Suggestions about Genre

[Anastassios Giannaras]

Hello all,

The Quest for the perfect media library goes extremely well thanks to MM Gold. I would like some suggestions though...

I'm sorting the whole library by Genre, which is great. Still I feel the genres I choose are a bit limited... for example, I have Leonard Cohen and Led Zeppelin under 'Rock' which doesn't really sound right... on the other hand I have no idea where to find more specific genre descriptions....


any suggestions?

[Mizery_Made]

You might take a look at Allmusic. They seem to group things into big genres like Rap, Rock, Pop, Country, etc, but I think they also have a "Styles" section listed for albums which is like a "Sub-Genre."

[RifRaf]

here is a list that i use, all tags are frequently used at lastfm and are suitable for about 99% of music here;

Acid, Acid Jazz, Acoustic, Acoustic Guitar, Acoustic Rock, Adult Alternative, Adult Contemporary, Alternative, Alternative Country, Alternative Folk, Alternative Metal, Alternative Pop, Alternative Rock, Ambient, Art Rock, Atmospheric, Audiobooks, Aussie Hip-hop, Avant-garde, Ballads, Baroque, Beach, Beats, Big Band, Blaxploitation, Blue-eyed Soul, Bluegrass, Blues, Blues Rock, Boogie Rock, Bossa Nova, Breakbeat, Breaks, Brit Pop, Brit Rock, British Invasion, Broadway, Cabaret, Christian Rock, Classic Country, Classic Rock, Classical, Classical Guitar, Club, College Rock, Composers, Contemporary Country, Contemporary Folk, Country, Country Pop, Country Rock, Crossover, Dance, Dance Pop, Dancehall, Dark Ambient, Darkwave, Delta Blues, Dirty South, Disco, Doo Wop, Doom Metal, Downtempo, Dream Pop, Drum And Bass, Dub, Dub Reggae, East Coast Rap, Eastern Europe, Easy Listening, Electric Blues, Electro, Electro Pop, Electronic, Electronica, Emo, Emocore, Environmental, Eurodance, Europop, Experimental, Folk, Folk Pop, Folk Rock, Folksongs, Funk, Funk Metal, Funk Rock, Fusion, G-funk, Gangsta Rap, Garage, Garage Rock, Glam Rock, Goa Trance, Gospel, Gothic, Gothic Metal, Gothic Rock, Groove, Grunge, Guitar, Happy Hardcore, Hard Rock, Hardcore, Hardcore Punk, Hardcore Rap, Heavy Metal, Hip-hop, Honky Tonk, House, Humour, Idm, Indie, Indie Folk, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Industrial, Industrial Metal, Industrial Rock, Instrumental, Instrumental Hip-hop, Instrumental Rock, Jangle Pop, Jazz, Jazz Fusion, Jazz Vocal, Jungle, Kids, Latin, Latin Jazz, Latin Pop, Latin Soul, Lounge, Lovers Rock, Madchester, Melodic Rock, Metal, Minimal, Modern Country, Modern Rock, Mood Music, Motown, Neo-soul, New Age, New Romantic, New Wave, Noise, Northern Soul, Nu Metal, Old School Rap, Opera, Orchestral, Philly Soul, Piano, Political Reggae, Polka, Pop, Pop Life, Pop Punk, Pop Rock, Pop Soul, Post Punk, Post Rock, Power Pop, Progressive, Progressive Rock, Psychedelic, Psychedelic Rock, Psytrance, Punk, Punk Rock, Quiet Storm, Ragga, Rap, Reggae, Reggae Pop, Rnb, Rock, Rock And Roll, Rockabilly, Rocksteady, Roots, Roots Reggae, Salsa, Samba, Screamo, Shoegaze, Ska, Ska Punk, Smooth Jazz, Soft Rock, Soul, Southern Rock, Space Rock, Spoken Word, Standards, Stoner Rock, Surf Rock, Swing, Synth Pop, Tango, Techno, Teen Pop, Thrash Metal, Traditional Country, Traditional Folk, Trance, Trip-hop, Turntablism, Underground, Underground Hip-hop, Underground Rap, Urban, Vocal Trance, Waltz, West Coast Rap, Western Swing, World, World Fusion

i like to use several genres for each song if possible and keep a smaller list that is used for grouping into major categories, the grouping tags are in the above list as well but are;
Audiobooks, Blues, Classic Rock, Classical, Country, Dance, Electronic, Folk, Hard Rock, Hip-hop, Indie, Jazz, Kids, Metal, Pop, Psytrance, Punk, Reggae, Rock, Soul

[onenonymous]

and check out Trixmoto's GenreFinder script - it can help do the tagging.

[Yaaklenmai]

Something that I am in the process of doing is applying new genre descriptions to all of my collection and before I started I tried to come up with a system that would allow me to find just about anything and came up with this idea.

If, for example, I wished to tag a track from 1968 that could be classed as "Psychedelic Rock", "Progressive Rock" and "Hard Rock" I would fill in the genre box as follows:

60's;60's Psychedelic Rock;60's Progressive Rock;60's Hard Rock;60's Rock;Psychedelic Rock;Progressive Rock;Hard Rock;Rock making sure that I also completed the Original Date box.

That way I can find anything by year, by decade and by any of the genres that I have chosen (in total or by decade).

Time consuming but, I think, worth it.

[MMan]

Just be careful in how you populate the the Genre field if you are going to sync with other programs or devices. If you use multiple Genre's deliniated by ; you have the option to have all or just the first genre sync'd. You may want to put the broadest genre first. I personally use the Grouping field for the broad groupings like Rock, jazz, Classical etc. I then get more specific in the genre field. i also use the year field to group into Eras. You have to be careful if you have a lot of compilations and greatest hits because the auto tag sometimes just puts the year for the album, not the underlying tracks. IMO, unless you are going to tag with as many options as Yaaklenmai, I find that if you get too detailed with the genres, it can get harder to find some tracks and the choice of Genre become a bit arbitrary (if it isn't arbitrary enough to begin with). I keep my detailed genres under the broad catagories to under 10 with Rock haveing the most at 10, including Misc. for all the odds and ends. Good Luck.