I don’t see an easy way on MB to reflect that this track has three sections, and each section a different performer. Is this possible, or is this CD just too much of an edge case?
When you enter the tracklist for the release, you can set the track numbers as 1.1, 1.2 and 1.3, for example, and then set the artists credits per track index. That’ll likely wreak havoc on people trying to use this data for tagging, but tagging isn’t MusicBrainz’ focus.
The two releases with track indices added to MB as a result of that forum post are:
You have selected an interesting release to add, indeed, but perhaps for different reasons! (I've hidden this text because it isn't central to answering your question. Click to show more.)
I’m not sure from where the Discogs editors got the information which performers performed on tracks 1.1, 1.2 and 1.3: the CD booklet lists all these four people as performing track 1, the vinyl releases’ liner notes don’t provide performer listings at all…
Track 8 has no performer information whatsoever in the CD booklet, and the vinyl releases’ credits on discogs don’t list who recorded this track.
And track 9’s credits are given as “the same artists plus [four more performers]”… What!? Who are these same artists? All the performers from Sanikiluaq, because track 9 was recorded in Sanikiluaq according to Discogs’ artist credits for the vinyl releases? Not sure about that…
Do note, however, that the CD release whose Discogs page you linked to already exists in MB:
When that release was entered, track 1 was entered with only the two performers of index 1.1. Instead of adding a new release, you may choose to clean up that release a bit… I just realized I could look if that release was in MB already, sorry for the “but actually…” more than half an hour after my first reply!
Ah, thank you, I missed that release as I searched the bilingual English-French title, and got this:
which is the vinyl release.
I want to add this release specifically so I can tag it in Picard, so I’ll go over the booklet again and see if I can clean up the release on Discogs, maybe the results will be easier to carry over both to here and into Picard
Well no, it’s a CD and CD releases must have one track per real CD track.
You have to use MultipleTitleStyle (but here it’s 3 times [untitled], so just once is enough). but here there is just one title
I would use the same style for track artist:
Title: [untitled] (or Untitled if it’s really the title of the track, and not the lack of a title)
Okay, for that use case, @jesus2099’s suggestion is much better!
I haven’t seen a “must” clause for CDs yet, but I, too, would prefer track listings that match the CDs. I’m surprised that the two releases that were the topic of that other forum thread survived this long with the “track.index” numbering (and some later, direct edits to the track listing on at least one of these releases) if the case was this clear.
The release we’re talking about doesn’t make it easy, considering the way it’s been structured, because individual CD tracks are given a title, with each index of that track given another, separate title in some cases (not just “untitled”). And it gets worse, going by the CD booklet instead of the Discogs page, as track 11 has index 0
with one title as well as indices 2 through 5 with another title and index-specific titles. Someone give the people involved in making these track sequencing and mastering decisions a severe talking to…
Once you attach a DiscID to the release then you are locked in to the “must” but the GUI itself. The ToC on the CD will set the number of tracks and lengths of those tracks.
Apparently this release features real track indexes, a feature that was only used on early CD and CD players, unfortunately.
I think it’s too late and too difficult now to make evolution to the Disc ID specs to integrate track indexes.
Players that handle them have been so rare, now, for years.
It would not even be verifiable or useable by more than a few geeks.
If the Disc ID is correct, this is not a track 8/13 with 5 indexes, it is in fact a 17 track CD, and the (mis)printed tracklist is not helping you with you CD player when you want to skip to track 9, you will hear what is printed as track 8 index b, but in fact it’s track 9.
I understand the track layout. The track labeling is “true” to the artwork and it is identical to the vinyl album, this was the manufactures intent. “Track 8” is “A Group of Children’s Songs” (5 songs 8a-8e), much like a melody but with each a separate track. Yes track 8a is physical track 8, track 8b is physical track 9, track 8c is physical track 10, track 8d is physical track 11, and so on, the labeling is accurate for the artwork (and for the vinyl album), maybe not the physical CD world. I bought this CD so I could check out how it was made. It is 17 physical tracks.
So how do we handle these “one-offs”, do we ignore the artwork because its a CD?
I’m surprised that the two releases that were the topic of that other forum thread survived this long with the “track.index” numbering (and some later, direct edits to the track listing on at least one of these releases) if the case was this clear.