User:PEJL/WT:ALBUM archives/17–32

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Usage of Non-free album covers

Discussions continue at Wikipedia talk:Non-free content. A current discussion is going on regarding the addition of the following to WP:NONFREE policy under the heading "Examples of unacceptable use":

"A CD cover, album cover, or boom [sic] cover used to illustrate an article about the CD, album, or book, when the article does not justify this by reference to attributes of the cover art. The mere fact that a picture has been placed on the cover of an album to sell it is not enough.

Supporters of this statement feel they are simply clarifying policy, detractors feel that they misinterpret policy [disclaimer, I'm a detractor]. The argument seems to depend upon what one deems to be a "significant contribution" of an image to an article. If you have an opinion and have yet to join the discussion, you may want to take a look. -MrFizyx 16:16, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Update. Debate on when policy should or should not allow the use of Album images is continuing at WT:FREE. One proposal is that covers should be allowed for identification only in the context of critical commentary of that item (the underlying album), not for identification without critical commentary, together with the strong recommendation that "If the artist, design company or photographer that created or designed the image is known, they should be clearly indicated in the article; if the image has a particular relevance to the underlying work, this should also be discussed"; but without such discussion being an absolute mandatory requirement.

Others still want to go further, and prohibit "A CD cover, album cover, or boom cover used to illustrate an article about the CD, album, or book, when the article does not justify this by reference to attributes of the cover art". Debate is continuing.

Special explanations advisable for Album cover images larger than 300 x 300

Either way, on a different aspect of this issue, both by the law and by the policy, cover images must be of a resolution no greater than the minimum necessary to achieve the purpose for which fair use is claimed. WP convention puts this at about 300 x 300 for album covers used in infoboxes.

But there are a lot of album cover images out there that are larger than this. It is likely that sooner or later, someone will make a sweep through the album cover images category to find all images larger than 300 x 300, and, perhaps, automatically replace them with smaller ones.

If there is a particular reason for a particular album cover that an image of only 300 x 300 will not do the job, it is strongly advisable that someone adds an explanation of this onto the image's media page, to say why it should not be automatically replaced with a smaller one. For example, Image:Beatles_-_Abbey_Road.jpg might justify a larger image, to illustrate Paul's bare feet and other details specifically commented on at Paul is dead. The fair use rationale needs to explain this: "Exceptionally, an image larger than 300 x 300 is appropriate because..."

Sorry for all this legal crap, but it is something we have to deal with, and some people have got a real bee in their bonnets about. From our side, we need to just make it go away, with as little collateral damage as possible. Jheald 08:42, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I fail to see where a guideline actually specifically mentions 300px. You've said it's wp convention, but I can't find any Wiki reference to the fact. As to the legalities, they vary based on the country of origin. In the UK, the Fair Use laws are different and here in Australia also are very different. In the USA they're the toughest of all, but here in Aus, they're pretty simple and lax, in the UK they're tougher and so in accordance, the items released from Australia have looser requirements to be referenced. I'm not saying this to contravene or dodge the Wikipolicies, but am simply saying that the actual laws really don't have a lot to do with it, as long as it passes general internet copyright procedures, and I don't know a country in the world that has copyright and fair use laws as strict as those here on Wikipedia. As I pointed out on the tag for the cover of Chasing Mississippi, if you were to actually print something at 600px², you'd end up with an image less than 4cm² (2'²), which is tiny, (just) less than a third of standard printing size, and the proposal of 300² would mean that were one to print it, it'd exactly an inch (that is, 300DPi is standard commercial printing definition). Now the purpose of Fair Use is to provide that something cannot be replicated in such a way as to take from the artist/copyright holder's capacity to earn from it, in short. If I'm printing something at that size, there's no way loss or damage could be attributed on account of its quality, because even though on a computer monitor it shows rather large, their printing ability is terribly lower than the resolution of a regular album, and less still than a Record cover. --linca^linca 09:54, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I think for ones more than 300px we might consider making a second image copped just showing Paul's feet. It would work better in the article anyway. Secretlondon 17:16, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Delimiting genres

Prompted by this change, I think we should have a guideline for how to delimit (and capitalize) genres. Commas and <br> are commonly used as delimiters, slashes more seldom, and now asterisks. For consistency with existing articles, I think we should pick one of the two most common delimiters, commas or <br>. Related to this issue is the fact that most genres shouldn't be capitalized, per WP:MUSTARD#Capitalization, which is a common mistake. I propose we choose commas, because that makes the capitalization more obvious, and is consistent with Template:Infobox musical artist. Therefore I propose we change this text:

Genre

One or more music genres, for example, "Rock" should link to Rock music, "Alternative" should link to Alternative rock, "Punk" to Punk rock, and so on.

to this:

Genre

One or more music genres, delimited by commas. Genres should be linked (piped linked where needed), for example, "Rock, pop" should link to rock music and pop music respectively. Note that most genres aren't proper nouns, and shouldn't be capitalized, but the first genre in the list should be.

It's a bit of a repetition from WP:ALBUM#Disambiguating links, but I think that is warranted. Any objections? --PEJL 20:03, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Commas should be fine: more line breaks just make the infobox unnecessarily tall. Also, there should really be as few HTML tags as possible. –Unint 21:24, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I second the use of commas... vertical lists just look bad when the rest of the entries in infoboxes aren't separated the same way. The change looks good to me. ~Gertlex 15:30, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. Thanks for the feedback. --PEJL 23:01, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

What about UPC / Catalogue #?

I've just stumbled along this page and I apologise if this has already been covered, but what about an optional field in the details for an album to be its "cat number" (that's what it's called in Australia, where I work for a music retailer) or "UPC" is a term I've seen used for a similar thing in the US (although I'm not very sure about that). This is a unique short series of letters and numbers to identify a CD. I already use wikipedia heavily to find information on artists and albums for customers, and the ability to know a CD's cat number would help immensely with finding it in our store's database. This is one example of which I'm sure there are many where this information would be useful and relevant. Frob 13:38, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

UPC is the 12 or 13 -digit number below the barcode. It's different from catalog numbers, which are internal to the company. UPC's are distinct for every product, from floor cleaner to record albums, whereas many record labels have a product with the catalog number CD01.

Many albums have multiple product codes, especially those released internationally, or reissued.

I don't think this sort of information is widely included on Wikipedia, but it might be worth including in cases where it helps identify different content (e.g. different edits, hidden or bonus material, remastering, defects, et cetera) found in different version of a same album. Since Wikipedia is not album complete (and by policy, won't be), it will never serve as a comprehensive database of product codes. / edgarde 14:51, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

There are periodic requests to include the catalog number in the infobox, and there's never been any consensus to add it. In my own personal opinion, I think it's infobox clutter, but if you think it's helpful info and find a way to work it into the text, that's fine. In addition, there are questions about the usefulness of cat numbers in an ever changing list of releases. -Freekee 23:22, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

I admit, I sometimes add a section at the very end of an article on the release history and if possible include a table of catalog numbers. Many sources include these in discographies and articles, so obviously somebody finds them useful (although I'm not entirely sure how/why). If you feel it makes your article more complete somehow, add that bit of data, but do it at the bottom of the page, there is no need to further clutter the infobox. -MrFizyx 23:32, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

The endash in the track listing

I am unsure if this has been discussed here recently. Is there a particular reason that the endash is used to divide the track name from the track length? This may be an idiosyncratic use of an endash; usually an emdash would be used for this sort of function—see, for example, WP:LIST#Definition lists. I bring this up here because there are now discussions under way at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Hyphens and dashes in the MoS to replace some dash guidelines with this draft. --Paul Erik 16:26, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Disclaimer, I've only glanced at the new guideline and not looked at the discussion. What would be the alternative to using spaced en dashes as we do now? Unspaced em dashes? The proposed new guideline seems to disallow spaced em dashes, which are acceptable in the existing guideline, so that wouldn't be an option. Spaced en dashes seem to be an acceptable alternative to em dashes in both the old and new guidelines. --PEJL 16:55, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Update: The guidelines have been updated, and they now explicitly say to use spaced en dashes in track listing and credits sections of album articles. --PEJL 13:11, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Why don't we have a new section for each Album page called...

'Accepted As Given Rock Music Fact', this way all of us true rock fans who really know our rock facts can make the given declarations we ALL know to be true, like the Rolling Stones Exile on Main Street is their greatest album and Nirvana was really a punk band (everybody knows that, right?)... stuff like that.

Am I being facetious? Of course. But this attitude runs rampant through the album pages. Whole histories of an album given with barely a citation or reference in sight, liberally sprinkled with much non-NPOV. I know of many Album pages where I could delete histories that are 6 to 7 paragraphs long leaving nothing because not a word of it is cited nor referenced. But we all know the uproar this would cause. SO... what to do, what to do... Buster 18:26, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

You are encouraged to source, edit, delete or {{fact}} tag such writing. Uproar is common when removing fancruft — if it becomes controversial within a given article, you could probably canvass this Project to editors who can help.

Lots of rock/pop listeners try to express personal experiences of passion rationally (and then just barely). Not an optimal starting point for NPOV or encyclopedic writing in general.

WP:NPOV#A_simple_formulation uses The Beatles' "greatness" as an example, providing a clear example for music pages. (Interestingly, The Beatles still has statements like "are the greatest band ever" reverted almost daily.)

I often point writers to WP:PEACOCK. WP:ATT or WP:CITE for unsourced statements. Maybe WP:BETTER for the rest. / edgarde 19:01, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

BTW, Edgarde, thanks for your help. Buster 00:54, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with 'Buster', it could be a problem coming from a 'giddy' 12 year old editor, but who's to say that I could give a hoot what the managing editor of Rolling Stone Magazine thinks from his regurgetated, commercialized, possibly inaccurate accounting of the band?(that's why they call em' retractions)

I will tell you that if i'm searching for a band, one that i've never heard of, like say: 'Black Tears'. If there is no content in the article, someone has left it blank due to no citation, I would much rather read about how some 'giddy' 12 year old got to go backstage and meet the "kewlest band in the werld" than to be left with absolutely nothing. This at least gives me a relatable article that has one experience that I may gleen some info of how this band was significant at that time(even if it is to one person). Leaving it up to my own imagination? I'd rather play Russian Roulette.

I say, leave it in with a "citation needed" tag until it's cited or replaced with the (sheesh)mighty, all-powerful 'Rolling Stones' quote...--ZapperZippy 20:13, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

If one really values unsourced opinions and original reviews from non-notable writers, I'm sure a Google search can find something free from quality control. / edgarde 21:48, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Hey, I was just playing Devil's Advocate. We don't have to quote from Mind Police, it's No Fun. Besides, that would just create Anarchy in the USA. I hope I'm not being too Boring...Who's to say Nirvanna was *not* a punk band? Thank God for Google--ZapperZippy 04:25, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

You are being somewhat boring (since you ask). But more to the point, you're using a talk page as a chat forum. As a general rule, talk pages are for discussion related to improving the article. Perhaps it's time for you to start a blog or something. / edgarde 19:31, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Are you stalking me? =)--ZapperZippy 23:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I would very much like to see better references for all music related articles. Unfortunately, there are very few usable sources in the field, if you're to follow official Wikipedia guidelines. You can't even use a band's own website. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources. We need to allow for a bit of stretching the rules, when necessary. -Freekee 22:21, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

I think what you are talking about is allowed and under the right circumstances does not involve breaking the rules. See WP:SELFPUB. Of course third party sources are always better. When you can find 'em use 'em. -MrFizyx 22:58, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Help requested

Hi,

Is it customary to have a nav box for between songs on the same album. Specifically, I'm talking about this TFD for Template:Mutter. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 10:42, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

No. There's the artist temp box already, for released singles. A temp box for a specific album is not needed, as unreleased singles usually do not have their own page anyway. — « hippi ippi » 10:45, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth - here are two examples that I have noticed: Blackbird (song) & Charlie (song). It's not common, but when there's an article for just about every song on an album, it seems to be a good idea. Putting the info in the infobox look better than a template at the bottom of the article, in my opinion.--Fisherjs 12:55, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Non-English language reviews

We now have a list of review sources that should not be used in the professional reviews section, at WP:ALBUM#Non-professional. I added Infomusic, a review source in Polish, to that list yesterday, but that change was reverted just now. How do people feel about non-English language reviews? My position is that the majority of readers of English Wikipedia will not know Polish and won't be able to read that review. Editors who don't know Polish are also unable to assess if that review source meets the requirements on review sources (being clarified at #Professional review sources). Opinions? --PEJL 17:17, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

WP:MOS-L#Foreign-language sites seems to support this. --PEJL 18:17, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I reverted that deletion. Thanks for linking WP:MOS-L so I didn't have to. A agree that non-english reviews don't work here.

Might consider an exception for articles on non-english speaking music (especially song-based) that isn't otherwise known in english speaking countries, but that should be justified on a per article basis. Even then, might require a translation of some sort (via Babelfish or whatever). / edgarde 19:13, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Non-English language reviews may still be useful in case there are no other reviews available but inability to assess the source by most editors is a fair point. Jogers (talk) 10:07, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

What about creating a category for it? And additionally, if the album's in a certain language, the review should be in the interwiki of that language. If someone understands the language of the review, they should understand the language of the interwiki article. --linca^linca 06:34, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Sputnikmusic's placing on non-professional list

I've noticed recently that Sputnikmusic has been placed on wiki's list of non-professional review sources, with the description: "As a matter of policy, reviews from these review sources are not considered professional, and should not be included in album infoboxes."

Rather than make any unilateral changes, as an editor at Sputnikmusic I'd ask you to reconsider this position, as Sputnikmusic's staff review section is recognised as a professional source by a number of media outlets, bands and record labels, who've cited and reposted our reviews on their sites and in literature. Reviews are also tallied by Metacritic, who draw from the staff list exclusively.

We would be happy to assist in removing any non-staff reviews which are cited as professional in other articles, as it has never been our policy to include them thus, but we'd urge you to reconsider. Perhaps Sputnikmusic could be included on the professional listing with a disclaimer urging contributors to verify that it's written by a staff member ("STAFF" will appear beside the authors given name on the page).

Anylayman 22:58, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about that, I didn't recognize the distinction between Sputnikmusic's staff and non-staff reviews. It seems very reasonable to include the staff reviews among the professional reviews. I'll update the non-professional list to only exclude non-staff reviews. --PEJL 23:28, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

I had already removed about 70 Sputnikmusic review links before this was brought up, of which I've now restored the ones which were staff reviews (only about 30), a sign that we need to keep an eye out for non-staff reviews being added in the future. --PEJL 19:27, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Is there a quick way of making the distinction between the two? Like, other than physically going in? (like based on the link to the review) I am a member of Sputnik and have left my 2 cents there a few times, and have never seen anything that at a glance appears to be anything different from anything else (maybe I've been looking at the wrong reviews). --linca^linca 06:32, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Not AFAICT. --PEJL 16:21, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

The only indicator right now is that the author's name has "STAFF" written beside it and is catalogued under the staff section of the site. I can make enquiries about a separate url structure however. Anylayman 07:39, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Template:Album cover article rationale

Well, Template:Album cover article rationale sprouted from the discussion above about more fair use images being tagged. It is simply a template to provide a fair use rationale for album covers used in their respective album articles, since there was resistance against hard coding the fair use rationale in to the template. Perhaps this can be added to the main page? Cheers. -- Reaper X 00:03, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I like it. Good work. But is the "user" parameter necessary? Jogers (talk) 09:56, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

No, but I've seen a fair amount of rationales with it though. It just adds credibility I guess. I can remove it if you feel that strongly about it, but I think it's good as is. -- Reaper X 02:29, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Agree this is quite good. I've done a whole bunch of rationales recently, primarily on Bowie single covers (Rebel Rebel is an example, if interested) without employing the user parameter and would prefer to see how those pan out before making it part of a template. Apart from that, I'd used variations of most of what you've included in the template except for item 3, which I think is a good 'un. Partly to make each rationale technically unique and to clearly state the article(s) for which FU is claimed, I also included the following line: "It is used to identify and illustrate the article <<album/single article link>>, which is the specific recording related to the cover image". Cheers, Ian Rose

Labels

Should distributing label be included in Labels line in an album's infobox? Daniil Maslyuk 07:55, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

WP:ALBUM#Details says that only the original label should be included. Does that answer your question? (I don't know exactly what you mean by distributing label.) --PEJL 19:31, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't do it. For any given album that's distributed all over the world there would be far too many such labels. –Unint 02:14, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Can I get you to clarify your question? If I understand what you're saying, some artists are distributed by different companies internationally (such as Jive Zomba being distributed here in Australia by BMG until they merged with Sony) or do you mean where an album has several labels attached (such as Room for Squares having Aware records, Columbia Records and Sony BMG all attached, because they're all participant in its creation etc)? In that case, I'd do the latter, but not the former. Generally, I'd just attach anybody who's (a) in the article AND (b) actually funded the album and done initial local distribution. --linca^linca 06:24, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Sourcing lists (specifically track listings and credits)

Please see this article which contains dummy statements at the top of the "Track listing", "Credits" and "Chart positions" sections, whose only purpose is to hang references on. That seems suboptimal. Firstly, do we need to source these pieces of information? I ask because I looked at some FA album articles, and only some do this, and then only for some of these sections. Assuming we do, is there a better way to do this? Hanging the references on the headings doesn't work well. For tables the references can be attached to one of the table headers, such as the "Position" header in that example, or to individual table cells, but that won't work for lists. Thoughts? --PEJL 00:04, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Any FA article that doesn't would not be there I's day because other references throughout the page would provide the information, because this information itself is doubtlessly some of the most importance information to be included on the page/in the article of all. --linca^linca 06:09, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Should track listings include lengths?

