The booklet of Release “Lost Oceans” by John Huling - MusicBrainz includes “Ocean Waves, Humpback Whales, Sea Gulls, Sandpipers and various other sounds” under the heading “Instrumentation”. Should that be added to MusicBrainz somehow? Style / Unknown and untitled / Special purpose artist - MusicBrainz mentions crediting [no artist] - MusicBrainz as “[nature sounds]” which seems related. Would it make sense to say something like “[nature sounds] performed vocals [humpback whale vocals] on …”?
Does the booklet credit someone for recording the nature sounds? If so, I would think the “field recordist” Artist relationship type would apply:
I’m looking for any releases that would support that.
I don’t see a way to list the actual sounds with that relationship, just the recording artist.
Here’s the relevant part of the booklet. Based on “all songs … performed by John Huling”, I credited him for all the instruments except rainstick. I’m not sure extending that to field recording makes sense though.
In order to be credited as an instrument, it would have to be on the Instrument list, and humpback whales, etc., aren’t.
I don’t see a way to credit the creature sounds specifically. Unless someone knows something I don’t, I think the best you can do is list Huling as the field recordist (it seems to be saying he performed all those “instruments”), and maybe list the nature sounds in an annotation.
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I’ve been using Other instrument “other instruments” - MusicBrainz with custom credits for instruments that don’t make sense to request. E.g., Release “I Solisti’s Other Hits” by I Solisti di zirnachron - MusicBrainz credits “zirnachron” as an instrument, which as far as I can tell is either fictional or a one-off custom instrument for just that album.
I’ll do that if there’s no better option.
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I didn’t think of that. That seems just as good an option.
You mean “John Huling performed other instruments [humpback whales] on …”? That seems a bit strange to me for something that isn’t really performed at all like an animal sound, but I guess it does seem to be what the booklet is claiming at least.
Yeah, calling nature sounds “instruments” is odd, but that’s the way it reads.
I still like the “field recording” Artist type for this, even without a field to specify the sounds recorded, but that’s just me. I suppose a “task” field could be added, like you see on Engineer artists, but I don’t know that it’s necessary. After all, it says “…and various other sounds.”
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