How do I change artist title.

[Shpongle]

Hi. I’m currently ripping CDs to a hard drive using dBPoweramp. I would like the album artist to read ‘Maze feat. Frankie Beverly’ but after I have ripped the CDs the artist appears as ‘Maze; Frankie Beverly’. Is there a way to change this? Many thanks

[simbun]

I've just tested this with a clean install of dBpoweramp 2024-05-30 on Windows writing to FLAC, and if I enter 'Maze feat. Frankie Beverly' in the Album Artist field at the top of the CD Ripper screen then that's exactly what is stored in the tags.

In what application are you seeing ‘Maze; Frankie Beverly’?
Are you sure you're not looking at the Artist tag instead of the AlbumArtist tag? To test this, when ripping set the AlbumArtist tag to 'Maze feat. Frankie Beverly' and set the Artist tag to something completely different e.g. 'Artist1; Artist2'.

[Spoon]

Appears like that in which program?

Check the files, right click on one of the tracks >> Edit ID Tags, how is the artist name shown?

[Shpongle]

I’m using the Naim app with Asset Management. When I look at the tags, it seems to be correct but when I use the Naim app to find my music it comes up as Maze; Frankie Beverly in both Artist and Album Artist. So is this just the way that the Naim app is set up?

[GBrown]

I’m using the Naim app with Asset Management. When I look at the tags, it seems to be correct but when I use the Naim app to find my music it comes up as Maze; Frankie Beverly in both Artist and Album Artist. So is this just the way that the Naim app is set up?

Looks like Naim is removing the " feat. " and creating artists separated by a semicolon.

[Spoon]

That will be Asset detecting a feat. as a sub artist.

[Shpongle]

Ok. So nothing I can do about it I guess?

I tried typing the whole word in ‘Maze featuring Frankie Beverly’ but it made no difference. Looks like the same happens when I rip an album where some tracks feature another artist as well as the album artist. e.g. a George Michael album where one track features Elton John. The dBPoweramp tag reads George Michael feat. Elton John but on the Naim app it shows George Michael; Elton John. The Naim app also seems to have a separate folder for ‘Contributing Artists’ and when I look there I can see a separate folders for all the artists who ‘feature’ on tracks. e.g. a separate folder for Frankie Beverly where I see all the tracks he features on and likewise a separate one for Elton John.

So I guess I’m stuck with this?

[simbun]

So I guess I’m stuck with this?

It seems that disabling 'Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists' works, although I wouldn't have guessed it from the name.

[Shpongle]

Ok. Forgive my naivety but where do I go to change that? I’ve always just used the default settings. Would disabling 'Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists' have any adverse effect on other togs? I’m thinking in particular of the intricacies of tagging Classical music. And if I disable 'Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists' would I then have to go in and re tag everything or would it update my existing rips?

Thanks

[simbun]

Ok. Forgive my naivety but where do I go to change that? I’ve always just used the default settings.

I don't know what platform you're on but in Windows it's under 'Asset UPnP Configuration > Edit Advanced Settings > General Settings'

Would disabling 'Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists' have any adverse effect on other togs? I’m thinking in particular of the intricacies of tagging Classical music. And if I disable 'Combine Duplicate and Similar Artists' would I then have to go in and re tag everything or would it update my existing rips?

Only the developers can confirm exactly what else it does, but it should be limited to only artist tags. The changes you make to the AssetUPnP configuration don't affect your media files (AssetUPnP is just a configurable view of your collection), so if it's not what you want/expect you can just go back and enable it.

[Shpongle]

Hi. This is really interesting. That definitely solved my problem, so thank you so much. I can change the album artist and the artist to Maze feat. Frankie Beverly and it shows up on the app exactly like that. However, if I go into an album where for instance there’s only one track that features another singer e.g. George Michael; Elton John, I can now change the Artist of that particular track to George Michael feat. Elton John but when I then do a search on the Naim app of just ‘Artists’ and look for George Michael, I now see a folder labelled George Michael that has every track except the Elton John one and I see a separate folder labelled George Michael feat. Elton John which just has that one track. However, I also have the option to search for ‘Album Artist’ which will show me the album in its entirety. Sorry if I’ve babbled on trying to explain. I guess you can’t have everything!

[simbun]

I guess you can’t have everything!

When using the syntax "Artist1; Artist2" each artist is stored as a separate entity(dbpoweramp uses the semicolon as a delimiter to enable the input of multivalue tags), unlike "Artist1 feat. Artist2" where it's stored as a single entity with no relation to Artist1 or Artist2 i.e. the unique values of Artist are:

Artist1

Artist2

Artist1 feat. Artist2

The standard is to store them as "Artist1; Artist2", which simplifies searching and filtering and enables you to use tags like ArtistSort as there needs to be a one to one relationship e.g.

Artist	ArtistSort
David Bowie	Bowie, David
Elton John	John, Elton
George Michael	Michael, George
George Michael feat. Elton John	???

If you didn't use search, then you could create another tag to hold 'Artist1; Artist2' and use that as your Artist index (so you had one value per unique artist) whilst still using 'George Michael feat. Elton John' for the track display, but I can't imagine living without a search function.

[Shpongle]

Many thanks. I want things as simple as possible. So I think if a whole album is by Artist1 Feat. Artist2 then I’ll change the tab but albums where there is an occasional guest singer, instead of for instance George Michael feat Elton John, I think I’ll just go with George Michael; Elton John to save more folders being created. There is a folder on the Naim app called ‘Contributing Artists’ where I see a folder titled ‘Elton John’

Many thanks again