Regarding WP:ALBUM#Track listing, it was brought to my attention that we don't explicitly recommend including track lengths in track listings. We do describe how to include them (delimiting using en dash), but do this vaguely (without actually mentioning that the delimiters are for track lengths, and for them alone, per existing practice) and don't mention when they should be included (always or only when appropriate, for some definition of appropriate). In practice the example is probably interpreted as a guideline that they should be included. A vast majority of album articles do include track lengths; about 90% in my sample of 1501 album articles do. (While some of the rest may not include them based on a conscious decision not to do so, I suspect most don't simply because no-one has bothered to enter them.) Therefore I propose we change the following in WP:ALBUM#Track listing, to codify existing practice:

Use an en dash (–) rather than a hyphen (-) as a dividing horizontal punctuation mark. [...]

to this:

Track lengths should be included for each track. Use a spaced en dash (–) rather than a hyphen (-) as a dividing horizontal punctuation mark before the track length. [...]

Any objections? --PEJL 12:18, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

I say do it. Violask81976 13:27, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm a big fan of the en-dash. Might be helpful to mention the HTML character reference (&ndash;), which is more convenient for some users to type. / edgarde 16:56, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

The HTML entity is already mentioned in the continuation of the paragraph, represented by "[...]" above. --PEJL 20:04, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Do it. --linca^linca 01:52, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Oppose - this is meant to be an encyclopedia of notable information, not trivial tidbits that are listed simply because they are there. How does a track duration listing help? According to WP:NOT, wikipedia is not just a list of random info, but important info. Merbabu 04:50, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Track duration is helpful in several ways. The most obvious is as a clue to identifying different edits of songs. If we were voting I'd give this a big thumbs up. / edgarde 05:36, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with edgarde. I find track lengths quite useful. Jogers (talk) 08:56, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't particlarly fuss me whether durations are included in an article or not, provided they follow a standard appearance when they are included. Cheers, Ian Rose 09:11, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Hey guys. We do need the,. It's in the B class requirements, as i'll show and link here:

A B-class article has:

• All the start class criteria
• A completed infobox, including cover art and most technical details
• Times in the track listing
• Authors for all songs
• Full credits, including technical personnel and guest musicians
• At least one section of prose (excluding the lead section)

Bold emphasis is mine, but there you have it. it's been made B class requirement, so obviously B and upwards should all have it included. See: B-class requirements. --linca^linca 12:36, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Does such a requirement make sense? Things can be changed, right? ;-) Merbabu 12:43, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

In my mind, yes it makes a lot of sense. Time is a notable thing about music. Music is all about time. It would, however, be senseless to explain why each song was of such a lengt in the dialogue of an article. It's as important a number as the album sales, the date it was released. I know I'm not arguing the point very well, but it's unhelpful to not include it, basically. How is one to know that a song doesn't go for 20 minutes while the remaining songs on the album average at 4 minutes (such as Love Over Gold)? --linca^linca 01:42, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. A majority were in favor, and it was as noted already a B-class requirement (and implied by existing text and examples), so I made this change. --PEJL 21:08, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Back covers for original realeases

I've just had some back covers removed from the Beatles pages. These cover shots were from the original UK releases from the 1960's and since the vinyl format is no longer the dominant format then I would argue there are historical interests to have them displayed. In most cases, a lot of back covers for albums in their original LP or even cassette/8 track or Reel to Reel format, will never be reproduced in the same way again (especially albums that were release pre-barcode). There are generations of people that have never seen a record on the store shelves in their lives, so I believe it is of educational value to display the originals on Wikipedia. A classic example is the back cover of the original 1969 release of Abbey Road. This version beared no mention of the song Her Majesty, yet the later reissues and the 1987 compact disc, which replaced it, include the track on its track listing. What does this mean? It means that the world’s first hidden track is, now and forever, stripped of its title.

Besides, who said the cover had to just mean the front? Isn’t the definition of a cover just something that protects and promote the album? The back cover is included in this as this is where the track listing is so people know what songs they are going buy with the related album. I know this idea has changed in the itunes era where the front seems to matter, but this just supports my earlier argument for having the LP back covers. And look at wrap-around covers like Led Zeppelins Houses of the Holy or Michael Jackson’s Off The Wall that can never be reproduced in the same way with standard CD packaging. It is also interesting to add that for an influential band as big as the Beatles. I found very little images of the rear sides of their original LP’s online.

Again, whether it’s Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones or AC/DC it is of interested that we don’t let these images become the memories of baby boomers and let them be replaced with the bastardised CD versions. paulisdead 20:25, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

The move to the CD format has robbed "pop" of one of its most important parts: the cover. Imagine a future where albums are available in a format no bigger than a postage stamp - not difficult to imagine - in such a hypothesis Peter Blake's Sgt. Pepper cover would no longer exist. In the case of a postage-stamp sized album it would be difficult for anybody with environmental credentials to justify a 12" square cover - perhaps the images could be encoded in the mp3 we download in the future? (Thinking about Pepper, for example, I mean including the original stickers/cutouts etc.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mvaughan0072000 (talk • contribs)

As I noted on your user talk page, the problem is that including back covers isn't considered fair use (see WP:FU) in most cases. This was previously discussed at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 13#Back covers. See also lengthy discussion of fair use at Talk:The Beatles discography#Problem with album covers, which is about including covers in lists of albums, but the policy and guidelines discussed apply to back covers as well. --PEJL 11:43, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Last time I looked at WP:FU, the consensus was on the side of an album cover being fair use in the album article with no special 'critical commentary' regarding the cover, provided the image file itself included a fair use rationale; however the back cover would certainly require some commentary in the article to justify its appearance. Cheers, Ian Rose 09:08, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

The reasoning provided by PID here is valid, but that reasoning needs to be provided on the articlespace as long as it's encyclopedic and not original research. I am 99% sure an admin won't delete a back cover if you're appeasing the requirements of fair use, but the ones you refer to from the sounds of things don't appear to be meeting fair use. --linca^linca 12:28, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

I did provide reasoning for each cover; being that the original covers form the 1960's are different to the current CD's and LP's - meaning they havn't been commericaly avalible in over 20 years (38 years for Abbey Road). The captions were there but the images were still taken down. I will post them with clear reasoning and making sure that the fair use is stated. paulisdead 17:10, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

You have now added for example this and this. I doubt those satisfy our fair use guidelines. See User:Durin/Fair use overuse. --PEJL 10:51, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

To clarify: My interpretation is that Wikipedia's fair use guidelines don't allow back covers (or other supplemental album artwork) to be added for a random article just because critical commentary is provided about the artwork in question, because our use of fair use images should be "minimal". That does not preclude it being included in cases when it is especially notable. (This goes further than the consensus from the previous discussion, based on the recent crackdown on the use of fair use images.) --PEJL 11:29, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

To further clarify: It's seldom "especially notable," as PEJL put it, to include them. If there was controversy over the content of the back cover, such as nudity that caused the album to be prohibited in places or had to be packages in "brown paper" 9so to speak) then THAT would be notable, especially if it could be seen as a reason for notoriety or sales being affected. Another case of where it may be acceptable is cases like this where, such as in this case, a word is misspelt, would be worthy of noting. I'm not even that sold on its importance, to be honest, considering that it's something that could easily be described in words, such as the description of the cover art of Time on Earth, where the description indicates the way the letters are spelled on the cover. As it's the front cover, it's somewhat irrelevant as the front cover is acceptable irrespective, but you should be able to get what I'm saying by now. --linca^linca 11:38, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Conflicts in Album Names

I am currently going through and doing a complete discography of Cowboy Mouth's albums (before I go and rework their page, which has been sporadically worked on). I'm hitting a conflict that their second last album was called Uh-oh. There is already an album on Wikipedia, by David Byrne, under this name. Is the proper method to link to Uh-oh (Cowboy Mouth), as someone has done somewhere else (though without actually creating the entry), or is there a better way to indicate whose album is whose? --Thespian 11:42, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

If there's already an album article for Uh-Oh then the name you should use is Uh-Oh (Cowboy Mouth album) - see the project naming standards. Cheers, Ian Rose 12:20, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

It should actually be Uh-oh (Cowboy Mouth album) and you should move David Byrne's version to Uh-oh (David Byrne album). By moving the DB version, it'll make the original page a redirect. Convert the redirect into a disambiguation page linking to both articles. Alternatively, you could just put a tag on the David Byrne version such as {{redirect}} and use the explanation of the redirection that the Cowboy Mouth version is at Uh-oh (Cowboy Mouth album). Hope this helps. All the info can be found amongst the pillar pages. --linca^linca 12:23, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you both. While on this kick, I note Mercyland redirects to David Barbe, a member of a band named Mercyland that disbanded 16 years ago (seems to have been part of the Athens 80s college rock scene, but not of note). In the case of a more recent album under that title, by a still active band, should/can it be changed? Or does the redirect stand, and a redirect go on the page? The album has not been reissued, but was on a major label MCA Records. Though I'm at around the 700 edits mark, I've never really worked with something that was going to require a lot of wiki-fiddling (I mostly just gnome), so I thank you for your help here. --Thespian 12:54, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Byrne album should not be retitled

If the David Byrne album is clearly more likely to be searched, it should not be retitled. There should be an {{Otheruses}} template leading to a Uh-oh (disambiguation) page. I'm not a fan of Byrne so please don't expect me to be biased toward him — I just think that album is more likely to be looked up.

This has been discussed before, and is consistent with disambiguation precedents. Several (I think 3) albums are entitled "Rush", but Rush (album) goes to the Rush debut, with a dab. / edgarde 23:44, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Disambiguate where necessary is the general rule, but the David Byrne album is one of his least successful releases. Another thing to note is that his page has the redirect tag and it goes to uh-oh (expression) which server to explain the expression and act as a disambiguation page, which is not good enough. The disambiguation page should be the base page (uh-oh) and the others should all stem from that. It's just common sense. --linca^linca 01:18, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Sittin' on Top of the World

Please refer to my comments on the discussion page of Sittin' on Top of the World. Ikeshut 03:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Assessments

I've made quite a few changes and tidied everything up quite a bit. All of the assessment related stuff is now at WP:ALBUMA. I've also nominated this page for deletion, as it is missing loads of assessments, there is already a bot-managed assessment archive and the results of assessments are shown on the project banner on the article talk page. Does anything else need to be done? Papa November 1 11:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Moving ABBA to Abba (band), per WP:MOS

Can someone confirm for me this is the right thing to do? No one's responding to the suggestion I left on Talk:ABBA, but the {{Capitalization}} template I left was quickly deleted, so I'm a little creeped about making this change. I would actually affect about 10 articles.

Relevant rules: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (trademarks), Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters)

Trademarks should be written in a way that follows standard English text formatting and capitalization rules. If this isn't an acronym (and no one calls this group Ay bee bee ay), this needs to be changed in titles and and articles. / edgarde 17:47, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

But the article says that the group name ABBA is an acronym formed from the first letters of each group member's name: Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid (Frida). Jogers (talk) 18:01, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Even so derived, it appears to be a name, not an acronym. / edgarde 18:08, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't need to be pronounced ay bee bee ay to be an acronym. See NASA and NATO. --Fritz S. (Talk) 18:18, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Why on earth would you want to lose a perfectly good article name ("ABBA") and replace it with something unnatural and unweildy ("Abba (band)"). If it ain't broke, don't fix it - and imho it ain't broke! --kingboyk 22:00, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

It's probably best to just remove the tags, unless anyone has any better ideas. Escape Artist Swyer | Talk to me | Articles touched by my noodly appendage 09:32, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

How should this be handled?

In my editing I ran across The Very Best of Rod Stewart which needs quite a bit of clean-up. What I want to know is should this just be one article? The article actually discusses three albums - that is three seperate physical packagings. Technically, The Story So Far:... was realeased in the UK as one double-album. The other two albums were released seperatly as Vol.1 & 2 and only in the US. However it's not just a split double-album. There are songs on the US discs that are not on the UK double and vice versa.
So my question is should this be one, two, or three articles? I was hoping that someone more experienced than myself could help me with this and possibly provided examples of how this has been handled in other cases. (Sampm 04:35, 21 June 2007 (UTC))

Most Beatles and Stones albums in the 60s had different track listings for the US and UK - they are always discussed in the one article so you could have a look at them. For a more recent compilation example there is The Singles Collection (David Bowie album)‎ - though it's very basic. Cheers, Ian Rose 08:26, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

A class review

Now that the assessments page is up to date and I have received no negative comments, should we start to implement the A class? Personally, I think it is a fairly useless classification as the guidelines for assessment seem like a vague intermediate point between GA and FA. If we decide to use it, can we decide on some project specific rules for articles to put on WP:ALBUMA? How about something like:

An A-class article must:

• Have passed the GA review procedure and meet all B-class criteria
• Completely describe the album, including all relevant sections from the following:
  • Background and history (may be separate sections)
  • Significance
  • Recording, production and marketing (may be separate sections)
  • Musical style and lyrics (may be separate sections)
  • Critical reception and aftermath (may be separate sections)
  • Artwork (may be separate sections)
  • Chart performance
  • Accolades
  • Singles
  • Any other notable information relevant to the album
• Be of an appropriate length
• Be well written
• Have a well written lead section
• Be fully referenced, with all references as footnotes in the correct format
• Have no copyright problems. All non-free media files must have proper fair use rationale

Any suggestions? - Papa November 1 00:17, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

It is rather useless, considering that it's not essential to be a GA to be awarded A class, which I find bizaare. Anyway, your list is good and comprehensive, but I can't help but feel there's something else that should be there. --linca^linca 10:56, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Is this based on any actual articles? Can we see what an article which meets those criteria looks like? Looks a bit overloaded to me, and some very fine Featured Articles don't cover all that. --kingboyk 16:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Please add to that list: "Should describe the contents of the inlay(s), in particular whether the lyrics are included in the inlay". Gronky 14:48, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Trivia imho. --kingboyk 16:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

FYI, this suggestion emanates from Template talk:Infobox Album#Can inlay info be added? Such as lyrics. --PEJL 17:17, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. With so many pressings around the world, I personally think such information is trivia unless there is something extraordinary to mention (the typeface of 1987's cover, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band's printed lyrics - apparently a first in the UK, and so on). Looks like you agree? --kingboyk 17:22, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes I do (although my response over at Template talk:Infobox Album was specifically about including it in the infobox). --PEJL 18:03, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

The list is based on sections found more than once in the current featured album articles. I said "relevant sections" as it is not intended to be definitive. There's probably a better way of specifying it, if anyone has any suggestions! Papa November 1 15:43, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Update on tagged album articles

I asked, and Alai delivered. Updated lists can be found at User:Alai/wonkyalbum and the whole lot transcluded at User:Alai/wonkyalbumall. If you're interested, help to whittle these down. Unless you are busy, of course, working on the current collaboration. --Fisherjs 10:53, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Stubs requiring sources?

One user is taking it upon himself to continually edit a stub album I created, Manos (album), adding a template to say that it requires sources. My reading of WP:V suggests that only material likely to be challenged requires references. How is a track listing such as an album stub likely to be challenged? I have no idea why he has taken it upon himself to continually do this to one stub album.

