# How to remove leading common text from ARTIST field of an album
**URL:** https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [July 7, 2024, 2:43pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228 "2024-07-07T14:43:52Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@LordDredd](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/LordDredd)
#### Post date: [July 7, 2024, 2:43pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228/1 "2024-07-07T14:43:52Z")
Hey guys
Hope all of you are doing great.
I have been trying to find the answer to this query since long
A lot of my albums have VARIOUS ARTISTS\ before the ARTIST tag.
I have tried whatever i could find on the support pages but unable to..
an option that somewhat worked was
quick actions
replace with expression
^\s\*[VARIOUS ARTISTS\]+\s\*
but this removes many characters from the artists field itself
the original field looks like = VARIOUS ARTISTS\Kishore Kumar\Rajesh Roshan
upon using the above expression it gets converted to = \Kishore Kumar\ ajesh Roshan
(the R goes missing , similarly from among other artist's names very many characters get omitted
also I would ideally like to remove the \ from between names of the artists as well..
any help would be appreciated
Thanks
AB
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### Author:  [@ohrenkino](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/ohrenkino)
#### Post date: [July 7, 2024, 2:49pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228/2 "2024-07-07T14:49:41Z")
Use an action of the (simple) type "Replace"
Search string: `Various Artists\`
Replace with:
(leave emtpy)
The square brackets in your regular expression have a special purpose and if you escape the opening bracket but do not escape the closing one as well, I don't know what effects that will have on your text.
Are you sure that you have
> [@LordDredd](#):
>
> VARIOUS ARTISTS\Kishore Kumar\Rajesh Roshan
(single backslash) and not
`VARIOUS ARTISTS\\Kishore Kumar\\Rajesh Roshan`
(double backslash)
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### Author:  [@LordDredd](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/LordDredd)
#### Post date: [July 7, 2024, 2:52pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228/3 "2024-07-07T14:52:06Z")
yes you are correct its double backslash not single..
also the filenames are also like VARIOUS ARTISTS - Koi Roko Na (so no artists names there as well - just thought of clearing this )
also i tried replace VARIOUS ARTISTS\ as well as VARIOUS ARTISTS with double slash at the end
it doesn't do anything
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### Author:  [@ohrenkino](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/ohrenkino)
#### Post date: [July 7, 2024, 2:57pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228/4 "2024-07-07T14:57:40Z")
> [@LordDredd](#):
>
> yes you are correct its double backslash not single
This means that you have several fields of the type "ARTIST" - to check, see the extended tags dialogue Alt-T for a single file. In case of
> [@LordDredd](#):
>
> VARIOUS ARTISTS\Kishore Kumar\Rajesh Roshan
you should see 3 fields of the type ARTIST.
To treat multi-value fields, see the function with $meta
> **[Scripting Functions – Mp3tag Documentation](https://docs.mp3tag.de/scripting/#metadata-functions)**
>
> Documentation on Mp3tag's scripting functions. Mp3tag is the universal Tag Editor.
and the action to merge
> **[Merge Duplicate Fields – Mp3tag Documentation](https://docs.mp3tag.de/actions/merge-duplicate-fields/)**
>
> Documentation on the Merge Duplicate Fields action type that can be performed as Quick Action or as reusable workflow from Action Groups. Mp3tag is the universal Tag Editor.
or remove duplicate fields
> **[Remove Duplicate Fields – Mp3tag Documentation](https://docs.mp3tag.de/actions/remove-duplicate-fields/)**
>
> Documentation on the Remove Duplicate Fields action type that can be performed as Quick Action or as reusable workflow from Action Groups. Mp3tag is the universal Tag Editor.
Decide, what you want to do: remove or merge.
I would recommend "Merge". Use a different separator from `\\` e.g. `;`.
And then repeat the simple replace with the
Search string: Various artists;
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### Author:  [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2024, 2:58pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/how-to-remove-leading-common-text-from-artist-field-of-an-album/65228/5 "2024-08-06T14:58:09Z")
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