Tracks with Artist != Album Artist are not show in all lists

[Guest]

I use the Album Artists tag very much. Normally I set Artist to the name
of the composer, e. g. J.S.Bach and the Album Artist to the Interpreter,
e.g. Glenn Gould.

I am using version 2.1 build 1.593.

However, those tracks do not always appear where I would expect them,
or more specific: the tracks where both tags are the same appear
always in every list, but the ones where the tags differ, do not.

Example:
I create two tracks:
(a) Artist = "Artist a", Album Artist = "Artist a", Album = "Album a", Genre "Genre a"
(b) Artist = "Artist b", Album Artist = "Album Artist b", Album = "Album b", Genre = "Genre b"

This gets me the following tree view:
-Artist
--Artist a
---Album a
--Artist b (Note: no album node here)
--Album Artist b
---Album b
-Genre
--Genre a
---Album a
----Artist a
--Genre b (Note: no album artist node here)
---Artist b (Note: no album node here)

If I click on "Artist", I see both tracks (as expected).
If I click on "Artist a", I see track a (as expected).
If I click on "Album a", I see track a (as expected).
If I click on "Artist b", I see track b (as expected).
I would expect a sub-node for "Album b" now, but it is not there.
If I click on "Album Artist b", I see nothing (but would expect track b).
If I click on "Album b", I see track b (as expected).

The same happens in the Genre node, but additionally, the album artist
does not at all.

I would like to see that artist and album artist are being handled all the
same, so that all node are created properly and that each node shows
all tracks that are assigned to this node or any other children nodes.

Is it a bug or a feature?

Thanks a lot,
Peter

[Lowlander]

In itself it sounds very nice but there is a but in this.

You see I have a lot of artist that feature other artists and are stored like this:
artist: Artist 1 Feat. Artist 2
album artist: Artist 1

Displaying both would not be needed for me as with artist it self I got all the artist information I need.

This leads me to propose a slightly different system.
I would like to see an option in the options menu on how to display artists and album artists in the explorer tree:
- Only artist field
- Use album artist instead of artist if album artist is available
- Display both artist and album artist

I would use number 2 myself as this significantly clean up the artist node for me. The other benefit would be that the album displayed under the artist would actually contain all it's available songs. And the guest can use the third one to display both. In my case the artist and album artist don't really display something different and in the guests case they are completely different. With the options we would both see what we need to and be happy!!

Whatever option is chosen it should have the full display functionality that the current artist display has.

I hope this gets considered and that the guest can find him/herself in this.

[Peter The Fat]

That would be exactly the thing I'd like to see (but I would more tend
to use either option 1 or 3).

Anyway, I still think that the current implementation as I descibed it
in my original posting is somehow weird (or buggy...?).

Peter (sorry for using the guest account earlier)

[Lowlander]

It seems logical if you look at it. The assumption in MM is that if the album artist differs from the artist the artist doesn't have the album, the album artist does. You see Mr. Bach doesn't have that album on his name. The interpreting artist (album artist does).

So there's logic to it and probably not a bug. Now this doesn't mean it could be changed. And as such I still propose my option menu to accomodate more people.

BTW I believe the program makers are working on a new explorer tree for one of the future editions of MM. So keep a look out for it and post in the wishlist forum what changes you would like to see to the current explorer tree.

[rusty]

Confirmed--we have plans to make the tree more customizable, though work on this has yet to begin.

Rusty

[Lowlander]

Added to the list of options can be the original artist field which makes for many more options and possible combinations.