Do I need references? If so, WHAT? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Generica (talk • contribs)

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 17#Sourcing lists (specifically track listings and credits). --PEJL 09:04, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Hardly seems canonical though. Is this documented wikipedia policy? I mean, I can understand needing this to get FA status, but for a stub, seems over over overkill --Generica 09:24, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I think it's a bit of overkill, but then again, it's likely to be challenged if it can't be sourced. It's almost silly to say that something doesn't need a source if it won't be challenged. Heck, people argue that the world is flat. We use documented sources to confirm even the finer, generally undisputed facts. --linca^linca 04:06, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Professional reviews with no links or dates

Prompted by this change, I think we should adjust the wording at WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews to say that a review must have either a link or the date of the review. Any objections? --PEJL 16:06, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Should be a link if the review is available online (like AMG) or date at least if not. However I'd suggest that if the review is not available online then it really should be properly cited - footnoted if necessary - with author, date, publication, page number. Cheers, Ian Rose 22:09, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Proper citing for unlinked reviews sounds good (better than banning them). Here's the change I'm proposing:

[...] If there are no online sources, you may include no link at all, but should then cite the information properly. The link should display as the date of the review being published, preferably including the page number – even if there is no link, this information should still be included. If you can not find the date of publication, the word link will suffice. Either a link or a date must be included though.

What should we do with existing and newly added reviews without either a link or a date? Remove them? Add {{fact}}? I'm tempted to just remove them, because {{fact}} implies that the information should be cited with footnotes, when we'd really prefer a link. --PEJL 13:31, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. I updated the wording per above. --PEJL 17:27, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Logos for album names

A number of albums have recently had logos added to them, replacing the text for the album name in the infobox. I think we should decide if that is something we want or not, and say so in the guidelines. In my opinion these logos don't improve the article, and appear to be solely for decoration. In most cases they would also just duplicate the text on the front cover. I also doubt that including the logos is fair use (unless they are discussed in the article, in which case it might be more appropriate if the logo was placed adjacent to the text discussing it). Therefore I propose we add some text to the guidelines to explicitly say that the album name should be written with text, not an image (unless the name cannot be represented using text, like the symbol-name for Led Zeppelin IV). Any objections? --PEJL 12:10, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think it's over the top to include logos as well as an album cover, particularly as the logo is just the title lettering from the cover. I'd agree with dropping them - it's pushing fair use boundaries and not at all necessary. Cheers, Ian Rose 12:24, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

If this is just one user doing this, I don't think we need to change our guidelines. Avoid instruction creep, right? Just tell that one user that they should stop as adding these violates Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria. --Fritz S. (Talk) 12:39, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it would probably be instruction creep in this case. Such a guideline would be quite useful in Template:Infobox musical artist though. --PEJL 13:05, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

This is not limited to just one user. The Evanescence editors did it earlier, for a start (see Fallen (album), etc). –Unint 15:03, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

The Led Zeppelin IV is an interesting piont. Also, an artist like Marilyn Manson will have a different logo with every album he does. Also if the front covers don't breach Fair Use then I can't see why a part of the cover (i.e the font of the album text) would. The example I used was the Carpenters album Close to You. As long as the logo can be read and contains alt text for disabled users I can't see a problem. If the logo can not be understood in it's released language then there should be text to translate it. Personaly, I don't think they're too distracting but if the Wiki community feels this strongly about the issue then I have no beefs about having them removed but I am just going on other examples that I have seen through about the site. What's good enough for one has to be across the board.paulisdead 12:36, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Close to You serves nothing to the article having the image as the text and is difficult to read for many, but is not really a breach of fair use simply because it's use of a freely available font with yellow on grey. --linca^linca 03:14, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I think the question here is educational value - does it serve eductaional function? Having a different font GENERALLY does not, but I suppose it's possible. I feel that the Close to You example serves nothing. A reader can see which font is used by looking at the album cover. Same with Sgt. Pepper. If the font or logo used has value in itself, I think that it should be used and also explained within the article - not just what font, but the importance.
As another note, I feel that Led Zeppelin IV is not part of the same thing. It falls more in the category of alternate name such as The White Album or <FAIR USE REMOVED>. I think we can treat this thing case by case as long as it doesn't get out of hand (unless it already has). Anyway, consensus rules I guess. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sampm (talk • contribs)

I don’t see something ascetic based as being a bad thing as long as it doesn’t impede on information. However, you could argue that since a band’s logo is a business logo and an instantly recognisable sign (meaning there’s the same educational value of including it as there is including a logo for IBM), then an albums logo is the recognisable sign of the business’ product. On another note: obviously, given the layout of the info boxes – there is no section for a logo to be included and given the artistic nature and associations of the art form, it’s to be expected that people will that this opportunity to merge titles and logos together. paulisdead 18:47, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Given that this was more widespread than initially thought, perhaps a note in the guideline would be appropriate after all. I propose we add to the following:

The album's title using text (not a logo), which will be automatically italicized.

This doesn't mention the Led Zeppelin IV case (one could argue that its symbol name is text, just not text representable in Unicode), but keeps it short and simple (as there was a concern about instruction creep). --PEJL 00:54, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it adds anything to the article. The logo is already in the picture directly below that. It could be considered to take away from the article, in that the font makes it more difficult to read, but I don't think I'll argue that case. I don't think it's a fair use problem in that a logo is fair game to illustrate a subject, but I don't think it's necessary to show it, in this case. I second PEJL's suggestion on the rules text. -Freekee 04:41, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 14:43, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Rolling Stone review links

I've been fixing the links to Pitchfork reviews (they changed their URLs again?!?), deleting the star rating templates for reviews from sites that don't use a star rating system and adding the new Review-Christgau template where applicable. While I've been at it, I've noticed that quite a few of the Rolling Stone links point to a URL that has the text of the review, but doesn't indicate their star rating. Oddly, I've found that there's usually another page with the same text that does include the star rating. For example, [1] says "NO STARS", but [2] says . What to do, what to do? I could replace the "NO STARS" URL with the URL that includes the star ratings, but if they're in the middle of re-doing their URLs, this extra work may be a waste of time. Any thoughts/suggestions? --Sanfranman59 18:21, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

It sounds like a glitch in their system. Perhaps you could contact Rolling Stone and ask them if this is intentional. While we're on this subject, some articles actually list the reviews as "Rolling Stone (no stars) link". I don't think this is appropriate, as we have a guideline for what to do for reviews without ratings (use a descriptive word or nothing), and because saying "no stars" may give the impression that the album was given zero stars, which I assume is not what they meant. --PEJL 18:55, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I was going to contact them, but their "Contact us" page doesn't really have a link for questions about the web site. I'll just pick one of the others and see what happens. I agree with your point about "no stars". When I come across this, I'll remove that text. --Sanfranman59 19:13, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I've emailed RS. Assuming I get a response, I'll post it here. --Sanfranman59 19:32, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't forget that for some album reviews at RS the star rating is a "user rating", not the professional reviewer's rating. I don't think we should use a user rating. Cheers, Ian Rose 22:11, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Ian. Yes, I'm aware of that. The example I gave above refers to the RS rating. Both pages have the user rating, but only one has the RS rating. --Sanfranman59 23:44, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

No response from RS so far. I'm not terribly surprised. Since they have the text of the review, I think I'll leave these links alone for now in the hope that RS fixes the problem at some point. --Sanfranman59 17:03, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Standardizing the credits section header

I'd like to standardize the credits section header. In my experience most album articles currently use either "Credits" and "Personnel" for this section. (No stats, sorry.) I'd like to standardize the heading (probably on one of those), similar to how we currently have a standard section header "Track listing". I don't really have a preference which is chosen, but I will note that we sort of imply that it should be "Credits" at WP:ALBUM#Credits, and that "Credits" (to me at least) sounds like a broader term. Specifically I propose we add something like the following (where the addition is underlined):

A credits section should be included under a primary heading "Credits" and should generally be formatted as an unordered list of names and instruments, delimited by en dashes [...]

--PEJL 01:15, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with the title of "Credits" being more appropriate. "Credits," though broader, is also much vaguer and could mean anything that contributes. "Personnel" is a more defined term indicating any persons who enacted work upon the album. This term includes anybody including artwork and such, whereas the term "credits" entitles studios to be entered which, though not illogical by that term, is not appropriate as they've generally been mentioned in the infobox for a start, and often another time or two in the album text (possibly exponentially more, dependent upon the breadth of the article). On this premise, I believe "Personnel" to be a more appropriate term. Less about corporations. More about people.

Secondly, on the topic of how to depict the information, I agree, though not necessarily with it being an "unordered list." There are a few ways I could suggest that it ought to be done, but we should choose one and run with it. First: alphabetical. Please don't go with alphabetical, but if you must, the option's open, but I just don't like pre-defined lists being re-created into alphabetical order unless absolutely necessary (maybe it's just me). Second option: just as it is on the album sleeve. This option isn't great since some album sleeve's are vaguer than the minds behind much of pop music; if we go with this, I suggest clarification where there are multiple versions of albums (such as Thirsty Merc) for any additionally recorded tracks, any personnel appearing on those tracks be listed last, or in sequence of addionally added content. Now the third suggestion I'm making is the one I think would work best, which is how I generally edit my pages: If there's a band performing, list them first in the same order from the album's article (as appropriate according to lineup changes etc). The band should be listed under their own sub-section. Another subsection should indicate any additional performers. These should be grouped according to instrument type (such as on Songs for the Deaf). A third section should indicate non-performing personnel, such as artwork, producers, engineers, non-performing songwriters etc. Again in heirachy of type (Producer first, engineer next, exec producers next etc).

I know I'm proposing far greater than you're mentioning, but this is how I would suggest it. Otherwise, sure. The en-dash is fine with me. --linca^linca 13:05, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I should clarify that only the text inside the insertion tags (underlined) in my proposal is the proposed addition. The rest of the text is the existing guideline, so the use of unordered lists and en dashes is already in the guideline. I too think using sub-headings is appropriate in many cases, but chose to propose standardizing the primary heading as a first step. --PEJL 13:16, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, saw the forest and the trees, but missed the signs. But yeah, all of what I said is still what my opinion is. --linca^linca 13:22, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a serious issue with either word but my preference is also for 'Personnel'. FWIW, I'm pretty certain that was the standard header wording a while back, though I'm prepared to be corrected... Cheers, Ian Rose 16:01, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I like Personnel as well, tho I've been using Credits as it seems more the established norm. Does anyone have an opinion on

Personnel

Band name

Additional musicians

... as is used on A Bigger Bang#Personnel? There has been some demand (needing under the current rules much reversion) for listing the "main" members separate from the session players. / edgarde 20:11, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

"Personnel" indeed used to be a standard a while ago but it was changed after rather brief discussion.[3] I don't have any opinion about the subject. Jogers (talk) 01:04, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Jogers for validating my memory! Re. Edgarde's suggestion, I've never been that interested in dividing the session players up from the 'proper' band in such a manner, I just list the ongoing members first and the guests afterwards - which I realise some people might see as a bit haphazard but it's often the way things appear on the actual album credits. However I would be happy to go with this as a guideline when appropriate, and I use those words deliberately. It's fairly hard-and-fast for 'a band' like the Beatles, Stones, Smiths, etc, to nominate the 'real members' and then the session players. Bit more of a challenge when you have an artist like Bowie, Numan, and so on, who though solo in name usually had a fairly constant group of musicicans behind them for a few albums (e.g. Bowie's Spiders) - but their augmentation was entirely at the whim of the leader. Happy to go into more detail here if requested but enough for now - so as long as the guideline is for 'proper' bands, I'm cool with it, and there may be instances when it's appropriate for so-called solo artists as a judgement/consensus call. Cheers, Ian Rose 01:14, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Though I agree Ian, I say we go with whoever is published on the album as the players of the band. For instance, Crowded House have (now) five studio albums. The first had Neil Finn, Nick Seymour and Paul Hester and additional musicians like Mitchell Froom (who also produced the album). The next album had the same three but Tim Finn appeared as a guest. The next album, Tim Finn was considered a member while Mark Hart, an American musician, was a pianist/keyboardist. The next album, Tim Finn had left and Hart had been enlisted completely. Now, with the new fifth album, Hester has passed and now has been replaced with Matt Sherrod who, according to the album sleeve (and several press reports), is also now a member. On each album there are several stand-ins and certainly live, there have been many. The incarnations of Crowded House has varied, but at any given time, it has been clear who is the central band, unlike the certainty of membership of groups like Simon and Garfunkel or The Beatles. I know this has been longwinded, but I'm simply saying that though bands change, the membership at the time of the album recording is what matters most... except for A Fever You Can't Sweat Out... I'm still not sure who actually played bass on that album. --linca^linca 03:13, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and edgard, I agree with the way you mention it. That's how I usually do it, but as I mentined before, the Production credits also should be in there like in Dream Days at the Hotel Existence#Personnel, I believe. Though the section may be small, it's inapropriate to put the producer as a band member or an additional musician (even if they may also be a band member or additional muso). --linca^linca 03:18, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

I prefer "Personnel." Partly because that word makes it more likely that the list is by person first, as opposed to function. I like to use bulleted lists, with line breaks between band members and production personnel (and sometimes between members and guests). -Freekee 04:33, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. Everyone seemed to be in favor of standardizing and of using "Personnel", so I made the change proposed above (using "Personnel"). --PEJL 14:40, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Professional reviews sorting

The guidelines at WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews say to sort the professional reviews alphabetically. It is unclear what that means for personal names like Robert Christgau and Piero Scaruffi. These are sometimes sorted by the first name and sometimes by the last. I can see arguments for both methods. Sorting by last name is the obvious way to sort personal names. On the other hand sorting by the first name brings greater consistency with the other review sources (which are in a majority) and is in my experience more common (leading one to assume that editors in general consider it to be the more obvious method). I'd like to standardize this as well, and am fine with either method being chosen. --PEJL 17:16, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I've been sorting on first. I'm not sure why. / edgarde 17:22, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Both methods make sense but I always sorted them by first names without even realizing the issue. Jogers (talk) 09:53, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Let's just decide to sort them by first name then. --PEJL 14:46, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

After probably going through a similar internal deliberative process as others, I've sorted by first name because that's the way the names are displayed. It didn't look right to me sorting Christgau's reviews as a C when the name is displayed as Robert Christgau. --Sanfranman59 17:07, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

I just realized that we have a similar sorting inconsistency with review source names like The Guardian as well. --PEJL 22:09, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Error in template

The text in the template says: "an attempt at building a useful resource", shouldn't it be "an useful"? Guirro 00:05, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Nope. "Useful" phonetically starts with a 'y' sound - "yoos-full" - so it gets "a" and not "an". (ESkog)^(Talk) 00:06, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

For this same reason, we should not say "an hospital," but should be "a hospital" though this seems to be fought at times. --linca^linca 09:35, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Maintenance list update notice

I've just updated the List4. Jogers (talk) 18:23, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

I've also added a list of album pages which titles contain an opening parenthesis without a space before it as requested by Fisherjs. If anybody knows how to make a regex that would allow me to make a list of titles that have an open parenthesis but not a closing one I could create this one as well. Jogers (talk) 19:24, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

\([^)]*$ --PEJL 19:34, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. They were only three of them. Jogers (talk) 19:52, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Release dates

In reference to the details, it is said that Released "Should refer to the earliest known date." now If there are a couple release dates for different countries, can we list those other dates as long as it doesn't get too cluttered? -- Reaper X 02:57, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

I tend to list about 1-4 depending, but any more than that it should be a table on the page. If the info's just laid crappily on the page, and you an't be bothered making the table yourself, just chuch a {{make table}} tag in there. --linca^linca 03:04, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

It should refer to only the earliest date. There was some discussion about changing that guideline a while back, but no change was made. A table is a useful way to display multiple dates, which has the added benefit that it can also contain information about labels, formats and catalog numbers. See for example Kid A. --PEJL 03:57, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Chronology

I was just looking over the chronology section to try and figure out how to order many of the jazz albums I intend to enter into the encyclopedia. In jazz, unlike many other genres, recording dates are often as or more important than release dates. I want to know if the normal way of going about this entails going by release date or recording date. For instance, some albums like Hank Mobley's Another Workout was recorded years ago and not released until decades later. What is one to do in this kind of instance? Thanks. (Mind meal 09:06, 5 July 2007 (UTC))

