Is it possible to go off spec when writing tags in ID3v2.3?

MusicBrainz Picard
, , ,
1

I tend to let Picard write tags in ID3v2.3 spec for better compatibilities, although everyone knows that there’s a price to pay… For me, it’s when I loaded these tagged musics into foobar2000, I found fb2k not parsing the ARTISTS field (TXXX:ARTISTS) into multi-values (e.g. ‘Kristen Bell / Idina Menzel’ as a single value)…

I’m aware that Picard writing <separator>-joined string into the TXXX:ARTISTS frame is standard in ID3v2.3. As for fb2k, after I added ARTISTS and LANGUAGE (TLAN frame) into its ‘Multivalue fields’ configuration, fb2k can correctly parse, e.g. ‘eng / fre’, into multi-valued language tags. But it just cannot understand ‘Kristen Bell / Idina Menzel’. If I split it (since it’s configured to be multi-valued), fb2k writes in duplicate TXXX:ARTISTS frames for multi-value (as seen from Mp3Tag).

So… If I can’t make fb2k understand <separator>-joined ARTISTS field, maybe there’s some hacks to make Picard write duplicate TXXX:ARTISTS frames in the first place?

I tried $setmulti(_id3:TXXX:test,A; B; C) or $set(_id3:TXXX:test,A), $set(_id3:TXXX:test,B), but they won’t work.

2

Alternatively, it makes me wonder how widely-used is the Picard-designed (is it?) TXXX:ARTISTS field, if a media player / library manager even as ‘advanced’ as fb2k cannot correctly understand ‘A / B’ (in order to do music categorizing / filtering)?

Should I use the standard ARTIST field (TPE1) instead, to store the multi-valued artists list, so that fb2k can correctly register that info into its database, and use another field (e.g. TXXX:ARTISTCREDIT) for display-friendly strings (e.g. ‘A feat. B’ or ‘A starring B’) ?

Is there anybody out there, who also thinks that Picard should (for the best compatiblity) store both an ARTISTS and an ARTISTCREDIT tags in the media file, and let users choose which one should copy into the ARTIST field (TPE1 for ID3) ?

3

Why are you still using ID3v2.3? If you swap to ID3v2.4 you’d get the multi-fields you look for.

Do you still have older players that need the older standard? Try them out with the v2.4 and it may just solve the problem you have.

MP3 specs are a vague thing that different companies and products read in their own ways.

5

When I was googling, I saw someone from 2023 saying that iTunes (and/or other Apple devices) had not fully supported multi-value tags yet (not showing complete artist list and ID3v2.4 and artwork thing blablabla).

I don’t use iTunes myself but I have a little bit of concern that I might run into a modern player like it that’s still trapped with v2.3…

Sure I’ve been considering v2.4 occasionally a couple years from now, but I’m just not sure when is the world prepared for v2.4 (is it now?) (Like, say, a decade ago I remember seeing people suggesting “don’t use v2.4 yet” blablabla…)

6

Last thing I had that need v2.3 was Win7 (I think). Modern phones and devices are fine. And why would anything actually use iTunes unless in the Church of Apple.

iTunes has its only little subset of standards anyway.

Try some albums out on your own kit. You may be surprised how much is happy with v2.4 and it solves your headache. v2.4 is old.

I abandoned v2.3 for a similar reason a decade ago also over the multiple values in one tag issue.

7

Alright, thanks for your useful advices