for me, these moostly feel like secondary types.
a group is a group, doesn’t matter if it is a supergroup or a jazz ensemble…
but i think if we really want more information we should add secondary types similar to releases.
where you have single/album/… and then there is secondary live/bootleg/official/… (i think)
the primary types should be as simple as possible:
that is a fair question. in the one case of this I can think of offhand, FF5, the artists do seem to consider it a separate project (formerly a band, now an electronic duo). perhaps others have other examples where it’s not also considered a seperate project?
this is a good question, as virtual group is the one that seems to be making it in first (if not the only one, lol)
according to the English Wikipedia description at least (where they also group virtual bands and virtual idols, oddly enough), these wouldn’t be virtual groups, since they’re not animated or virtual avatars (unless you count the suits). I don’t know how much I like this, as it also excludes acts like KitCalibur or Stallionslaughter, which are made up of drawn characters who appear on cover art and whatnot, but to my knowledge, the groups also doesn’t have animations or virtual avatars. this definition would include hololive IDOL PROJECT and the like, as the characters do have virtual avatars that perform, each performed by a consistent person. sounds kinda like the examples y’all gave, but a bit less sweaty, lol
I think a simpler solution would be a simple “if (all/most) members are characters, then virtual group”. not sure if there’s any groups with both characters and people, but that’s a possibility, I’d imagine
actually, I don’t know if The Wiggles are characters or not, they could throw a monkey wrench into the works if they are (or should I say a Monkee wrench? lol)
Something not mentioned here would be a union / guild / association / order, for example
It would be great to be able to show artist membership in such associations, when they joined, and what positions they had within the group [President].
Maybe these are closer to labels, but the concept of membership here makes sense. This could extend to a loser concept of a “collective” as well.
I think we already have it, sort of, if you write president in the Task Attribute of the following artist-label executive position relationship.
In Japan, there are many cases of groups with fictional characters based on animations and movies that are actually performed by real people in live music – and some of these groups are so well known for their activities by real people that they have become more than just fictitious. It seems strange to me to call such groups “virtual” only. The idea suggested by @UltimateRiff seems more appropriate.
The term “virtual group” sounds like a sub-field of the “fictional groups” listed in Wikipedia (en) and MB.
Yeah, “fictional group” is probably the best wording, and would possibly include things like Spın̈al Tap.
I’ve never really liked “fictional group” myself… while it’s technically correct, I guess it’s got a subtle implication that it’s not real music to me, and a lot of my favorite music is from such artists. that said, it is a reasonable descriptor in most cases
also, created a ticket for group type attributes, as that sounds like a more reasonable solution for them