Since one album may have several recording dates, including dates that span those of other albums, chronology can only be consistent if release date is used. Obviously recording dates should still be included in the article, if known. / edgarde 09:12, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. P.S. - I am severely addicted to this place. Just when you think you've bored yourself silly applying yourself to one task, something else comes up. Albums sound fun. (Mind meal 09:18, 5 July 2007 (UTC))

As well as dates, another issue to bear in mind with jazz albums is that many released before the mid-1950s were often repackaged compilations of material, some of which were tracks previously issued on 10" discs (typically three 10" discs worth of stuff spread over two 12") and some of which were left-overs from the recording sessions – as also happened with re-issues of albums on CDs. I think the 1949 Charlie Parker album on Dial ('The Bird Blows the Blues') was the first 33⅓ 12" jazz album; at the time 12" format was considered something for the classical market and 78 rpm and 10" EP was dominant for jazz. Gradually the small labels, like Blue Note, made the switch and merged and re-released their 10" catalogue in 12" LP format. The long-play album, containing music intentionally created to be grouped together as a commercial release, is more a thing of the late 1950s and into the 1960s, e.g. Miles Davis's Kind of Blue, or especially his and Gil Evans' Miles Ahead. Ricadus 17:29, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

The short version is to include the recording date and the release date autonomously in the infobox and make mention within the article of the difference or subsequent releases of the work. --linca^linca 06:40, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Making artist names show up in categories devoted to albums by a specific genre

Hello there. I just created a few categories, and intend to expand them. An example is my creation of Category:Hard bop albums, which I have made so it appears in the Category:Hard-bop musicians also, for further circulation. My question is how, if possible, one can make the name of the artist appear with the album title in these sections? Is there an easier way? I do not want to place Category:John Coltrane albums in the hard bop album category, because not all albums by Coltrane are hard bop. See the problem? Any help would be great. (Mind meal 03:01, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

When artists deviate from their regular spectrum of music, then you categorise album for album. For instance, Category:John Coltrane albums should be included in Category:Jazz albums and Category:Albums by artist, and each album by Coltrane should have Category:John Coltrane albums but those that deviate from Jazz should be individually categorised as, for instance Category:Hard bop albums. Just like Robbie Williams since not every RW album is a Swing album(like Swing When You're Winning), nor Pop (Like Escapology), nor Rock (like Sing When You're Winning) or even dance music (like Rudebox). All of his albums slant in a different area than each other so he should only have Category:Albums by artist (and maybe Category:Robbie Williams) as the parent cats of him. Does that help/make sense/confuse you further? --linca^linca 06:36, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, thank you for trying to clarify things further. I pretty much understand the categorization process as you just laid it out. My specific question was perhaps not as clear as it could have been. Say I categorized a Coltrane album under Hard bop albums. This category is bound to fill up with hundreds and thousands of albums by various musicians over time. I was curious to know if there was a way to format the categorization on their album page so that when the album appears in the Hard bop albums section, their name can appear after it. Also, I am not categorizing albums that fall into hard bop also under jazz, as hard bop is a form of jazz. Instead, I have created a Category:Jazz albums by genre which is now on the Category:Jazz albums page. I am curious also to know if there is a way to create a default Category:Jazz albums by artist as well, so as to tidy up the Jazz albums page and make for easier browsing. Perhaps that last bit is overkill, though. (Mind meal 07:03, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

I don't think you can add more information about category entries. That's one of the limitations of categories. Help:Category has more info. --PEJL 07:48, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

• I wonder if it would be acceptable to begin doing something likeCategory:John Coltrane hard-bop albums, to be found in the hard bop category only....thoughts? To do this with all artists could make order out of what will potentially become chaos. I don't want browsers to click on albums when they don't know who created it. This would make for excellent searching, imo, and could be done for many arists of various genres. (Mind meal 07:57, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

• Please see Category:Free funk albums to see what I have in mind. This way everything is not randomized, leaving users to mystery click albums in specific genre categories. (Mind meal 08:27, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

I just think this is overcategorising to be honest, though I'd leave it to the floor to give any guidance on that, because I don't know of any specific guidelines that govern this (mind you, lately I've become a fan of WP:IAR). --linca^linca 09:29, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

• Well, I've decided to stop going down this route anyway, as it is really tedious work. I guess folks will just have to mystery guess for now, until a solution can come along that better organizes albums by genre. Thanks for the input, anyway. (Mind meal 09:56, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

Live tribute albums

Is there consensus on what to enter in the "type" field for such albums? (Mind meal 16:36, 6 July 2007 (UTC))

I don't know of any. One option is to use the most distinctive type, for example a live album by a tribute band might be categorized as "live", while a tribute album by a non-tribute band might be categorized as "tribute". Just use your best judgement, and consider also using the "Longtype" parameter. --PEJL 22:20, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

TfD nominations for album infobox alternatives

Template:Infobox Album/HTML, Template:Infobox Album/temp and Template:Triptych Cover album infobox have been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the templates' entries on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. --PEJL 22:00, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Category:Uncategorised albums

Starting to get filled with articles that have been there since June. 172.135.96.6 01:06, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

I worked on some of these - artist, year and genre anyway - but most of these are barely stubs. I can't even tell what some of them are. Categorization is the least of our worries, but they are more likely to get fixed if they show up in some categories. Hopefully someone with more knowledge/time can help —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Sampm (talk • contribs).

Personnel

Isn't it rather redundant to force a list of personnel at the end of an album article when all of the personnel is mentioned in the prose of the article? Teemu08 02:58, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes it is redundant information (as is the data in most infoboxes) but it is included for quick reference. Papa November 1 10:58, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Not really redundant, I believe. It's a matter of summarising information that may not be as accessible as in list format. --linca^linca 12:54, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Chronology conflicts

What are we to do when an album is by two or more musicians and we are chronologically ordering both musicians' albums? Thank you. (Mind meal 11:42, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

Do you mean like this?--Fisherjs 11:58, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Can you give an example? You can use the {{Extra chronology 2}} template to provide the second artist's chronology in the infobox. See documentation for details. - Papa November 1 12:04, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Category:Jazz albums by artist

There is currently a discussion underway at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_July_9#Category:Jazz_albums_by_artist. I believe that all Category:Albums by artist should be broken down into genre+albums+by artist, as Category:Jazz albums by artist has done. Nobody ever browses Category:Albums by artist. If they want to find someone, they will just search for their article and look for a discography there. Please see Category:Jazz albums to get a feel for what potential this wields. Far from impeding navigation, I believe this accelerates it in a much more useful manner. Otherwise, people have to just randomly click on an album title in say, Category:Jazz albums, not knowing anything about it. Albums need major work in terms of categorization, and I think that this is a good first step. (Mind meal 15:06, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

Album article names vs WP:UCN

I'm involved in a discussion at Talk:Pussy Cats (The Walkmen album), where the argument was made that album articles should use the most common name, citing WP:UCN, even if this is not what is (considered to be) the actual album name. In my experience this is not something that is usually adhered to for album articles. Instead we almost always use the actual album name as the name of the article (with disambiguation as necessary). I note that our guideline at WP:ALBUM#Naming doesn't say anything about this. Should we be taking WP:UCN into account for album articles names, or should we disregard it (as we currently do)? Either way, I think we should clarify this at WP:ALBUM#Naming. (There is also a question about what the official album name is in this case, but that is a separate issue.) --PEJL 17:11, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

The article name for an album article should be the name of the album, but needs to be able to reflect both necessary disambiguation and differences of opinion about when the album title starts and stops. While I haven't seen the disc, if the cover image for Pussy Cats is accurate, then I personally wouldn't include "starring The Walkmen" as part of the title. -Acjelen 18:45, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

The position of the editor I was discussing with was that the official title included the band name (because that's what the website referred to it as) but that the article should not be at what he considered to be the official title (because of WP:UCN). The second point is what I was asking about above. To the first point I responded as follows, which might be worth repeating here:

I said "if you consider" intentionally, because what is the official title of an album isn't as clear-cut as you make it out to be. Most albums contain both the artist name and the album name in some combination on for example the front cover. The album never explicitly says which is which ("This is the official title of the album: ..."), we just assume that the artist name is not included in the album name in most cases, because it is written in a way that makes this likely (on a separate line, for example). Other cases are less obvious. There are lots of examples of "Artist Album", "Artist: Album", "Artist's Album" and "Album by Artist" and the like that are in a grey area. I contend that "Album starring Artist" is also in that grey area.

--PEJL 20:08, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

I've always held that Macy Gray's first album is Macy Gray On How Life Is, not just On How Life Is. -Acjelen 20:11, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

"Love and Theft" was just moved to Love and Theft, even though the former is considered the actual album name. I think we need a guideline that says to use the actual album name as the article title, for example with a new sentence at the beginning of WP:ALBUM#Naming:

The article name should be the title of the album, disambiguated if necessary.

I think we can choose to interpret WP:UCN as not forbidding such a guideline. Anyone opposed? --PEJL 13:34, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

I'd say avoid initial quotation marks for reasons specified in Wikipedia:Naming conventions:

To maintain the functionality of Alphabetical Indexing and avoid needless redirect pages, page names should not begin with non alpha-numeric (A-Z,0-9) characters used solely for emphasis.

So, Love and Theft, not "Love and Theft". Anyway, most users would probably enter the name non-quoted.

I think album article names should favor the "actual album name", but modified as needed to defer to Wikipedia naming conventions. So if Pussy Cats Starring The Walkmen really is (ignoring quotation marks) the official title, I think that would be the right article title.

Since I'm unfamiliar with this band, I have no opinion on what the official title would be. In the absense of other deciding factors, the band consistently referring to the album by the long name on their website would probably make the long name common enough. / edg ☺ ★ 14:17, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

As for quotation marks on "Love and Theft", note that the problem with indexing order can be fixed by piping categories, as is currently done for titles beginning with articles such as "The". (The naming conventions guideline similarily says that articles should not begin with "The" (see Wikipedia:Naming_conventions#Avoid the definite article ("the" and the indefinite article ("a"/"an") at the beginning of the page name), but makes an explicit exception for titles. No exception for titles is made for quotation marks, but that might just be because it is relatively rare for titles to begin with quotation marks.) I also don't think the quotations are used "solely for emphasis" in this case, as the title actually includes the quotation marks. That said, WP:UCN does suggest that the title should not include quotes, but makes no mention of the relevance of that guideline for titles. Another aspect to consider is the article itself, which (currently) uses quotes to refer to the title (in the intro and in the infobox for example). Having the article name not include them just seems inconsistent. My position on the other title mentioned is similar: Pussy Cats or Pussy Cats Starring "The Walkmen" are reasonable title alternatives, but one of them should be used consistently. --PEJL 14:42, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

"Heroes" is another example of such a title. --PEJL 15:12, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if this is quite the same, but in all english speaking countries, the Billy Joel live album Концерт was released under that title, however for some reason that i can't quite discern, we have the article listed as Kontsert, despite not being an accurate reiteration/translation of the title (it may as well be "Concert" considering it's the accurate translation). I think it should either be "Concert" or Концерт but not "Kontsert" as that's not quite the phoenetic translation (I don't know how to construct IPA, but the description on the page isn't right). --linca^linca 01:35, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. I went ahead and added the proposed wording. --PEJL 12:13, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Proposal for a change to album categorization

Hello fellow WP:Album members. Recently I found what I feel is a gap in our current method of categorization. Wikipedia, as per it's own definition, can be used either by search or browse. These are two legitimate methods. I ask everyone to put their bias at the door, and listen to this proposal with an open mind. I am going to number my points, so to make them more readable. My proposal is that we begin subcategorizing Category:Albums by artist into Genre Albums by artist.

1. As Category:Albums by artist currently functions, there is absolutely no way for users to find artist albums by genre. Users have no way to browse jazz albums, or hip hop albums, or any genre you can imagine, by artist. Instead, they are left with the odd option of clicking on a random album title. They know nothing of who made it. There is no context. Only that the album mysteriously falls into this certain category.
2. It has been suggested previously that something like Category:Jay-Z albums simply be placed in Category:Hip hop albums. My proposition is that this practice is incorrect. Category:Rap albums doesn't say anything about artists, so we need a Category:Rap albums by artist to function as part of the Category:Rap albums to organize these people. In most categories, when albums by artist are placed in a genre+albums category, the list goes on for page after page; it distracts users from the actual albums below the artists.
3. This encourages browsing, and allows people to find musicians they typically would never find. This is the purpose of an encyclopedia, to educate people and help them access information as efficiently as possible.
4. Category:Albums by artist is, quite simply, far too large. We categorize musicians by genre, why not those musician's albums by genre? Users do not browse the category Category:Albums by artist. I highly doubt anyone has EVER searched for ANY artist in that category. It doesn't really serve a purpose, aside from a potential mother category for subcategories. But for some strange reason we subcategorize them by everything BUT by artist. WHY?
5. Music lovers enjoy certain genres more than others, and it would be optimal to give them that option without forcing them to randomly click on album titles in guess mode, trying to find something. I have more to say on this, but I've made my case. (Mind meal 18:35, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

How is your proposal that much different than current practice. The category Category:Thrash metal albums is already divided into subcategories by musician/group. While some of the articles in the category need to be placed in an artist subcat, I don't see that as reason enough to change the structure. -Acjelen 19:06, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• It isn't. In that case all that would change is a Category:Thrash metal albums by artist would be created to house all of those artist albums; of course it would reside at Category:Thrash metal albums. These albums would still of course go into Category:Albums by artist also. Essentially it just leads to better organization. Technically those albums by artist do not belong there, as supposedly Category:Albums by artist is "all inclusive". So if someone wanted to move all of those artist album categories from a given album by genre page to the albums by artist category only, they would currently be justified in doing so. Not to mention that on some categories those albums by artist go on for many pages. This just serves to better organize things and condense the categories for easier browsing. It seems to me that Category:Thrash metal albums is for just that, thrash metal albums. If we want to have a category for thrash metal albums by artist, then it is logical we create a category for that. You see what I'm saying? Apparently this is controversial though, as you can see at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_July_9#Category:Jazz_albums_by_artist. (Mind meal 19:14, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

Aren't you just renaming an existing category, but not changing it otherwise? I suppose if you wan't to do something like what we did for Category:Paul McCartney classical albums across the entire encyclopedia for all album articles, that would be different, but I don't see you suggesting that. -Acjelen 19:33, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• Actually, I did do that in some instances but it is actually very laborous. See Category:Ornette Coleman free jazz albums as an example. This was criticized as being overcategorization. This proposal does not threaten anything at all, it just is an easier way of categorizing certain musicians who perform predominantly in certain genres. The way this would work is that when someone strays from the genre, then that album be categorized as you demonstrated with Category:Paul McCartney classical albums. The "genre+albums+by artist" would serve as an artists predominant field. And no, I am not proposing a rename. All I am proposing is that if we are going to include say Category:Miles Davis albums at Category:Jazz albums, why not create a subcategory at Jazz albums for Category:Jazz albums by artist? Incidentally, users can now view jazz albums by artist in one click, and not have to go to the second page to see the rest. It seems we do that sort of organization with everything else on here, ie. Category:Jazz albums by record label and Category:Jazz albums by nationality; the latter being more redundant that by artist could ever be. (Mind meal 19:39, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

You are suggesting that Silver (Starflyer 59 album) would be in Cat:Starflyer 59 albums, a subcat of Shoegazing albums by artists, a subcat of Shoegazing albums, a subcat of Alternative rock albums, a subcat of Rock albums? But what would be the purpose of putting an additional layer of category between Category:Starflyer 59 albums and Category:Shoegazing albums? What else besides musician/group subcats would go in Category:Shoegazing albums? -Acjelen 20:18, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• Because by definition they are shoegazing albums by artist. Please see Category:Rock albums. For a user to access all rock albums by artist, they must click next 200 three times. We place Category:Hip hop record labels in their own category, and do not dump them at Category:Hip hop albums. The same can be said for Category:Classical music record labels, and on and on. I don't understand the resistance, as it just does what other such subcategories do also....they organize things. This is not an additional layer, but merely a correct form of categorization. Why not just toss jazz record labels at Jazz albums, or jazz albums by nationality at jazz albums, and do away with "by record label" and "by nationality"? We don't because we keep things organized.(Mind meal 20:27, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

But the number of artist subcats won't decrease in number by putting them in their own category, there will still be hundreds. Making sure that albums aren't just in a genre category will reduce the number, but we already have instructions for that. And I'm not sure what you are talk about when you reference "by record label" or "by nationality"? Is there a Category:Jazz albums by nationality? -Acjelen 20:42, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• But it WILL condense the actual Category:Rock albums. Right now it serves two purposes, it houses albums and then albums by artist. I am only saying they belong in a by artist category.(Mind meal 20:57, 9 July 2007 (UTC))
  • But nearly all albums are by some artist. If you read the directions on this project, it should be very very few albums that are listed in, for example, Category:Rock albums by themselves and not in the subcat the for the musician. As an example, Addictive Poetry needs to be in the subcat Category:Badapple albums, Afili Yalnızlık in Category:Emre Aydın albums, and After Dark (album) in Category:The Make-Up albums. -Acjelen 21:08, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Ah. Perhaps if you had suggested to this project the creation of the "by record label" and the "by nationality" you might have avoided all this trouble. Shoegazing albums by record label might be considered overcategorization. -Acjelen

• I wasn't suggesting that for shoegazing albums, for that is overcategorization. Apparently I am being unclear here. Shoegazing albums ultimately trace their roots to rock albums, right? Record labels and nationality are typically for the "mother genres". I wasn't suggesting any such thing concerning shoegazing albums. However, many of the head genres by album do house genre albums by record label and nationality. It is certainly not without precedent. Many record labels produce only one form of music. I don't know of any that produce only shoegazing albums. Could be wrong. All i am fighting for is by artist, for albums BY artist. I feel like I'm running around in circles here. Does anyone comprehend what I am proposing? I give up, everything that could be said has been said.(Mind meal 20:57, 9 July 2007 (UTC))

I find this quite difficult to follow, mainly because I'm not that familiar with the category structure. Would it be possible to summarize your proposal using a schematic chart? For example:

Albums by artist:

ARTIST albums:

ALBUM

Albums by genre:

GENRE albums:

ARTIST albums:

ALBUM

Perhaps such an overview could be useful at WP:ALBUM#Categories as well. --PEJL 21:16, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Here is how it currently works to my understanding:

Category:Albums by artist - This is where all albums "by artist" go, ie. Category:Wayne Shorter albums, Category:Master P albums, et cetera. Irregardless of genre.

