DRIFT Series 1 - New album, Nov 1, 2019

[TheBang]

Originally Posted by mykeyz

Discogs does a lot of stupid things, such as placing releases in the album section that are clearly not albums and also putting live releases in the album section instead of its own section. It is amazing when they decide to follow rules and when they decide not to and when they decide to ignore logic. In the end, it seems like there are really no rules when a compilation can be called an album and an EP can be called an album or vice versa. For instance, Lorn called his latest release an EP and a mini album.

I think there are two things that are preventing you from understanding how Discogs wants to operate.

The first is the sorting of the releases into different categories (albums, compilations, singles/EPs, Misc, etc.). As purlieu said, there's some old code and criteria that are not the greatest that makes for some messy sorting sometimes. You're just going to have to accept that you cannot affect that. There have been tons of discussions about it, and nothing's going to be changed with it in the near term. However, you cannot (and should not) tag formats based on how you want to force the releases to category sort.

Which brings me to the second item. The format tagging. In your posts, you've cited a lot of things that don't matter to Discogs, like number of tracks, duration, music retailer categorization, etc. You have to ignore all the stuff that you yourself normally consider or think of when you try to tag releases as singles, EPs, or albums on Discogs. In fact, the guidelines even say this: "Do not guess at or attempt to apply personal standards to these tags." In the guideline, the only thing that matters is, did the band/label/release refer to/designate it as a single or EP or album? If so, then you can use the tag. If not, then you can't. It's really that simple.

As for your poing about compilations, there are special rules about the Compilation tag, and it can absolutely be used in conjunction with other tags (it even says so first thing in the guideline: "The compilation tag can be used in conjunction with any other available tag, for example, 'Compilation, Album'"). So, for Drift Songs, it could, conceivable, qualify for both the Album and Compilation tags. However, we don't actually know yet, since we don't know what's going to be on the album. If it's all new songs, or different versions of the songs, it might not qualify for the Compilation tag.

[iamneorev]

Originally Posted by TheBang

I think there are two things that are preventing you from understanding how Discogs wants to operate.

The first is the sorting of the releases into different categories (albums, compilations, singles/EPs, Misc, etc.). As purlieu said, there's some old code and criteria that are not the greatest that makes for some messy sorting sometimes. You're just going to have to accept that you cannot affect that. There have been tons of discussions about it, and nothing's going to be changed with it in the near term. However, you cannot (and should not) tag formats based on how you want to force the releases to category sort.

Which brings me to the second item. The format tagging. In your posts, you've cited a lot of things that don't matter to Discogs, like number of tracks, duration, music retailer categorization, etc. You have to ignore all the stuff that you yourself normally consider or think of when you try to tag releases as singles, EPs, or albums on Discogs. In fact, the guidelines even say this: "Do not guess at or attempt to apply personal standards to these tags." In the guideline, the only thing that matters is, did the band/label/release refer to/designate it as a single or EP or album? If so, then you can use the tag. If not, then you can't. It's really that simple.

As for your poing about compilations, there are special rules about the Compilation tag, and it can absolutely be used in conjunction with other tags (it even says so first thing in the guideline: "The compilation tag can be used in conjunction with any other available tag, for example, 'Compilation, Album'"). So, for Drift Songs, it could, conceivable, qualify for both the Album and Compilation tags. However, we don't actually know yet, since we don't know what's going to be on the album. If it's all new songs, or different versions of the songs, it might not qualify for the Compilation tag.

The number of tracks and duration is what another Discogs member brought forth to try to distinguish albums and EPs. He posted a link about what the different sites consider the standard for each format. Not me. My point was in response to that and I clearly said how the lines are being blurred in my posts above and how the number of tracks and albums doesn't matter anymore. Hence Nine Inch Nails calling what should technically be an EP an album by these standards that others pointed out and how these Drift Episodes would be considered albums instead of EPs if went by them. One of the first articles about Drift called these Episodes EPs, 5 EPs and an album, which is why I said the listings should be under the EP section, not the album or miscellaneous section. I am not putting a personal standard on them. I am calling them EPs because they were called that in an article where the band was specifically interviewed about the Drift series. They didn't pull the info out of a hat. They distinguished the EPs from the album that would come later.

[holden]

Honestly, I do not now, nor have I ever, cared about discog's classifications. I've released plenty of music via netlabel, and they mess it up. But with an established, popular band like Underworld, that site would still not be the first place I'd consider for accurate info. Actually, you'll get more truth here!

Thanks for the links regarding the Drift album content. I'm still hopeful for a larger percentage of new, unheard tracks. But I'm fine with a Rick and Karl curated best of with a few extras (I have bought/downloaded every drift track, and pre-ordered the box set, so I hope I'm covered)

[iamneorev]

Originally Posted by holden

Honestly, I do not now, nor have I ever, cared about discog's classifications. I've released plenty of music via netlabel, and they mess it up. But with an established, popular band like Underworld, that site would still not be the first place I'd consider for accurate info. Actually, you'll get more truth here!

Thanks for the links regarding the Drift album content. I'm still hopeful for a larger percentage of new, unheard tracks. But I'm fine with a Rick and Karl curated best of with a few extras (I have bought/downloaded every drift track, and pre-ordered the box set, so I hope I'm covered)

Well I think even the tracks they select from the ones we know from the Episodes will be different from their Episode version on album as I read an article that made it sound that way.

[purlieu]

When they first introduced the separation between album / EP / etc., there was an algorithm introduced to try and to it automatically, which is why things get put in there. It's probably due removal, to be honest. As for live releases, if a live album is a live album then it should be there I suppose.

I honestly think it was better about 10 years ago before they started separating between formats. It's caused no end of hassle trying to figure stuff out. Even so, the best thing you can do is just follow the submission guidelines and then you'll have no problems with your submissions.

[iamneorev]

Also, it seems Karl has thrown a wrench in all of this as he calls them "albums" when talking about the Drift Songs boxset being comprised of "seven albums" in this video at 9:44

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=317946779092263

[dubman]

This process seems indistinguishable from how an album is made, imo. here we have a spawl of tracks with a loose aesthetic goal, and at the end of this process they're going to curate it into a statement of what they've explored and created as a band, more or less.

Just because we're somewhat let into the process doesn't change what it essentially is. These are episodes, not EPs. it might be convenient in the RYM sense to classify them as such, but they don't really function as EPs do. The only thing that makes this seem like anything other than an album is the transparency in making it.

[purlieu]

Originally Posted by iamneorev

Also, it seems Karl has thrown a wrench in all of this as he calls them "albums" when talking about the Drift Songs boxset being comprised of "seven albums" in this video at 9:44

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=317946779092263

Seven??

[34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j]

one of them is a DVD though. so I think the musical part being 5+1 is still accurate


interesting thing from that interview...looks like they know what they're going to be working on post-Drift?

[purlieu]

Yeah, I noticed that, and I don't think the interviewer did, because otherwise she'd have been straight in there asking what he was talking about!