Release events of digital releases

MusicBrainz
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1

This got me thinking:

The release event says UK 202-12-04. Now the Bandcamp release date was the same but that is not always the case.

Should those be two different release events? I don’t see why iTunes or music.apple should be UK only, but for Bandcamp releases I always select [Worldwide].

I sometimes see an iTunes/apple or deezer or tidal release as a separate release, but to me it feels like a release event of the same thing. Especially with new releases, the artist most likely uploaded the exact same files.

Is there consensus on how to do this in the MB database?

Thanks!

2

Ah, on this one of the same artist the digital releases are separate:

That just feels like overkill to me and it feels better if that itunes/etc release would be a release event on the digital release.

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3

Maybe because the bandcamp account has no regional lockdowns?
And the itunes account is tied to a region and not all regions have same releases?

4

I only use Bandcamp so I don’t know how that works. I’ll ask the artist if there are any restrictions on the iTunes release.

But do you agree (or: what is the consensus) on listing those as release events on a single release entry?

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5

https://musicbrainz.org/doc/Style/Release#What_should_be_added_as_a_single_release? and the section after it describe some of the criteria for determining when things should be entered as a single release vs. multiple releases.

I’m not an Apple Music user, but the UK release event seems wrong to me. I see what looks like the same album at https://music.apple.com/us/album/the-days-the-clock-stopped/1633902465 and https://music.apple.com/de/album/the-days-the-clock-stopped/1633902465, for example.

a-tisket didn’t give me a UPC for those Apple Music URLs and I don’t see a UPC at https://tdwprog.bandcamp.com/album/the-days-the-clock-stopped either, so someone could argue that those URLs don’t belong in the 8718858193004 release.

For something that is a single release per the style guidelines but became available on different days on different platforms, I’d recommend using the earliest date in the release event and setting the URLs’ start dates appropriately if you want to add that information to the database.

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6

Not all Bandcamp releases are worldwide though. They started allowing geo restrictions several years ago.

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Don’t rely on a-tisket for barcodes with Apple Music. Always check with the Toad King script first. Then when using a-tisket, put in BOTH the ID & barcode. The barcode for the Apple Music release is 197046091595, not 8718858193004. The Bandcamp barcode is 8718858193004. You can find it by using Bandcamp import script or just by opening the “view-source” of the page and searching for “UPC”.

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Ah, a different barcode is clearly a different release then.

The documentation has something very important: “when there was clear intent by the artist or label to create multiple releases”. Good to know.

Thanks for the clarification, all!

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9

I’m procrastinating from something, so I moved the iTunes links to a new release. Hope that all makes sense!

But if you want you can still add this since-removed cover variation.
I’m not procrastinating that hard :stuck_out_tongue:

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