Category:Jazz albums - This category is merely an example. It could be any genre followed by "albums". These categories currently house albums that have been categorized as "jazz albums". These categories also currently house Category:John Coltrane albums, as an example. It also can house other categories like Category:Jazz albums by record label for labels that specialize in that genre only, and also Category:Jazz albums by nationality (which I find redundant, actually).

Proposal Categories such as Category:Jazz albums by artist would also appear on the corresponding head category, in this case Category:Jazz albums and always Category:Albums by artist as well. My argument is that Category:John Coltrane albums does not belong in Category:Jazz albums as it is currently structured. This can be said for any category. By definition such albums are by artist, and either belong in Category:Albums by artist or (example) a more specific category like Category:Jazz albums by artist. This effectively separates "jazz albums" from "jazz albums by artist" in the mother category Category:Jazz albums, and creates easier navigation. See Category:Rock albums to see the disorder. There are albums by artist randomly tossed there. There are mere album titles tossed in the mix, also. There are rock albums by record label there in some instances. There are rock albums by nationality interspersed throughout. All I am proposing is that we organize them as has been done at Category:Jazz albums, ie. the subcats containing "genre+albums+by artist", "genre+albums+by genre" (for subgenres), "genre+albums+by record label", and "genre+albums+by nationality". This condenses all of the random subcategories displayed in categories like Category:Rock albums and is less intimidating for the reader. It is simply good housekeeping. (Mind meal 01:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC))

Yes, a chart of some kind would help.

Also, in any case, this looks to be a massive, and quite elaborate, undertaking. If only partially implemented, it would leave a mess (or at least I see that as an undesirable situation). Do you have ideas as to how it would be implemented across the entire range of artists and albums? –Unint 22:15, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

• It really would not be that difficult, provided a few people start using Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser to do such work. I was able to effectively organize all albums like Category:Miles Davis albums under Category:Jazz albums by artist in about 30 minutes. I also provided a {{catmore2|}} template in each listing with a DEFAULTSORT, providing readers a link to the artist's article as well as alphabetically organizing them. It isn't very tough, because these albums by artist already are housed under categories like Category:Hip hop albums or Category:Pop albums; all this entails is a simple matter of recategorizing these artist albums in the "genre+albums+by artist" scheme I am proposing. It will make for less clutter. Ask yourself this simple question: Is Category:Jazz albums currently more user friendly than a category like Category:Rock albums, or not? When you navigate to them both, which has taken the time to properly organize albums in specific ways?(Mind meal 01:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC))

Well I would agree that Category:Jazz albums is currently more user friendly than Category:Rock albums, but that has mostly to do with the fact that there are simply more rock albums that there are jazz albums (on WP anyway). Actually, if my understanding of the current categorization system is correct and if it were done correctly, I don't believe we would have the problem that you are trying to resolve. As I see it, Category:Jazz albums is similar to the proposed change whereas Category:Rock albums is the current way. If thats true then Category:Jazz albums should only have four items in it:

• Jazz albums by artist
• Jazz albums by genre
• Jazz albums by record label
• Jazz albums by nationality
• (and possibly) List of Jazz albums
  

The logic is that there are no Jazz albums that don't fit into one or more of those subcats or subcat belonging in one of those such as Charlie Parker albums or Axiom Records albums. Making Rock albums, for example, subdivide would straighten things up slightly. Mostly due to the fact that genre subcats and artist subcats would no longer reside together. This would decrease the log by 21 items. In either case none of the pages you see listed in this cat belong here. Most are housed here b/c no proper subcat exists, such as Category:Babacar albums. This, in my understanding is miscategorization. Soooo, correctly categorizing Rock albums would decrease the long by 111 items without the proposed change.
Thus, I am of the opinion that both correctly categorizing and the proposal would help (this would make Category:Rock albums have only four/five items and the each subcategory would have only part of what is in this category now) and if, as you say, "It really would not be that difficult" then I don't see why not - as long as both things are done. I also may be misunderstanding one or both ways so correct me if I am. (Sampm 02:56, 10 July 2007 (UTC))

• "In either case none of the pages you see listed in this cat belong here. Most are housed here b/c no proper subcat exists, such as Category:Babacar albums."

That there is one of the obstacles I am facing. The only logical place to put jazz albums by record label, by nationality, by genre, and by artist is on the jazz albums page. My vision is seeing something like I did with Category:Bebop musicians. Every single musician can be snugged into a subgenre, often multiple ones. Every album belong in specific subgenres. As we both know, the term "rock" is rather generic. It only serves to loosely define a starting point "medium" in which an artist or group performs in. Nobody actually plays simple "rock". What I have been doing is using All Music Guide as a reference on categorizing musicians, albums, et cetera. This has proven much more accurate than any other method I've tried. When a subgenre does not exist as a category here, I'll begin it when I encounter an artist that falls into it. You said that "Well I would agree that Category:Jazz albums is currently more user friendly than Category:Rock albums, but that has mostly to do with the fact that there are simply more rock albums that there are jazz albums (on WP anyway)." I think that in addition to that point, one can see that the entire top half of subcategories would be condensed into 4 simple subcategories. (Mind meal 04:29, 10 July 2007 (UTC))

Past discussions have suggested duplicating All Music Guide genres and subgenres here, but it was suggested that we should not adhere so strictly to such a resource. Some of their categorization is also hotly contested. –Unint 13:39, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

• I emptied Category:Jazz albums by artist just now, as it was clear people at categories for discussion "weren't having that". Apparently it was useful but...did not fit into the mind of obsessive compulsives. Something like that. (Mind meal 10:01, 10 July 2007 (UTC))

Unofficial cover art

An editor recently added unofficial fan-made cover art to Destroyer (Ryan Adams album). Before I remove it, could someone please confirm that this isn't something that should be kept? Adam McMaster 22:17, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

It should definitely not be kept in a way that implies it is not unofficial, such as it currently does. It should probably not be included otherwise either, unless it is notable by itself. (Note to self: Handle cover at From the Sounds Inside per outcome of this topic.) --PEJL 22:24, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Of course the entire matter could be handled by removing the article itself. -Acjelen 22:26, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Who owns the copyright for photograph used in the cover? That seems like one question that could be used to resolve this. (Meanwhile, The Black Room is another article that would be affected.) –Unint 02:32, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Sure, there may be copyright issues with such images, and it may be that such articles aren't notable enough to exist in some cases. But that doesn't answer the general question of whether unofficial covers should ever be included. Unless anyone can come up with an example of when such an image would be notable enough to be included, let's just decide to only use official cover art. I propose we add the following sentence at the beginning of the section WP:ALBUM#Album cover:

An image of the official front cover of the original version of the album should be included at Cover.

Besides saying that only official artwork should be used, this also says that the image should be of the front cover (obviously), and that it should be of the original version of the album. Some album articles don't currently adhere to the last point, and instead have the cover of a (possibly more extensive) re-release at the top of the infobox, with the original cover in an "Alternate cover" section. I feel that having the original cover at the top of the infobox is more appropriate, for consistency with the guidelines for "Released" and "Label", which say that these should refer to the information about the original version of the album. Any objections to adding this? --PEJL 16:35, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

When the original cover can be located, certainly. Sometimes the only image out there is of a reissue though. I agree fan art should never be included. (Mind meal 17:08, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

Sure, it may be that finding the original cover art is difficult in some cases. We should still encourage editors to attempt to do so, shouldn't we? I intentionally left undefined what would happen if the original cover art could not be found (both for albums with reissue cover art and for albums without it), to keep the text simple. Are you saying the proposed wording needs altering? --PEJL 18:10, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah I think something should be said along the lines of "When the original album cover is unable to be located, then the cover of a recent reissue of the said album may be acceptable as an alternative. This is especially true for reissues that share a strong resemblence to the original. When using a reissue cover, please note that in the article body." (Mind meal 18:38, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

I guess we could say something along those lines. I see no reason to limit this to recent reissues (as opposed to all reissues) or only covers with a strong resemblance. Mentioning which cover the image refers to is probably more appropriate in the image caption than the the article body, for consistency with "Alternate cover" sections, and would be just as useful for all covers from albums which have multiple covers (regardless of whether the topmost cover is the original cover or a reissue cover, and regardless of whether only one cover is shown in the infobox or not). So how about:

An image of the official front cover of the original version of the album (or a reissue, if no original cover can be found) should be included at Cover.

and a new sentence about image captions:

If the album has been issued with different front covers, which version the image refers to should be noted at Caption.

In my experience the latter is rarely done, but I guess we could start recommending it. Any objections to this? --PEJL 22:41, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's rare (never done it myself to be honest) but I think it's a reasonable recommendation - no objections from me. Cheers, Ian Rose 23:03, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 12:21, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

So, Adam, did you get an answer to your question? The infobox is only for official covers. If there is unofficial artwork that widespread enough to be included in the article, it should noted as such, but still not be in the infobox. -Freekee 03:10, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Yup, that clears it up. Thanks. Adam McMaster 16:33, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Category:Albums by artist

Proposal - Break down this category by genres, ie. Category:Rock albums by artist.

Vote options:

Support indicates you support this proposal.

Oppose indicates you do not support this proposal.

It is my belief that this category is absurdly large. I wonder why other categories this large become broken down, but this one remains so humongous? I would like to begin taking votes on whether we should begin breaking down albums by artist into specific genres (not subgenres). This currently is not permitted for some reason. Artists could still be placed in Category:Albums by artist, depending on consensus. I will go first with my own vote:

• Support so that artist albums do not hog entire categories devoted to say, Category:Rock albums. Instead, condense them into a dropdown category that is visible at Category:Rock albums. If an artist strays from a genre, please see Category:Paul McCartney classical albums on how to circumvent this conflict. (Mind meal 09:43, 11 July 2007 (UTC))
• Oppose. This is one obsessive-compulsive against such a change. I don't want a judgment call mandated on albums by artist, which is a great umbrella category. If an album category fits into jazz, the category can go into Category:Jazz albums.--Mike Selinker 15:40, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment But Mike, isn't that making the exact same judgment call you oppose? (Mind meal 20:11, 11 July 2007 (UTC))
    • There's a difference between "can" and "must" here. If Albums by artist is subdivided, everyone must have a genre. But if an artist clearly belongs in one genre category, they can go in that category.--Mike Selinker 16:03, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose A directory category is useful, since some artists routinely cross genres, and some genre's aren't obvious ... i.e. death metal vs. doom metal vs black metal. -- Prove It ^(talk) 14:43, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me that saying "some genre's aren't obvious ... i.e. death metal vs. doom metal vs black metal" is in itself a judgment call. The fact is those subgenres exist, and for a reason. For an encyclopedia, we sure seem to keep aiming for mediocrity when it comes to albums. And Mike, most artists perform in various subgenres, and sometimes various genres. I think subgenres should be included in our categorization hierarchy...absolutely. Have some faith in editors, everyone seems to assume that categorizing musicians correctly is not something Wikipedia can accomplish. I guess we'll never know if we are never to try. (Mind meal 16:25, 16 July 2007 (UTC))

Quick question about recent edit summary

Wondering if anyone can field this... Is this edit summary valid. "Live albums are listed by the year they were recorded, only studio albums are listed by the year they were released"??? Seems odd... I would have expected that by clicking "next album" I would get the next album recorded by the artist... Not a live performance recorded in one decade and released 4 decades later? Just hoping someone here could direct me to where that guideline is... thanks. 156.34.142.110 16:40, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

That is incorrect. Albums should be listed by the year of release, per WP:ALBUM#Chronology. --PEJL 21:59, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

I thought as much. The user who made the edit, Rock Soldier, also edits as an IP and under another "Alterego" username. He is a very hard working editor who has contributed a lot. But tends to make up his own rules as he goes along and doesn't seem to have a hard grasp on many of Wiki's music related project guidelines. Perhaps someone could have a chat with him and give him some links back here to show exactly what rules should be adhered to. Have a nice day. 156.34.142.110 14:32, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Yet another proposal

Proposal to include artist names in all album titles

*I continously am trying to find a way for album categories to more easily be navigated, and think I've found a simple solution. I propose we MOVE any album that is title only, and make them look like this:Second Genesis (Wayne Shorter album). This way when people browse albums by genre, they will know who made the album prior to clicking on it. Incidentally, Second genesis is named that way because it shares the name of a book also. I believe if this becomes common practice, albums by genre will be user friendly. (Mind meal 14:49, 12 July 2007 (UTC))
WP:ALBUMS#Categories poses this editor with an impossible quandary. Take the example given of Category:Slayer albums being categorized under Category:Thrash metal albums. This guideline assumes by implication that all Slayer albums are considered thrash metal, which in the case of this band is accurate. However, what if Slayer were to perform a hip hop album? Would we then place Category:Slayer albums under Category:Hip hop albums, also? And if so, isn't that misleading users into believing that all Slayer albums are hip hop albums? Can we still categorize all of their albums under thrash metal anymore, either? My answer is no, but perhaps others feel miscategorization and ambiguitiy is what one should expect from an encyclopedia.

I have been told that the solution to this is creating Category:Slayer hip hop albums in such an instance. In the case of an artist that does not yet have an albums category, this suggestion is too complex for the average user. It isn't even easy for an artist who does have an albums category. Just to correctly categorize one album with this method requires four to five steps of categorization, and this is assuming a Category:Slayer albums exists to begin with. Most users do not know this, for it defies common sense, but WP:ALBUMS#Categories does not allow an individual album to be categorized by genre. It permits only artist album categories. Again, this implies that all albums by an artist fall into just one genre. It also makes it next to impossible for editors to create subgenre categories.

