Tags: multiple genres

[Huebi]

Hi, just installed the moode software to my old RPi 3b with a Hifeberry AMP2 and it took only 30 minutes until it was up and running.

Now i have my first question

Does moOde support multiple genres? I would like to assign songs to a couple of genres, not only one. Media Monkey understands "Genre 1; Genre 2" and the somg is trhen occuring under both genres. But in moOde this is only one genre having a semicolon inside. 'Is this supported and if yes how do i need to set the genres if i have more than one i would like to assign.

//Huebi

[Tim Curtis]

Just add additional Genre tags.

Genre Rock
Genre Classic Rock
Genre Blues Rock

[TheOldPresbyope]

Careful, the answer depends on the tapping scheme being used: ID3v2, Vorbis Comment, etc. Unfortunately tools like Media Monkey, Mp3Tag, and the like hide the details.

If the track is an MP3 file, for example, then the tagging scheme is almost certainly ID3v2 and there can be only one genre entry. Hence the silliness with semicolons, slashes, or even nulls as possible separators of several genres in a single string.

For a FLAC file, on the other hand, the tagging scheme is almost certainly Vorbis Comment and there can be multiple individual genre entries.

Other music file formats and tagging schemes exist too. Google is your friend.

Regards,
Kent

[TheOldPresbyope]

Sorry, I just reread this and realized I never got around to asking the OP's question.

moOde will display and use multiple genre values if and only if the underlying music player daemon (MPD) returns multiple genre values. MPD, in turn, depends on various plugins and some internal code to decode track metadata for the different file formats.

Except for tracks I picked up at random, my collection is entirely in FLAC format. Multiple genre values are dead easy to encode in this format---the Vorbis Comment just contains multiple Genre=xxx fields---and MPD properly returns them.

I never got around to creating a suite of test files to see how MPD deals with multiple genre values in other file formats. In particular, I never tested which separator characters might work in an ID3V2 tag. Perhaps other users can comment.

Regards,
Kent

[Huebi]

Hi,

thanks for the answers. I only have mp3 files and have maintained the tags by mediamonkey so far.

As far as i understand moode does not support this, neither a semicolon separazed list nor something else I read that people suggest \\ ( double backslash) when using mp3tag, but if moode does not understand this is a pity (at least for me). Mixed genres like "Classic Rock" "Blues Rock" is not a solution for me.

[Tim Curtis]

Hi,

thanks for the answers. I only have mp3 files and have maintained the tags by mediamonkey so far.

As far as i understand moode does not support this, neither a semicolon separazed list nor something else I read that people suggest \\ ( double backslash) when using mp3tag, but if moode does not understand this is a pity (at least for me). Mixed genres like "Classic Rock" "Blues Rock" is not a solution for me.

As @TheOldPresbyope mentioned MPD parses the tags from the files when it indexes the collection, moOde just uses whatever MPD provides. You might want to post your issue in the MPD repo. https://github.com/MusicPlayerDaemon/MPD/issues

Here's the documentation on which tags MPD supports
https://mpd.readthedocs.io/en/latest/protocol.html#tags

[Nutul]

Hi,

thanks for the answers. I only have mp3 files and have maintained the tags by mediamonkey so far.

As far as i understand moode does not support this, neither a semicolon separazed list nor something else I read that people suggest \\ ( double backslash) when using mp3tag, but if moode does not understand this is a pity (at least for me). Mixed genres like "Classic Rock" "Blues Rock" is not a solution for me.

As @TheOldPresbyope mentioned MPD parses the tags from the files when it indexes the collection, moOde just uses whatever MPD provides. You might want to post your issue in the MPD repo. https://github.com/MusicPlayerDaemon/MPD/issues

Here's the documentation on which tags MPD supports
https://mpd.readthedocs.io/en/latest/protocol.html#tags

Hi all,

in the Vorbis comment (used by FLAC, among others) it is good practice - and is strongly recommended - to use multiple genre tags when needed, and MPD reads and interprets them correctly.

id3v2 (used by mp3 among others), OTH, wants the GENRE tag to be unique (probably expecting no more than one genre per file, or assuming that separating them by commas, or the like, is enough...)

NEVERTHELESS, if you have a tag-software that allows you to create more than just one GENRE tag in a id3v2 tag, MPD will just be happy, and recognise two (or more) genres.

I, for example, when editing graphically, use KID3 under Linux, and if I specify more than one GENRE for mp3 file (hence using Id3v2 as metadata container), it marks the second (and/or subsequent) genre in RED, and comments "Must be unique"; HOWEVER it saves it, and MPD, as said above, is happy with it.

YMMV according to the tagging software.

[TheOldPresbyope]

Interesting follow up, Al.

[Huebi]

NEVERTHELESS, if you have a tag-software that allows you to create more than just one GENRE tag in a id3v2 tag, MPD will just be happy, and recognise two (or more) genres.

Hi, thanks for the advice, on Mac i used Tagr which isnt able to insert a second genre, but i installed kid3 as well, and it behaves as you described, the second genre is possible, but in red. I will give it a try report back if this is working.,

[Nutul]

NEVERTHELESS, if you have a tag-software that allows you to create more than just one GENRE tag in a id3v2 tag, MPD will just be happy, and recognise two (or more) genres.

Hi, thanks for the advice, on Mac i used Tagr which isnt able to insert a second genre, but i installed kid3 as well, and it behaves as you described, the second genre is possible, but in red. I will give it a try report back if this is working.,

Hi Huebi,

yes, it warns you that such tag should be unique. It could also be possible that a purist software consider the metadata tag as invalid; but as far as MPD is concerned, it works.

Asking MPD maintainer to consider managing multiple genres in the unique tag is a better idea though, as this should keep the tag consistent with its specification...