i have an old ipod nano 5gen and some playlist with various artist, but each plist have album title. add plist into ipod, i get for same album a long list of artist, because damn ipod see 1 album but a lot's of album artist ...
so my trick is set as 'album artist' a value 'various' to have 1 album (playlist) only with more artist from this compilation
on my previous outdated app (T&R) i had as option 'Part of compilation' but on Mp3Tag i can't see an option like that
also i've read some others thread about same topic, someone talk about ITUNESMEDIATYPE but no understand how value need to put (maybe 1?). at the moment value is 'Unknow'
and same for 'Compilation' value. need to add 1 ?
See the documentation on Compilation:
Search the same list for Mediatype
so 'Compilation' value 1 right ?
and no need any value in ITUNESMEDIATYPE ?
What does it say in the documentation?
What does the extended tags dialogue Alt-T look like in respect to the field COMPILATION for files that behave in the favoured way on your iPod?
I think you have to try it locally anyway as I could suggest anything whithout any guarantee for success.
Set to "1" only for tracks on compilations, typically with the AlbumArtist field set to "Various Artists" or similar as well.
This field is only used for iTunes and some iOS devices using Apple players. Music files are labelled "Normal" while other formats have specific names. Again found in the documentation. The search function will quickly show you these topics.
Of course, this is the correct handling of this example of tracks.
You can leave the Artist field with each individual artist. But for any compilation album to be recognized by most players, including iPod, the combination of Albumartist+Album needs to exactly match to be consolidated into a single Album.
Consider what would happen with an Album named "Greatest Hits." Without the Albumartist tag you could have hundreds or even thousands of tracks mixed up under one Album. The Albumartist tag assists in this case to separate the actual different Albums by each Albumartist.
The same goes for compilation Albums. Using a consistent name such as "Various Artists", "Various", "VA", or even "Compilations" would suffice.
The Compilation flag also supports this, but is not the only thing needed to get the Albums to group together correctly. In iTunes, this separates these Albums in the browser, and at the top of the Artist list you will see the first entry is "Compilations". This is generated from that flag.
right, in fact for each compilation (or playlist) i have to edit the 'Album artist' tag with 'various'. only this allows to have only one album with different artists inside. so the 'compilation' value 1 does not serve my purpose, or did i miss something along the way ? the only solution is 'various' on 'Album artist' field ?
This is the most important part, along with a common Album name. The combination of the two fields has to be unique.
This depends on your use case. But since you are using an iPod it will be helpful to include the Album under Compilations when browsing. But by itself this flag will not create any discrete distinction for any Album without the matching Albumartist.
BTW - From your original post…
…this is the same as setting the COMPILATION flag to "1"
ye, COMPILATION "1" on mp3tag or 'Part of compilation'on T&R is the same: ipod see always one album for each Albumartist. so my workaround is set 'various' for all Artist
if there are no other solutions i will do the same with mp3tag
There are no alternative solutions here. This is the only way to have compilation albums separate in virtually every player on any platform.
For iTunes there are a few things to be aware of, this also extends to ipod, and the Music app on iPhone although not really as relevant.
If you add values to the Albumartist tag (it could be "Various" or whatever), it will be treated as created by that artist "Various", and sorted under "V". If you leave Albumartist blank, but use the compilations tag to 1, it will be sorted as a compilation, and itunes and ipods will substitute the Albumartist-name with your localized version of "Various Artists".
So for iTunes the correct way to add "Various" compilations, is to remove Albumartist (ensure it is completely blank), but set the compilations tag and ensure that Albumname is exactly the same, if you want the album under compilations tab and sorting in iTunes and iPod and iPhones.
If you set the compilations tag for an album with an artistname, it will not to anything in itunes, but it will however for music sharing be put under compilation, and removed from the album list.
Anyway the only requirement iTunes have for creating an album is that Albumname is the same and Albumartistname is the same (or blank, but with the compilations set to 1).
As "Artistname" is a little ambiguous ...
ALBUMARTIST = Various Artists or empty
ARTIST = the name of the performer
ALBUM = the same for all files that should be treated as coming from the same compilation
COMPILATION = 1 to be set for files that have no data in ALBUMARTIST.
Please note that this are rules for only some players. For best compatibility fill all fields ALBUMARTIST, ARTIST, ALBUM, TITLE, (TRACK).
Non-existing data may lead to strange effects.
I see I wrote a mistake, fixed it. It should be ALBUMARTIST and ALBUM is the same.
Leaving the ALBUMARTIST field blank will certainly lead to compatibility problems with almost any other player besides iTunes. There is certainly no harm in using a consistent name of your choice for compilations in the ALBUMARTIST field, even for iTunes.
For some tribute or similar albums that by definition are a compilation of many performing Artists for a single main Artist, you might consider setting the compilation flag but setting ALBUMARTIST as the main Artist rather than using the Various tag. This will include the Album under that Artist when browsing.
Most modern players treat these in the same way as iTunes. At least foobar2000, vlc, mediamonkey, musicbee, etc. For obscure players sure, they probably do, but they do weird things for other metadata as well. This thread specifically references iTunes and iPod, so I wanted to provide information that may provide a better experience.
thanks everybody for replies.
and the best solution for me (now solved) is 'Album artist' blank and set compilation 1.
with this i have one album only on my ipod with 'Various artist'
wonderful. another great solution thank to this amazing forum