If we moved all album titles to include artist names, ie. Second Genesis (Wayne Shorter album), this would allow editors to circumvent the endless steps of categorization currently forced upon us in order to even TRY to accurately categorize albums by genre. To see the problem this style of categorization presents an editor with, please see New Thing at Newport. This album falls into 3 subgenres and is led by two artists, so it required 6 new categories to be made. This seems crazy to me, and was crazy to implement. This must be done over and over for every new artist, if subgenres are to be included. Furthermore, Category:Slayer albums is a poor example. It selectively uses the example of an artist that performs in just one genre. I believe the introduction did not use an artist who performs in multiple genres precisely because they knew such a categorization scheme could not work. I propose the project go back to the drawing board and find a reasonable solution to this problem. (Mind meal 02:33, 14 July 2007 (UTC))

You do realize that everything you are proposing will require either recatigorizing or MOVING thousands of articles, right? -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 15:37, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

• • The current categorization scheme may not be perfect but I think that massive pre-emptive disambiguation is a bad idea. Jogers (talk) 16:22, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

• • Mind meal, the current scheme for categorization as spelled out on this project page is for album articles to be categorized by musician/musical group and by year, but not by genre. Category:Hard bop albums should have few or no album articles. That way a browser will know who recorded an album as the album will be in that musician's or musical group's category. For example, Brazilia (album) should be in Category:John Coltrane albums (or Category:John Coltrane hard bop albums), not by itself in Category:Hard bop albums. This system works for the majority of albums. I admit that it has draw backs for musicians who record albums in a variety of genres and for over-analyzed genres, like jazz. -Acjelen 17:26, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

• • • • No one might play jazz, but plenty of people hear it, know what it is without having to ask, and categorize it as "jazz", just as people do for "country" or "classical". If an album contains songs of more than two subgenres of jazz, then the album is jazz broadly. -Acjelen 20:02, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

It's not a point of whether you as a jazz fan knows the difference between bebop and hardbop, etc. A normal person who hears a "jazz" song is going to look for "jazz". Country is the same way. Classical is the same way. Why dont' you want to make it romance era, classical, baroque, etc? Because there's no need. Looking at the encyclopedia articles, i cannot tell the difference between hard bop and bebop. ANd I can tel lyou the difference between screamo, hardcore, post hardcore, and death metal even though most peopel cant' tell the difference either. If it's easier to fingure out the difference between those 4 then jazz, why bother? Most people won't, and don't. I see no problem. -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 20:20, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm worry, I don't really know what to say to it then. Are you proposing this for all albums or just jazz? Idoupt anybody will agree to pre-emptively disambiguating thousand of articles for no reason. If you're only trying to do this for Jazz, I guess I don't see why not. I still don't see a problem, but if you insist there is, then go for it. I won't lie, I have 1 Kenny G album on iTunes, I know nothing about Jazz. -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 20:53, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Regardless of musical subgenres (which are not the original topic of this section IMHO), I would also consider it very useful if album articles would use a naming scheme of "Album Title (Artist album)". That way you have the artist information easily at first sight when finding an album article in a category. BNutzer 21:05, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

And moving articles could indeed happen over time in my view - by editors who consider it useful ... BNutzer 21:16, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I know I'd start the second there is a green light. (Mind meal 21:19, 12 July 2007 (UTC))

Article naming and categorization are separate issues and should stay that way. If there is no naming conflict the article should have the most straightforward title as per WP:Disambiguation. I'm afraid that I'm unable to provide any alternative to resolve the problem, though. Jogers (talk) 21:52, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

(Hopefully I won't get the edit conflict this time) For example it would make album articles harder to search for unless a redirect was created for each page and harder to link from other articles. It would be better to find a solution independent of article naming. Jogers (talk) 22:25, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Please don't do this. The move being proposed is contrary to much Wikipedia precedent regarding disambiguation — the article title is simply not a good place for categorical information.

It is exceptionalism to presume jazz albums present a unique problem which can only be fixed by presumptive disambiguation — this is certainly not the case. Many different (and conflicting) naming schemes can be proposed to satisfy various specialized "database query" interests. Problems this poses:

• Only one scheme can be applied per any set of articles, so only one interest can be addressed.
• It complicates article naming.

It is also contrary to official policy:

• Do not use an article name that suggests a hierarchy of articles.
• Naming conventions: Album titles and band names

Please turn back. A less disruptive solution is needed to address the abovementioned categorization concerns.

Good places to inquire about categorization display functionality would include Wikipedia talk:Categorization and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Categories. / edgarde 00:53, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Using categories such as Category:John Coltrane hard bop albums (Artist+Style+"albums") is a more sensible (and much less disruptive) approach to the problem you want to fix. Eventually, some artist categories would contain only subcategories. / edgarde 01:34, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

• • Nobody said you are crazy. Please stay cool and assume good faith. Jogers (talk) 15:30, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

• • • I think your last point hit on the crux of the whole problem. It is as I have said before - the problem is not (necessarily) that the categorization is messed up, but that the current categorization is misused. If we create new cats then logically (and unfortunately) they will be misued as well. If the time we are spending discussing here we instead spent re-cat-ing those miscat-ed albums much of the prob would be solved. (Sampm 15:44, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

• WP:ALBUMS opener:

"WikiProject Albums is an organization of Wikipedians dedicated to improving Wikipedia's coverage of all kinds of musical albums. We seek ways of simplifying album pages so users can get the basic information fast, creating high-quality new pages, ensuring a standardized format and make articles as informative as possible." That is rich. (Mind meal 16:28, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

• I have made a post at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation, Wikipedia talk:Categorization, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Categories and at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Jazz to broaden the scope of this discussion. (Mind meal 18:57, 13 July 2007 (UTC))

At the moment I'm thinking a discographical list (whether part of an article, or a stand-alone list) is a better and easier way to both maintain and find this kind of information. Additionally, a list can include albums that don't have articles, something a category can't do. As far as jazz goes, there are many, many, many more jazz records than there are Wikipedia articles about jazz records. I suspect this holds true on other musical genres. My $0.02. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 19:14, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I completely disagree with this proposal. We're not supposed to pre-emptively disambiguate albums unless there's duplication in the album title (Supernatural for instance). Another reason is that we're supposed to make things easier on non-wikpedians to navigate and this would mean that many pages would be harder to find meaning it's a less useful resource. Less useful = less used. --linca^linca 02:51, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

It would be helpful for posters to offer up solutions to this problem when they state this is not adequete, otherwise the problem only goes unaddressed. Also, the idea that people will not find albums anymore if implemented is a false one. Please search "The Avant-garde". The first search item to come up is The Avant-Garde (album), which is a disambiguation. The only alternative to this that I see is finding a way to make an artist name appear along with the album title in categories through coding. (Mind meal 02:56, 14 July 2007 (UTC))

Note that removing your own comments after others have responded to them and repeatedly editing your own comments is considered inappropriate. See WP:TALK#Own comments. One of the reasons I haven't gotten involved in this discussion is because I find it difficult to respond to a moving target. --PEJL 14:54, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

No worries. I'm finished with this issue. It has been brought to the project's attention. If they choose to take no action, so be it. Everything is inappropriate on here. (Mind meal 17:06, 14 July 2007 (UTC))

Heads up - Crowded House

Hey guys, just set up a new WikiProject. Check it out if you're interested.

Hi! I've seen you editing Crowded House related articles, and would like to invite you to join WikiProject Crowded House, an effort by Wikipedians to improve the band's coverage on the encyclopedia. Please consider signing up here.

--linca^linca 07:30, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

You probably shouldn't use the non-free logo outside the article namespace as per criterion 9 of non-free content policy. Jogers (talk) 09:55, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Although that's true, they're just guidelines and it does fall under fair use, legally speaking, as centrally, there's no free analogue present that would adequetly substitute the image. I'm working on one, but it's not ready yet. --linca^linca 10:04, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Just letting you know in case you didn't know. There are certain editors who adhere to the policy very strictly and they have merciless bots :-) Jogers (talk) 10:15, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Relevance of "leaked dates"

I was wondering about the actual relevance of leaked dates, that is the information about an album (or any other media) being leaked onto the internet. I have removed information like this because I personally don't think it has anything useful in it, other than informating people that they can download the copy illegaly instead of buying it. But, it has happened that people keep adding the information back in (both IP's and by regular users), so what is right and what is wrong? Need an answer I can refer to in future edits. As an example, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Apostasy&oldid=144506363 (Third piece: "The entire album was leaked on May 31, 2007."). Grinder0-0 09:02, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Plus, it's just maths. Album release date = x. x - 9 days = leak date. Basic stuff. (yes, I'm being cynical, but realistic). --linca^linca 10:17, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

What are you trying to say? The unmixed version of The Apostasy was leaked a month ago, and it often occurs albums being leaked 3-4 weeks or more before the scheduled release date, so what you want with your "rule" (which is a bit of totally changing the subject here), I don't know. Please leave this and continue with an answer to my original reply, thank you. Grinder0-0 11:05, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

We've actually had this discussion before. Three times. Here, here, and here. I think general consensus was not to include them. Maybe it's time to add something to that effect to the guidelines. --Fritz S. (Talk) 10:58, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, and I agree, there should be guidelines about this. Grinder0-0 11:05, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

I think maybe to alleviate this, it should simply be addressed in Music download indicating that early leaks are a very common occurence, rather than have it indicated on every page that it has happened with. If it's a truly divisible issue where some albums have it and some don't, we could categorise? ...On second thought, no. No categorising for that. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lincalinca (talk • contribs).

Y Done. I added text about leak dates usually not being notable to WP:ALBUM#Dating. --PEJL 11:02, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I hope you don't mind, but i just added to what you wrote. It just seemed ambiguous enough to suggest many possibilities. I've hopefully ruled out most of them by being somewhat specific (as there's only 4 occasions I can think of this happening: Minutes to Midnight, Results May Vary, Stadium Arcadium and Steal This Album). I know that responding isn't limited to four times ever, but the response given by each of these cases warrants its notation, but not, say, Korn's Untitled Eighth Studio Album. --linca^linca 12:12, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

And I hope you don't mind that I tweaked that a bit further. :-) --PEJL 13:13, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Disputed album covers

Would anybody be interested in helping to clear the list of disputed album covers? (created from intersection of Category:All disputed non-free images and Category:Album covers) Most of these images just need the fair use rationale. It's may be a bit late but we could still save some of these images from inevitable deletion. I suggest we make this task our current collaboration because anything else can be done later but this list will start to turn red soon... Jogers (talk) 13:33, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Some of these images are quite large. Does anybody familiar with discussions related to fair-use know what is the consensus on the term "low resolution"? Jogers (talk) 13:53, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Since in general the only allowed use for a fair-use album cover image would be in the infobox in the album article, the safe move would be to make it exactly the 200px the infobox uses and no more. --J Clear 17:56, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Just spotted an archived discussion here about 300x300.... --J Clear 18:01, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

200px is a clear-cut. According to this note everything up to 300px should generally be acceptable too. Jogers (talk) 18:03, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

I suggested explanations might be advisable for anything over 300x300 back here -- and promptly got dragged over the coals for it. So today at WT:FAIR#Low resolution I emphasised the possibilities for flexibility -- only to get it in the neck again, for not being prescriptive (or should that be proscriptive?!) enough. I think I should keep quiet now!  :-) Jheald 18:11, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

(ec) I have been working on the J's, using Template:album cover fur -- mostly for images used in Infoboxes. (The template produces a more specific rationale for that case). Images just used in discographies I have (sadly) been leaving to meet their fate. I have got about 45 more J's to look at, then I might do some book covers for a bit. Jheald 13:56, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

The {{Album cover fur}} template looks great. I'm going to use it from now on. Jogers (talk) 14:05, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Could you also produce a union list for images in subcats of Category:Images with no fair use rationale? Sadly, it seems we're too late to save anything tagged before 27 June. Jheald 14:03, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Sure. Just give me few minutes. I didn't notice this category. Jogers (talk) 14:07, 14 July 2007 (UTC

I wish I have thought of these lists before. Jogers (talk) 14:08, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Here it is. I created the separate page because the List6 was already quite large. Jogers (talk) 14:20, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

This should be the Project's top priority now. Tens of perfectly valid images are vanishing every day. Jogers (talk) 11:00, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Is it worth trying to sort the lists by timestamp on the image dispute (if possible)?--Fisherjs 12:00, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

That makes a lot of sense. Jogers (talk) 12:12, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

real album cover

the one that is currently on the lead sails paper anchor page is incorrect. the real cover has a picture of a boat sinking in a black sea with part of a skeleton in the water with a red sky. i dont know how to upload it to this page but if any1 does the picture is at www.atreyurock.com

Go to Special:Upload. It's kinda tough to work through, the first time, but just make sure you write a fair use rationale. Try {{album cover fur}}. -Freekee 03:45, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Star rating template broken

We need to do something about {{Rating}}, which seems to render bogus results. See first, fourth and fifth example, which are all have half a star too high. --PEJL 01:21, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Crazy. I know esoteric and complex functions, but don't know how to debug these kinds of things, because the scripts appear to be written correctly. --linca^linca 05:17, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

This just started happening a few days ago. I noticed it too, and wasn't sure if I was entering information wrong at first. I never noticed this before just recently. Do we know who created this template? (Mind meal 16:32, 16 July 2007 (UTC))

Y Fixed it. --PEJL 17:09, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Psh. Nice one Eliyak. Nice of you to break it. Gosh!. Haha. Just messing. --linca^linca 12:57, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Track listing numbering

I recently created Timeless: Live in Concert on which the tracks are further subdivided on each disc. I can't figure a way for the numbering to carry over through the subdivisions so that they are correct. Could someone help me on this. Thanks in advance. (Sampm 10:06, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

You can use #<li value=X>

3. like this

but I should point out that using sub-headings for such purposes is quite non-standard. See also WP:ALBUM#Track listing. --PEJL 10:30, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the help. I agree that this action is non-standard, but it is also non-standard for the record company (I have seen no others that are that way, though I'm sure they exist) so that I am of the opinion the article would benefit from showing this published division. It seems to me that the other option would be to describe it in the text, which would be less clear than the current way - don't you think? I am in hopes that this article is close to B and could soon be pushed even higher so any further edits or suggestions for edits would also be appreciated. (Sampm 11:23, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

Yes, it might be acceptable in this case. I made some formatting adjustments per WP:MOSHEAD, WP:MOSDATE, WP:ALBUM#Details, WP:ALBUM#Track listing and WP:ALBUM#Personnel --PEJL 12:03, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

A ha! So that's how it's done. Thanks PEJL. -Freekee 03:38, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Artist+genre+album

After all the discussions above on how one can accomplish categorizing albums correctly by subgenre, now User:Mike Selinker has taken it upon himself to make this route impossible, ie. Category:John Coltrane free jazz albums; see his proposal for merger into Category:Jazz albums at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_July_17#Jazz_albums. Now even THAT cannot be ageed upon. What gives? (Mind meal 16:21, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

The root problem here appears to be that Mind meal insists that Each album page is then placed into two categories, "Category:<Artist name> albums" and "Category:<year> albums", which are then placed as sub-categories into the respective top-level category.

means both

1. Every album should appear in an artist category and a year category
2. and that no album should appear directly in any other category of that level.

I see no sign in the previous discussion that any one else believes that the present text means #2; and if we do want to so rule, we should do not as explicitly as possible, since this is not the way categories usually work.

The other road to go is to permit albums to go in genre cats, subcats of Category:albums by genre exactly as they go into year and artist cats.

Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:57, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• I insisted it? WHAT? That is the guideline! My goodness. Screw this project! Everyone above understands that albums are categorized by artist and year, and that placing them directly into a genre is not allowed. I didn't make this crap up. And even if we did categorize albums directly by genre, that istelf poses a problem. then they are just random albums without any context. Just the album title, no artist info or anything. (Mind meal 19:02, 17 July 2007 (UTC))
  • If it is consensus, the project page should say it, beyond any reasonable doubt. It doesn't.
  • The nature of categories is to classify things without context. Classification with context requires a list.
  • Guidelines can be changed. If it's crap, stop fighting for it, and make the argument to change it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:11, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

My proposed text follows. I intended to cover the difficulties involved in:

• Not all albums have a consensus genre (in which case, no genre cat should be added.
• Many artists write only in one genre (the artist cat can then be a subcat of the genre cat)
• Some albums fall into several genres (include in all the genre cats)

Category:Slayer albums is a sub-category of Category:Thrash metal albums because all their albums belong to that genre. If an artist's work is divided between different genres, each album should be in the appropriate subcategories of Category:Albums by genre. Like all categories, genre categories must be supported in the article; and since genre is a matter of opinion, there should be consensus among the sources before placing the album in a genre category. (If an album contains songs belonging to different genres, it should be categorised in all of the genres. This is what categories are for.)

