iTunes 12.4: Compilations - not very practical

Hi,

In Artist view you can group compilations:

Jim

I'm not quite ready to update to 12.4 and this doesn't help. I do know that when I import a CD I routinely uncheck the compilation button and make sure the Album Artist is Various Artists and then each song will have the Artist listed. Even if it's a greatest hits compilation for one artist I do the same thing.

Jyroflux wrote:

I'm not quite ready to update to 12.4 and this doesn't help. I do know that when I import a CD I routinely uncheck the compilation button and make sure the Album Artist is Various Artists and then each song will have the Artist listed. Even if it's a greatest hits compilation for one artist I do the same thing.

I'm too OCD for that. I will go through each track and change it to the original information — i.e., the album it originally came on, the year it was originally released, and what the track number(s) are. I don't like having Greatest Hits albums in my library. I've imported several over the years, and do the same for all of them. No, Frank Sinatra's "In the Wee Small Hours" did not come out in the 21st century, it came out in the 1950s.

As for me, I tend to buy Greatest Hits to get the one or two songs that aren't available anywhere else. But I end up ripping the entire CD. I don't use the release year of the CD for the songs. I enter recording dates, city and recording studio(s) under Comments. The Year for each and every song is derived from the recording date. So when I read that iTunes is deleting libraries I freak out a little bit. Although I have a Time Machine backup, there's always the chance something could go wrong.

I wish folks would post more screen shots so I can see what's changed before I dive in.

I've got some compilations showing separately and some still under Various Artists - most annoyingly some in a series show one way and the remainder in the other way. I thought the easy way to get them all to show the same way was to check or uncheck the compilation box but this hasn't worked, trying both ways. Has anyone been able to solve this?

I routinely uncheck the compilation button and make sure the Album Artist is Various Artists

You mean this Various Artists group (http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Various_Artists),

or this one (http://www.thevariousartists.co.uk/)? 😉

Neither, of course. But you knew that. I'll never have either of those in my library so I'll continue to use common sense.

The issue seems to be that in the 12.4 build compilations are hidden in the Album > Grid listing if the Sort By field is set to anything other than Artist.

tt2

I discovered the same problem. My solutions was to check the compilation flag and to leave the Album Artist field completely empty. So NO entry in the field Album Artist! After that all compilation were show in the grid view under compilations and the Album Artist war show as "Verschiedene Interpreten", which is "Various Artists" in German.

I find that omitting compilation albums from an Album search to be pointless & frustrating!

Apple, please put it back the way it was for myself & many DJ's who have to use this to find tracks.