist/5659/8 "2025-11-12T15:05:21Z")
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