Comments? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:08, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• Do you even understand music? ALL albums fall into genres, ALL. Please, leave jazz up to people who know jazz. All Music Guide has long been established as an acceptable source, and that has been my reference. If users think All Music Guide is unreliable and not a reliable reference, they should say so. Every single albums known to man fits into a genre. Every one of them. But I'm again talking to people who don't get it. YOU just do not get this problem, as many others do not. Don't take that as an insult, you just don't understand all of this. So why pretend? (Mind meal 19:13, 17 July 2007 (UTC))
  • WP:CIVIL, please. If it turns out that no album has a disputable genre, so much the better. But the arguments on the subject, here and elsewhere, do not leave me as optimistic as Mind meal. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:17, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
• Yeah, maybe you could try that out also per our side conversations. I don't care what you feel about me, isn't that obvious to you? I have been working on a fix for this problem for weeks now, with no result. Why don't YOU try to understand why someone like me would be angry with someone like you? (Mind meal 19:19, 17 July 2007 (UTC))
  • Perhaps if you were more civil, you would have gotten further. Is it time for a wikibreak? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:24, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

And, for a substantive question, can a source which only began in 1991 be regarded as long-established as anything? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:24, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• 16 years isn't long-established to you? It is for me. Yahoo, MSN, ArtistDirect all use their information. It is an industry standard. Do you know of a better source? Time for a wikibreak? You will enjoy no such luck in that department my friend. For weeks now I've been trying to find a way to do all of this. I created 42 jazz subgenres for albums, all about to be destroyed. Not because albums don't fall into those genres, but because everyone says they "might not fall into those subgenres"; or that somehow categorizing albums correctly is overcategorization (lmao). If you can find such a miscategorized album, then you are on to something. Have you found such a miscategorization, or are you another who assumes users are stupid and can't categorize things right? (Mind meal 19:37, 17 July 2007 (UTC))
  • 16 years, long-established, for jazz? Certainly not. It's been four times that long since the Golden Age. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:41, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
• You don't even know jack about jazz, so why are you lecturing me about the accuracy? Amazon.com, Yahoo, AOL, Itunes...they all use All Music Guide for their information. Like I said, it is a STANDARD. We seem to be entering into an "oppositional disorder" stage, where anything I say you must disagree with. (Mind meal 19:44, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

I, for one, have found AMG's categorization to be less-than-useful, at times (e.g. not placing Mingus in hard bop - are other sources wrong because they do?). In this editor's opinion, it would lead to innacuracy and over-categorization, were we to rely on (or model ourselves after) AMG. If Amazon, Yahoo, etc. choose to rely on AMG (for categorization) then that's disappointing. Coming back to the topic at hand, having seen no policy nor guideline (at least not a clear one), I believe we should place album articles in "Albums by genre" categories. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 19:51, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• To prove that All Music Guide miscategorizes people, one obviously must provide examples. The absence of placement is a far cry from miscategorization. You'll never find a source that is infallible, which seems to be the standard for users here. Nobody is omnipotent, thus no source will ever be "perfect". Also, how then do we allow users to understand who made an album in such categories by genre? Do we have a solution for that? Or are users to just find a category filled with 1000's of albums without any context? If you think that having tons of albums appear in categories without artist info along with them is the best bet, so be it. Yet another conversation that ultimately will go nowhere. (Mind meal 19:57, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

Okay, okay.

If the problem is that albums in genre categories continue to lack context as to who recorded them, then that's a problem that persists across Wikipedia. Many large categories remain impossible to navigate, and the only solution has been to diffuse into smaller subcategories—and here the only possible subcategories that can be created for that purpose are considered overcategorization because they are too small.

Your other suggestion, a massive page-renaming project, is blocked by the "don't reflexively disambiguate" policy.

So your obstacle is that, as of now, people seem happy to let categories stand without that level of context. I don't think this can be solved short of a complete rethinking of the concept of categorization, and it would take a considerable show of demand to get people to budge about that. –Unint 20:35, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• You know, if others worded their response as you just did, at least I would know they comprehend the issue. Thanks. (Mind meal 20:45, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

• At least some of the cwtegories would not be enormously large: if all the cross-cats were taken out, Category:Free jazz albums would have less than 20 members, and Coltrane's would show up as two entries, instead of three subcats. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:54, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

• Subgenres of jazz are important to me. There could not be a clearer example of difference as can be heard in the styles of free jazz and dixieland. Anyone who listens to both back-to-back will readily see this. I'm disappointed that others at WP:ALBUMS do not wish to include subgenres, which is what all of these conversations point to. Ironically, Category:Thrash metal albums is ultimately a subgenre of rock. I'm very disappointed that we have been unable to reach a solution to this problem still. I still think that if there is a way to format our categorization on an album page by genre that will allow the artist name to appear with it in HTML, we should do that. Does anyone know of such a thing? This is a rather confusing discussion all-around, and most users just don't know where the problem even lies. They believe I am crying wolf. (Mind meal 21:10, 17 July 2007 (UTC))

Is there a specific prohibition (WP:ALBUM or otherwise) against Category:Avant-garde jazz albums? (Apparently not, because it's a blue link.) Assuming, as others have suspected, that there is no policy (or even a clear guideline) against dropping an album directly in that category, then this would help with the issue of sub-genres (though again, a particular album might end up in a high number of such categories). If it isn't already obvious then let me state that the level of (sub)categorization, at some point, will have more to do with individual preference. For instance, I'm completely satisfied placing Talking Heads, Tim Berne, Arthur Blythe, Can, and Dennis Gonzalez CDs in the same category, "Category:Albums in Gyrofrog's car", a subcategory of "Category:Good music". (This is a joke but I hope it illustrates the subjectivity that is ultimately involved with categorization.) FWIW, users with pop-ups installed could move the mouse cursor over Demon's Dance (if it existed) and see the first sentence, "Demon's Dance is an album by Jackie McLean." -- Gyrofrog (talk) 23:25, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

If you reference genres, how exactly is that subjective? All Music Guide is an acceptable reference, and until you can change that fact it is acceptable. Also, I don't care if we place albums directly into genres. I'd be for that. But until now, that wasn't the way we did things. The language of the current guideline states that we categorize album pages by artist albums and year, and that artist albums are then categorized by genre. I didn't just make this up, and I suspect they wanted artist albums in genre categories because of the problem I am highlighting (to give readers context). So per the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2007_July_17#Jazz_albums and the current guideline, categories like Category:Avant-garde jazz albums cannot exist because nothing can populate them. And if I have to explain to one more person why that is, I'll pull my hair out. Blue links? Every category or article that has ever faced deletion has once been a "blue link". What is your point? And good for pop-ups users, a minority of users at Wikipedia. I'm glad they can get the correct information others are not privy to. And that isn't even taking into account whether or not the first sentence will even include artist information! (Mind meal 00:15, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

• • All Music Guide is a reliable source; it is not the only reliable source. If, as may happen, there is consensus for something it doesn't say, we should not follow it; but in general we will. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:51, 18 July 2007 (UTC

P.S. This goes back to Unint's earlier comment: Compare Category:Mystery novels, one wonders if anyone has broached the subject on WP:BOOKS and if/how they dealt with it. (Note: I am not advocating making a WP:POINT.) -- Gyrofrog (talk) 23:34, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

It has series subcats and nationality subcats, and about 600 individual entries. It should clearly have more; but with enough series subcats (which would be artist cats here) it would be quite workable. I see no problem with having an artist a subcat of a genre when he works only in one genre. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:32, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

P.S. I like cake. (Note: I am not saying I like cake.) (Mind meal 00:44, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

There's no need to be rude about it. Chill out man. -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 01:08, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

)

I'll use an example that I mentioned in an earlier CfD. How would you categorize music by Kenny G, Glenn Miller, and Frank Sinatra? You responded with various sub-genres, and that is one answer, I'm not denying that. But there are others who would not consider the music of these three musicians to be jazz at all. That was my point (I should have been more clear). This is what I mean about the categorization being subjective. If there are disagreements over jazz content then I can see more specific subcategorization leading to edit disputes (and tiresome to navigate). I also have to say that I would not look forward to devising "Cat:Alice Coltrane Indian classical avant-garde jazz albums", "Cat:Alice Coltrane Egyptian mythology jazz organ trio albums" etc. so I could place Universal Consciousness in them. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 02:14, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

• Who are these other people that may protest? Who cares if something might lead to an edit dispute? You can't stop that kind of thing, it is the nature of editing in general. It just all comes down to sourcing information. If someone can prove that Kenny G is not a smooth jazz musician, then I'm all for that. But if it isn't sourced, and someone just feels like the categorization is wrong, then they have a bogus argument. Your closing argument is so weak I can't even address it, as they aren't even genres (just sarcasm). Where are these "disagreements" you keep hypothesizing about? Where is the beef? (Mind meal 04:28, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

I hope that my sarcasm did not obscure the point I was trying to make. I am compelled to point out the irony of your criticizing another editor for employing sarcasm. Having said that I'll try and avoid its use in the future. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 13:59, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Contradiction?

I note that Mind meal believes that the proposed edit is in direct contradiction with the opening of this category section, ie. "Each album page is then placed into two categories, "Category:<Artist name> albums" and "Category:<year> albums", which are then placed as sub-categories into the respective top-level category."

I do not understand this. To say that an album must be in Category X and Category Y does not prevent it from being in Category Z. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:03, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Also, does anyone else see the contradiction? If so, can they explain it? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:08, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Where does it say in the guidelines that we place "album pages" into categories by genre? Maybe I'm seeing things, but the guideline currently states that "Each album page is then placed into two categories, "Category:<Artist name> albums" and "Category:<year> albums", which are then placed as sub-categories into the respective top-level category." Please note the words each album. Please note the words "two categories". Please also note "which are then placed into the respective top-level category", ie. album by genre. How is your proposal not in contradiction with current guidelines? You have proposed we categorize albums directly into a genre, which contradicts the guideline. You just like disagreeing with me for the sake of disagreeing with me, that much is established. I mean if there were no contradiction, we wouldn't even be discussing this (if it were precedent, then no discussion would be needed). At first you just added this proposal as if it were the law of the land. I just said we should get consensus first. Then you inserted your argument under my discussion here, which isn't even related to your proposal. This section is about categories like Category:John Coltrane hard bop albums, and when I created a discussion for the proposal that you said was being discussed on the talk page (a non-existant discussion), you deleted that and magically started the discussion here. I don't know anything about you. All I know is you are as unpleasant to deal with for me as I am to you. (Mind meal 04:15, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

The guideline says nothing either way about adding albums to genre categories. One solution would be to add such a prohibition; which

• would say "don't add album articles to..."
• would specify which inclusions are deprecated
• should say why not.

We have no such prohibition now; I would prefer not to add one, since I don't see why not, but if consensus is against me, oh well. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:46, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Nobody said consensus is going to be against you on this. I've already placed my support behind it. But the guideline does say something right now. It tells us that each album page is categorized in two categories. It also tells us what does go into the genre categories, ie. artist albums. If album pages were to be categorized directly into a top level category, the guideline would state that (which it does not state that). The language does not need negative instructions. In order to implement this, all one needs to do is state we place each album in three categories (ie. artist albums, year and genre) instead of the current two (artist albums and year). So yes, a change in the language is necessary to implement this, and I'm surprised you still have not read that in the guidelines. (Mind meal 06:23, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

This conversation is a demonstration of the necessity of including negative instructions, if we mean them. There will always be illiterate dolts like myself who will not see a requirement of A and B as a prohibition of C.

The question, therefore, is "should we prohibit C?" You don't seem convinced of that yourself, and nobody else has come out for it; so what about altering the first paragraph to remove any suggestion of a prohibition? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:35, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Technical fix?

There ie a way to do the artist identification Mind meal wants without the cross-cats. It is possible to cat a redirect; if we created Reign in Blood (Slayer) as a redirect and put the album cats on it, that would give the contextual information. This is the sort of thing for a bot to do (it should also comment out the album cats on Reign in Blood); it would still be a lot of work. But it is a possible solution. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:23, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Have you even read the previous discussions here? You would save yourself a lot of time. I'm for what you are proposing there, but that is what everyone keeps calling "preemptive disambiguation". My only alteration to that would be Reign in Blood (Slayer album). (Mind meal 04:16, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

Note: You Don't need the "album" after it, it should be given that all pages in a category of albums are albums. -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 14:17, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Support I consider the redirect suggestion useful and desirable (with "album" I would like it even better). BNutzer 21:28, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes that is preemptive disambiguation, but we could make an exception in this case if we got enough people behind it. Anyway I would just like to see this go somewhere. At first, especially here, there seemed to be some destination, but now it seems like a bunch of rhetoric being thrown about. This discussion is great, I'm just saying could we have a concrete proposal from someone so that all this is not for nil. I see three possibilities right now:

1. We could make at least some of the changes Mind meal is suggesting - which I for one would like to see lined out as I have gotten somewhat lost of late.
2. We could keep things like they are, but create lists instead of subcats. - This was mentioned only briefly (and I can't find it now), but it was one of the few other suggestions made.
3. We keep things like they are. While most music, including jazz, is by nature progressive, sometimes status quo is okay.
   (Sampm 10:50, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

I had brought up the list proposal, look near the bottom of the #Yet another proposal section. The only One objection to such a list, as far as I could tell, was that it did not address WP:ALBUM's ability or inability to resolve the category issue. (Here is the objection, which was subsequently deleted.) -- Gyrofrog (talk) 13:59, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Support OP suggestion If the word album is a major problem, it is not that important to me. I definitely support this sort of thing though, as it could serve to clear up what has been a real pain in the neck lately. Since we categorize albums by genre, this seems a good compromise. Lists don't have the luxury of "self-updating", which is important when dealing with gigantic categories such as these. Albums and genres are so intertwined that if we cannot find a way to categorize albums by genre in a precise manner the project fails in my eyes. This is a precedent that can be implemented for every album over time, and will serve at least to make navigation more friendly for users without WP popups. I believe this will encourage browsing. As soon as we can get enough people behind it, I'll begin right away. (Mind meal 15:39, 18 July 2007 (UTC))

Preemptive disambiguation would be moving the article to Reign in Blood (Slayer). I would not care for that, and it will be unpopular; it makes the article hard to link to. This proposes to create redirects. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Comment: There would no longer be a category link in the article itself, correct? So it wouldn't be obvious if an article was in the wrong category (e.g. "Cat:1968 albums" instead of "Cat:1969 albums"), you'd only see such errors while looking at the category (or, less likely, the redirect) page. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 22:02, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

I believe the proposition would be for genre-related categorization only, and that albums would otherwise be categorized the same on album pages. If this is not proposed, I am proposing it. (Mind meal 22:28, 19 July 2007 (UTC)) I propose we include albums by year on the normal album page, and everything else on the redirect page. Also, a new question arises amidst this discussion. Would we {{DEFAULTSORT:}} by artist name, last name first, or by album name? (Mind meal 22:32, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

• The categories should also be on the article page, commented out; something like this:

  <!--

  The following cats are at [[Reign in Blood (Slayer)]] which redirects here:

  [[:Category:Albums produced by Rick Rubin]]

  [[:Category:Def Jam albums]]

  [[:Category:Major label debut albums]]

  -->

  You could even have a template with the beginning text; just remember to subst it. (You need the extra colon to turn the cat off; even in comments.)

  It's a matter for later discussion what exactly goes on the redirect; I agree with Gyrofrog it seems redundant to put rtist cats there; if you're at the artist cat, you know who the artist is.

