Sometimes (more frequently than you’d expect) I come across albums that I can’t find in the MusicBrainz database but I do find them in the discogs database. Is there any way to get Picard to connect to the discogs database and load the tags from there? Currently I’m forced to use Mp3tag but I’d rather use Picard if possible.
I’m not entirely unfamiliar with scripts and programming but if I’m to start coding custom commands and plugins I will need some help getting started and being pointed in the right direction.
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No, but there’s a script to help import them into MusicBrainz proper (and from them you can get them into Picard).
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Hmm, I see.
I suppose discogs have quality control in place? I’d hate to mess up the MusicBrainz database with dodgy info. If My files get some wonky tags it’s no biggie but I wouldn’t want to be responsible for others files getting bad tags.
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Discogs have different guidelines than MusicBrainz, so even with the Discogs importer userscript you will often have to apply some manual clean up to the releases you’re importing (one of the reasons automatic imports are more often than not a bad idea).
MusicBrainz is generally a lot more “machine friendly” than Discogs. Discogs does have an API and it is possible to query Discogs for help with tagging, but they don’t have any way to use, e.g., AcoustIDs to identify recordings or Disc IDs to look up releases/mediums. They also lack several concepts that MusicBrainz has (works, recordings, events) and mosh a collection of others together into their “label” entity (labels, series, places). Several fields that are direct entity properties on MusicBrainz are stored in generic text fields in Discogs (even if they do seem to have standardised how to present them), e.g. release barcodes and artist birthdates.
All of this makes Discogs inferior to MusicBrainz when it comes to digitally “talking about” music, as Discogs simply isn’t capable of the same level of detail that MusicBrainz is. Thus, for software digitally “talking about” music such as audio taggers like Picard, MusicBrainz is just a more expressive data source.
Finally, Picard is hosted by the MetaBrainz Foundation, the same organisation behind MusicBrainz. Picard was and is written with MusicBrainz heavily in mind by developers involved with MusicBrainz’s development as well. So in addition to the technical reasons that Picard is not going to allow using Discogs in place of MusicBrainz, there’s also heavy political reasons that Picard supports the use of MusicBrainz over other data sources (and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future).
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Well, I wouldn’t even be looking at discogs if I found the releases in the MB database. Anyhoo, I’ll probably just stick with using Mp3tag for now when the need arises.
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Which is where the userscript @reosarevok talked about earlier comes in handy. I usually spend less than 5 minutes on importing a release from Discogs to MB.
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Please do try to find some additional (preferably primary) source to back up the data you are importing. Discogs itself luckily has quite a lot of cover art, but almost everything there seems to be added without any kind of proof.
Welcome @kema 
Basically, unfortunately we don’t support tagging via Discogs, for the reasons Freso mentioned.
It is a daunting idea to start adding all the releases you need to MusicBrainz, so I think it’s unrealistic to expect you to jump right in with your time (especially if you have a lot to add).
But if you are really passionate/interested in getting comprehensive tags and data, or would like flexible tags (eg if you’re spending a few weeks/months/years! perfectly tagging everything, I would highly recommend Picard so that you can add or change tags across the whole library with a few clicks in future), it should be worth your time and effort.
Also, it might not be the ‘official’ stance, but I don’t always double check information from Discogs. I have way too much to add (all the music), and because they’re a marketplace their users value specific data. It’s not always perfect, but personally I want to spend 1-2 minutes importing a release, and if someone else has better information they’re free to fix it up later - the edit notes clearly show my source, so inconsistencies can be followed up.
Sorry to anyone I’ve enraged with that admission 
To make life easier Discogs often has scans, which is actually the best source (after having something in hand) we could hope for.
Out of curiosity, what genres are you adding that are generally lacking on MB @kema?
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In the end I decided on the easy way out. The releases aren’t that many so I just use a different tagger that is connected to discogs. It won’t have much impact on my library.
My library has been accumulating over many years and is all over the place. Mostly it’s promo discs, bootlegs, rare imports obscure compilations and stuff like that. Genre wise it really is a little of everything blues, jazz, oldies, metal, electronica, rock… My library isn’t huge by any means, I’ve regularly purged albums to keep it under 2TB. Not counting zipped backups. 0:)
I can honestly say that I have little to no idea what could be lurking in the backups, lol. I’ll be done with the tagging in a day or two, it’s taken a long time since I’ve also been streamlining it by transcoding all lossless music to flac and being really anal abut album art.
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Since you asked you could use SongKong, this prefers MusicBrainz but also searches Discogs to get better coverage. Disclaimer I am SongKong developer and it is not free software (although there is a free trial)
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Hello,
I’m a complete noob in coding. Where could i paste the previous script plz, on OSX Sierra, MB 1.4.2?
Thx
If you’re talking about the import script, it actually installs in your browser. If you have a look at the Greasy Fork website, they have a pretty good explanation of the process for installing scripts and an excellent collection of scripts (including quite a few related to MusicBrainz).
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Check out this video to import Discogs into MusicBrainz DB : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsojvxMvmWU
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Thank you all !!!
You saved my day … today !!!
Installing and using discogs_importer.user.js script did the trick… editing also tags …
regards
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How do I use the script? I am fairly familiar with JS but what do I do with the script you linked?
Read https://wiki.musicbrainz.org/Guides/Userscripts
Basically those scripts run on user’s browser to add features to websites you visit.
Importers are basically parsing data from the website, formatting them, and feed release editor on MusicBrainz (prefilling fields, track list, etc…).
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I use mp3tag to add discogs tags to tracks then bring the tracks into Picard. Sometimes I skip discogs as some tracks are only in musicbrainz. Plus adding things or making edits that you know are correct can take time if you get put on cip program where you need to get votes. But can’t get votes if your editing obscure tracks.
You only need time: 7 days as you can see here: Introduction to Voting - MusicBrainz
There is no need to get votes. Even without any vote at all, your edit will be applied after 7 days.
Your edits for ‘obscure tracks’ will be accepted as long no other editor vote against it.
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your right, the problem with Discogs is that you need votes to for something to be added in. So if you make an edit. someone has to vote thought your edit. otherwise, it just gets stuck there. whereas with MusicBrainz, if no one votes for your edit either way, then 7 days later, it gets voted through.
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yeah, that user script no longer works 