Can Library be switched from sort by 'Album Artist' to sort by 'Artist' only?

[rongon]

For doing batch retagging you will need to consult other users / posts. I think @the_bertrum posted about a nice program  in this thread.

Sigh. 

We're going around in circles. In this thread, the_bertrum posted

I find that MP3TAG is actually pretty good at correcting situations where the wrong type of tag has been used.  It won't tell you your FLAC has ID3, but if you open such a file, then cut all the tags (ctrl+x) and then paste them back (ctrl+p) it will put it all back correctly.  ID3 tags become properly formatted for FLAC.

Does that mean a FLAC file does not have to have a FLAC header in its metadata, and it's OK for a FLAC file to have ID3 tags? 

All I want to do is have a music box that plays my music. 
I never wanted to have to re-tag my entire collection. 
I never wanted to take a deep dive down a music file metadata rabbit hole. 
But here I am. 
It's OK, I can deal with it. I'd just like to get a bit of definitive information so I can embark on the project with some confidence that I won't have to do it all over again in a couple of years. 

Oooh... I think I'll spin an LP. It's less stressful.
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[Tim Curtis]

You cherry picked his post which is not good. He mentioned a nice program called BLISS (blisshq.com) in that post https://moodeaudio.org/forum/showthread....3#pid42643

[rongon]

I find that MP3TAG is actually pretty good at correcting situations where the wrong type of tag has been used.  It won't tell you your FLAC has ID3, but if you open such a file, then cut all the tags (ctrl+x) and then paste them back (ctrl+p) it will put it all back correctly.  ID3 tags become properly formatted for FLAC.

Finally, I see the way forward. 

It does look like I'll be retagging a lot of files, but Mp3tag does seem to work fine for this. 

For pop, rock, folk, blues, Latin, and most jazz titles I'll be able to simply transfer the contents of the Artist tag to Album Artist, and that should fix the indexing in Moode 8.1.2. 

Mp3tag display a Tag column, which lists what tag types are written into the file. 
I see that there are three tags written into all my files: ID3v1, ID3v2, and FLAC. 

To fix them: 

1. Select the FLAC tracks to repair.
   
2. Press Ctrl+x to cut the tags from the FLAC files and copy those tags to the clipboard. 
   
3. Leave the tracks selected. Press Ctrl+v (*not* Ctrl+p -- that creates a new playlist) to re-insert the tags into the FLAC files. 
   
4. Now you'll see only FLAC in the Mp3tag > Tags column. 
   

Thank you all for sharing your knowledge, being patient and helping me get to a solution to this problem. 
I hope the information in this thread makes this all very clear for the next person who stumbles into this tagging issue. 

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[rongon]

You cherry picked his post which is not good. He mentioned a nice program called BLISS (blisshq.com) in that post  https://moodeaudio.org/forum/showthread....3#pid42643

Apologies! I completely missed that paragraph at the end of that post. My bad. Thanks for catching that.
I guess I'll need to pony up the $79 for Bliss. Thanks.

[TheOldPresbyope]

I’d do things in stages.

First, I’d fix the multiple tag problem. Off the top of my head, it should be relatively easy to write a script to strip away the MP3 tags leaving just a FLAC file with metadata in a Vorbis Comment block. From there it’s trivial to run thru your library in batch mode. Back up first!

From what I’ve read, Bliss is a great program. I think, though, for making cookie-cutter changes to specific metadata items, I’d write my own program using, say, the Python Mutagen module (cuz I like Python) or even just build a bash script calling on metaFLAC to do the tag work.

I’d rather pound nails in my head than use a GUI-based program to fix more than a few albums manually.

ETA - the great thing about scripts is you can easily make changes (you changed your plan or you found a mistake) and rerun as necessary.

Regards,
Kent

[the_bertrum]

You cherry picked his post which is not good. He mentioned a nice program called BLISS (blisshq.com) in that post  https://moodeaudio.org/forum/showthread....3#pid42643

Apologies! I completely missed that paragraph at the end of that post. My bad. Thanks for catching that.
I guess I'll need to pony up the $79 for Bliss. Thanks.

You can try a few "fixes" for free in bliss to see if it works for you.  Also, the developer is very responsive, if you send him your problem, he will often respond with the right commands to get it done in bliss.

[the_bertrum]

There is a menu tucked away in the Mp3tag UI which allows one to select how it deals with various tagging schemes on both read and write operations.

Quite right Kent, I'd forgotten I set that option years ago.

Ah, tagging. What a wonderful mess it makes

[the_bertrum]

All I want to do is have a music box that plays my music. 
I never wanted to have to re-tag my entire collection. 
I never wanted to take a deep dive down a music file metadata rabbit hole. 
But here I am. 

Is that lyrics from the classic Blues song "Since my collection went digital" by the EmPee Trio?

I'm sorry that the reworking of how moOde reads tags has broken your scheme. There is no right way to tag, but there is also no way that one system can accommodate all the different schemes that people come up with. However, if the Artist (strict) proposal does address your issue, that would make moOde by far the king of all system that I know of in it's ability to be flexible with tagging schemes. To be fair, it already holds that title in my opinion. Artist (strict) would also add another layer of usefulness to schemes that already work (for example, I'm not interested in seeing composes in the Artist list). Can you bear to hold off re-tagging until that option can be added?

[DRONE7]

For an Ubuntu  O/S.....

For the easy stuff I use  Musicbrainz-picard....for Flac and slightly more troublesome I use Beets.....for the gnarly stuff I use kid3.

These days I rip using Fre:ac and then find album art separately. 

All have a learning curve...but their tagging seems to work for most of the players I use... Ymmv.

https://www.freac.org/


https://kid3.kde.org/

https://beets.readthedocs.io/en/stable/faq.html

https://picard.musicbrainz.org/

and this thread for classical alternative for cover art..
https://moodeaudio.org/forum/showthread....=classical

[TheOldPresbyope]

I also use Linux for almost all my work. (I run a virtual Windows 10 Pro host via VirtualBox for the few apps which don't port to my satisfaction).

Some of the tools in my kit-

UI-based apps

• Mp3tag runs quite nicely with the help of Wine. PlayOnLinux hasn't had an upgrade in 2 years but Mp3tag installed in it easily as well.
  
• Kid3 as @DRONE7 mentioned
  
• MusicBrainz Picard, ditto
  
• (my quarrel with all these has to do with the "veil" they draw over their workings: what do I see on the screen vs what's actually encoded in the files)
  

Command line-based apps

• Python Mutagen module for nitty-gritty
  
• metaflac - for FLAC files
  
• ffmpeg - the A/V Swiss Army Knife
  
• eyeD3 - ID3 tagging
  
• kid3-cli
  
• there's lots more out there but none jump out at me
  

For quick examination of the metadata in files from the CLI

• mediainfo - very nice but converts some metadata item names to a common name
  
• metaflac - flac only
  
• exiftool - seems photo-oriented but actually damn near universal
  
• mutgen-inspect - ID3/flac/ape tags
  

I use abcde for all my CD ripping and various sources for cover art.

Regards,
Kent

PS - For completeness sake, I should mention that in the past I've dabbled with Exact Audio Copy, dBpowerAmp, MusiCHI.