Featured artists in track artist credit, but not release for 1-track digital single

I’m having a back-and-forth discussion on Edit #117830232 which might be of interest to more editors. I’ve always thought of it as being a no-brainer, just keep it consistent. But it seems there’s some disagreement and I’m not really finding a good recent discussion precedent on these issues relating to digital media, so I thought I’d start one.

Just doing searches, there’s 41,438 results for “artist:“feat.” AND primarytype:single”. I’m unable to write a query that searches artist credits for tracks on a release, though, so I can’t get statistics otherwise.

3 Likes

It seems like a no-brainer to me as well, but I don’t edit Japanese music often, so maybe there’s a very important reason why it shouldn’t happen here. In any case, I’d follow the cover first (so if the cover lists both I’d always list both) but in general, the distinction seems entirely meaningless and the only reason I could see it ever making sense is as a way to avoid releases being categorized under a separate combined artist on sites that don’t do multiple artists properly.

5 Likes

For me a single should have the same AC as its A side, it doesn’t make much sense, otherwise…
AC is a system quite specific to MB (but it is good IMO) (many other websites put this info in the title, instead of artist field).

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I don’t really think there’s anything inherently Japanese specific for the linked case, I think it’s more about generally about if (or when) featured artists should be credited as release artists.

2 Likes

This edit closes in two days (1 yes, 1 no currently) and I would like to have some more vote input, since this forum thread will probably be referenced again, it would be good to have more votes on this particular edit. Not saying that you have to vote yes, but it would be better if it either passes or fails with a bigger margin.