  • I would still sort by album, myself; if you want all the albums by X, together, go to Template:Cat:X Albums; but that's just me. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:17, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I think the "Albums by artist" category should stay on the article page, e.g. we don't need to see "Blonde on Blonde (Bob Dylan)" if we're already looking at the "Cat:Bob Dylan albums" page (because we already know they are Bob Dylan albums). But yes, good idea, put the genre-related categories on the redirect page. I think you would sort by album title in any case, because it's a category of albums. I can also imagine that you'd want to see the artist's name in "Albums by year", though. If we can get a 'bot to create the redirects and re-categorize, then perhaps it can also add some comment (hidden) text on the article page (or even both pages), near the category list, that says "Check (other page) for additional categorization of this article." -- Gyrofrog (talk) 22:50, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

True, the categories will be for albums. I will simply point out that if you walk into any record store, however, albums are grouped together by artist name for browsing. I'm just trying to keep the end-user in mind, and this method would keep artist albums grouped together. (Mind meal 23:35, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

Prodding for an update. Where are we at on this? (Mind meal 13:13, 24 July 2007 (UTC))

I am guessing that, at this point, it is a matter of figuring out the technical details (e.g. setting up a 'bot). Personally I am not sure how to proceed with that. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 21:50, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Another technical fix

1. Make a list article out of all the albums in a genre category, and include all useful contextual information. The list articles will need to be maintained, but missing one or two albums for a while is not a tragedy. If done well, they could be made into nice short histories of each subgenre, from another perspective.
2. Link to them from each category page, using {{catmore2}} or a purpose-designed template. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

That is an extra step that is not necessary. Album categories themselves should be equipped to handle this, especially given how we are dealing with genres of music. Albums always fall under genres of music! It just does not make sense that we create lists from categories that themselves are incoherent. If the categories themselves can just be made navigable such actions as this aren't needed. This method still will not address the issue of categorizing. Pretending that lists can ever be as complete as categories is a fool's game. How many "other fixes" must we run down the gambit of before we can just vote on something outright? This method requires an endless amount of lists. Nothing we come up with is going to pe perfect, but I think we should try the route that most addresses the categorization gap itself. (Mind meal 06:17, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

No, they can't. Categories aren't intended to do what you seem to want; and the present state of The Avant-Garde (album), with four categories the largest of which have two members, is simply silly. 17:38, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

You obviously aren't grasping any of this. Those categories are in their infancy you know. And I agree, the Category:John Coltrane hard bop albums method was STUPID, but it was all I had to go with previously. Can squash this crap already? You see it your way, I've seen it mine. Categories are useful for browsing, I don't know why so many people enjoy pretending otherwise. (Mind meal 18:28, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

Then make a proposal, clearly, precisely, and with reasons. You may convince me; you may convince others. Abuse is unlikely to do either. I use cats myself, btw. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:47, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Your "technical fix" proposal is just fine. I'm not even going to venture proposing anything else. I've already thrown my support behind it, as I believe it to be a very good idea. (Mind meal 21:21, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

This proposal would make one list per genre cat. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:47, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I meant the previous suggestion. I have no problem, however, with lists accompanying categories as they do elsewhere. They help to know what albums are not yet on Wikipedia. (Mind meal 22:38, 19 July 2007 (UTC))

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Category weirdness

Abominog, for example, has the code [[Category:Uriah Heep albums‬]]‬. Clicking on it brings you to Category:Uriah_Heep_albums%E2%80%AC (see the URL). On the other hand, Category:Uriah_Heep_albums has not yet been created but contains two albums by the same band. So what's with the "%E2%80%AC", why does the above code point to this and how should this get fixed?--Fisherjs 12:41, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

It's an invisible character. I removed this from the above-mentioned album, but this should be changed for the other albums by this artist as well, Category:Uriah_Heep_albums should be created, and Category:Uriah_Heep_albums%E2%80%AC should be deleted. (In certain web browsers both URLs confusingly look the same.) --PEJL 13:35, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Album covers

They're coming so be prepared to defend. An album article without a scan of the cover is near worthless as far as I'm concerned, I don't know about the rest of you. --kingboyk 23:10, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

In Large Friendly Letters: All you need to do is add a fairuse justification on the image page which says something like "This image of an album cover is uploaded so it can be shown in the article on that album." Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:22, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

You mean "all we need to do..." See Category:Images with no fair use rationale :-) -Freekee 04:42, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

One quick easy tool: {{album cover article rationale}}. Just click on the link so you know how to use it, and I'm sure you could clear a bunch in a jiffy. I'll help as much as I can. All the power to you eh? -- Reaper X 05:58, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Have you noticed the list of album covers with disputed fair use claim and the list of album covers without fair use rationale? Jogers (talk) 08:45, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, funnily enough, The KLF is a featured article, and the images there already have rationales, but even that isn't enough. I'm now having to trawl through a category of 50 images adding rationales. In what way is this a good use of my time? Hmm...

I'm well aware that adding rationales is all it takes, but imho - and in the opinions of many ordinary editors - there is no reason at all why album covers should require individual rationales because their use is so blatantly obviously "fair". Indeed, if we look at the Board resolution I see nothing there to prevent the adoption of a boilerplate fair use rationale for these images. We already have the machine-readable templates the policy requires. The policy allows exemptions for articles on "copyrighted contemporary works" except "where we can reasonably expect someone to upload a freely licensed file for the same purpose". Album covers are irreplaceable, period. "Media used under EDPs are subject to deletion if they lack an applicable rationale." Nowhere, that I can see, does it say that every image used under an EDP must have an individual rationale.

This crusade is doing way more harm than good for our project imho. Missing fair use rationales ought to be the least of our worries when one considers that we have approximately 1 million crap articles! --kingboyk 22:41, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I love the argument against templates and boilerplate. Like anyone really does sit down and write a FUR off the top of their head. And even if they did, who's reading it? Either it's a fair rationale or it's not. Grrr. -Freekee 03:16, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Right. So why the hell can't we include the rationale in the non-free-album-cover template then?! Sigh. I've just had to rescue a load of images and will now waste more time copying/pasting/tweaking rationales, time I could be using far more productively (writing stuff, working on AWB, doing adminy things, whatever). Sometimes I wonder why popular music fans bother contributing here when there is an army who seem to take a perverse pleasure in deleting the images. Fair use isn't bad; in this case it's unavoidable and in the interests of our readers to make full use of our rights of fair use under US law. Too many folks round here put the enyclopedia a distant second to their hippy idea that copyright is somehow bad and that we must rely on crappy free images or complete 10 forms in triplicate before using a cover scan of Sgt. Pepper! --kingboyk 22:59, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

...in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public inquiry, lost again, and finally buried in soft peat for three years and recycled as firelighters... My sympathies, I go through the same thing myself more often than I care to consider - it's a good way to increase your edit count but no way to build an encyclopedia that people will want to read and look at. Cheers, Ian Rose 15:01, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Infobox edit proposal

Just a heads-up for those not watching Template talk:Infobox Album; there is an edit proposal at Template talk:Infobox Album#PROPOSED CHANGE Producer(s) ---> Producer. --PEJL 14:58, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, this change was made, including making the field labels occupy less width, which means there is now more space available for actual content. I think that is a noticeable improvement. --PEJL 22:12, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Proposed new infobox to replace 4 others

Hello, I am new to this project, and I have worked on a super-infobox to replace {{Infobox Album}}, {{Infobox music DVD}}, {{Infobox Single}}, and {{Infobox Song}}, located here: User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release and the related User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release/link and User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release/color. I have some examples listed at User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release/examples. Tell me what you think of them. FMAFan1990 08:50, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

PS, if anyone can tell me what to use instead of whitespace on my examples page, please tell me what I can use. FMAFan1990 09:16, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Can you explain why you feel that merging these infoboxes is preferable? --PEJL 09:36, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

It saves the hassle of using multiple infoboxes. FMAFan1990 09:59, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Saves who that hassle, when? I'm not trying to be difficult, and I'm not saying I'm opposed to the idea of merging them, I just think we need figure out the advantages and disadvantages of doing so. --PEJL 10:10, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

One of the disadvantages that I think of is that it would make tagging album articles and updating the list of articles categorized as albums which don't transclude the Infobox Album more difficult. Jogers (talk) 12:16, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

As PEJL is saying, I think it needs to be shown that something is broke. Otherwise, don't fix it. I've never thought there was a problem having these as separate infoboxes.--Fisherjs 12:26, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

From a user perspective, I can understand this: Uniformity makes sense, in that, for instance, currently only Single and Song have "chart certifications" while albums, which is possibly as notable for charts, does not. I understand taht the existing one's not broken, but I'm certainly not against this, however there's a shitload of work to be done behind botting the conversion. Another pro for this would be if we currently have any gripes about the existing one, we can fix those issues before implementing this one. (such as chronology issues, as have been mentioned in the past). An omission I'll bring up straight off the bat is videos, though it's generally the same as DVD. Another thing that could be cool, since we'er brainstorming now, is a boxset infobox in which you have at the bottom a listing of all of the works of the boxset. This would be for box-sets of existing works (such as entire artist catalogues sold as a box or, in some cases, a tin). I'm for this proposal IF it can be proven to work (i.e. use full UAT before implementation and then run regular PVT to make sure it still goes). --linca^linca 13:08, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Note that none of that requires merging. I believe the reasons the album infoboxes don't include chart certifications is because there hasn't been consensus to include that. If we merge we either end up with an infobox where we are forced to include support for such things we don't want for certain classes (chart certifications and region coding for albums for example), or have to code the infobox such that they are actively unsupported for those classes. I note that User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release currently does the former. The problems with the chronology could also be solved without merging infoboxes (although if we are going to merge them in such a way that we require bots to update them (not a given, not required for current version of User:FMAFan1990/Infobox music release), we should certainly consider revamping the chronologies at the same time). What is UAT/PVT BTW?--PEJL 14:14, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

UAT = User acceptance testing; PVT = Post-verification testing. It's basically after you go through your bug checking in a QA side of things (which I'm assuming would happen, otherwise we wouldn't gain a consensus to go ahead with this) where you basically check "does this fulfill all the criteria that users would want and therefore accept?" If the answer is yes on all marks, and it can seamlessly (or almost seamlessly) be implemented, then you've completed your UAT. PVT is pretty much an ongoing process once you have completed the change, but in particular initially once it's done, you PVT to make sure you haven't royally screwed things up, basically. It's through UAT that you perform regression testing to make sure it won't happen, but PVT is essential because without it, you face things happening to the user end that you didn't foresee because UAT is nefer broad enough to cover all aspects. --linca^linca 14:21, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I see. Testing is good, I guess. We aren't doing any of that now though, are we? --PEJL 14:37, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

No, I'm just saying, if it's gone about in the right way, including thorough testing, considering the volume of articles we're talking about here, then I'm behind it. Oh, and if it can be justified. A few bits and pieces here or there trouble me with the existing ones that could be resolved with this, but I'm still not 100% sure combining the 4 is the right way to go. I can see it's merit, but I'm not totally sold. --linca^linca 14:43, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't see the merit in merging them, as I don't believe any advantage (that holds up) to doing so has yet been presented. --PEJL 15:26, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

First, there are the technnical isues that someone mentioned, that need to be resolved. Second, I'm worried about people using fields that are meant for other formats. Like chart position. We haven't agreed that it is important for album infoboxes, but there it is in the template. -Freekee 04:47, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm in favour in general because if we want to eg. add more fields, we only have to add them to one template instead of all 4.

But I've spotted a problem. Music release is a subset of song. For example, the Star Spangled Banner (I'm an Australian, but I try to be relevant here), or "God save the Queen", or any other traditional song, is not a music release. It's a song. There are many instances of the song (ie. different people's recordings) that are music releases, but the song itself is not one. An album page documents something particular. A song page may not. But maybe that's why we have "Infobox Standard". I guess what I'm really saying is that we should do the following rename:

• Infobox Song -> Infobox Song recording
• Infobox Standard -> Infobox Song

Anyone?

-- TimNelson 02:46, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Another thing -- rather than having all those "previous", "next", etc, there should be a sub-template called "series", or something. That would mean that songs on an album could be listed as part of a series (ie. a series of songs on an album), but could also be used to refer to a series such as the Child Ballads.

-- TimNelson 07:38, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Adding fields is not a common occurrence. The work needed to merge the infoboxes vastly offsets the work needed to add fields to the separate infoboxes for the foreseeable future. Your proposed template renaming would likely cause confusion, and would require updating every single song article, as it repurposes Template:Infobox Song. I don't quite understand what you mean about the series sub-template. Are you talking about chronologies, succession boxes or something else? --PEJL 08:03, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I see your point about adding fields not being a common occurence. I can see the problems with a rename (ie. not worth doing unless we can get a bot to do it for us).

As for an example of what I mean about a series, I made a mockup at User:TimNelson/Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight. I basically copied the article, and then made a different infobox. I've named my infobox User:TimNelson/Infobox folk song, but that's probably not a good name. It's also not intended as a final version (the layout is ugly, and too tall), but more as a proof of concept. You'll see the "series" bits mostly look like the chronologies mentioned, but you'll notice that the first one is not a chronology at all, but a reference to its place in a standard book of songs (my copy of the current "Infobox song" template, which I called "Infobox series", only required an additional two fields to cope with this situation).

Anyway, I hope this helps the situation become more obvious. Of course, there are some songs that have been recorded by 20+ people, so that's something we should keep in mind too.

-- TimNelson 11:46, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Album Project Summary

I've just updated a part of Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Summary. I've written a script so it will be updated regularly by Jogersbot every time I run it but no more often that every day for small categories and maintenance lists and every week for big categories. This stuff may be useful again. Jogers (talk) 14:44, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Great! The names of some of the items under "Special lists" are less than obvious. May I suggest renaming the other items in the same vein as User:Jogers/List3, to something like "New articles", "Wonky articles" and "May need redirection". It might also be useful if your other lists were included. --PEJL 15:19, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

I've added some comments but feel free to tweak it as you like. As long as you leave the comments before the values that get updated the bot should have no problems with parsing the summary. Jogers (talk) 15:28, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, this may be better. Jogers (talk) 15:31, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Yep, that's what I had in mind too. Thanks! (Note that they're all at 0 now though.) --PEJL 15:33, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'm working on it :-) Jogers (talk) 15:37, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Tracklist table guideline

Hello. I have been working on a lot of game/anime soundtracks. this pages usually have a tracklist in the table format (see Shadow of the Colossus: Roar of the Earth or Music of Final Fantasy VII. This is usually the best course of action due to these album's massive amount of tracks ( FFVII is about 120...). Sometimes, we also use collapsible tables when the article is not about the soundtrack only (see Secret_of_mana#Musical_score).
What I want to know is are there any guide lines to using these tables. Can we create one? I'm seeing a lot of inconsistency on these pages. I'm talking about things like: Should the column be titled "length", "time", "duration", or for another column: "#", "n°", "number" etc... this also holds for "title", "name" "track" etc.
What should the table title be called ? "album listing"? "album tracklisting"? "album track listing"? what if the album contains the word soundtrack, the will it look like this? "game soundtrack tracklisting"?
Should album time be added to the table title too?
Should table contents contain a "font-size:90%" (I don't think it should on a side note).
Or should the song titles be put between " (hyphens?), if it is in a table cell anyways?
Sorry to bother you on something that may not seem that important, but creating a guide line would really help the effort for table format album pages, which are all but consistent. Thankyou. Happypal 06:35, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

The section heading should be called "Track listing", per WP:ALBUM#Track listing. Track names should be between double quotes ("), per WP:ALBUM#Formatting. I don't think the large number of tracks is actually an argument in favor of using a table rather than a list, as a list actually scales better than a table. It is true that how tables used for track listings should be formatting is currently undefined. I'd rather see us drop support for tables entirely though, so I'm not going to propose we standardize them. If you want consistency, use the list track listing format, which is both much more common in general, and clearly defined. --PEJL 08:28, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Not a bother, Happypal. Most of us at this project are quite happy to deal with the details. :-) We have answers to many of your questions, and you can find them if you read through the project page, particularly Track listing. Also note the mentioned feature article, Enta Da Stage. It shows a table for the track listing. The questions we don't have answers for are the ones dealing with the table specifically, since we've never really discussed its use. Check out the project page, and the infobox, and you can probably figure out what would go best. I would call the table "Track listing" only if the article is only about the record. In other, broader articles, you'll have to be more specific. "Album track listing" is fine. Btw, I like the use of hideable tables in those articles.

The only real advantage to tables that I can see, is when there is a lot of information to get across - more than the usual title, length and composer. A table is good for organization. The problem is that with more info and more columns, it's still hard to make it readable. It has to be formatted carefully. -Freekee 18:57, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the answers. I guess we will have to go more on a per album basis. I had read Track listing several times, but it doesn't really have anything to say about the tables, except that they can be used for complicated titles.

Still, I feel I have to disagree with the "I'm not going to propose we standardize them. If you want consistency, use the list track listing format, which is both much more common in general, and clearly defined". It's not because something is more common and already defined we can't use something else. I'm not saying make an absolute rule about writing these tables, or creating a template or anything. I'm just saying agreeing to naming the columns "#", "title" and "length" would be a minimum. I mean, even both articles Enta Da Stage, and Before These Crowded Streets, one a feature article, and another, a guideline example, are inconsistent.

I'd like to change this:

Particularly for hip hop albums, it is helpful to list which members of a group (or guests) rap on which verses as well as mentioning sampling sources. This can be done in a nested list, as in the example above. Using a table is recommended in more complicated situations (see Before These Crowded Streets for example). If a table is used, it should be formatted using class="wikitable".

to:

Particularly for complicated albums (soundtrack or hip hop albums), it is helpful to list which members of a group (or guests) rap/sing on which verses/songs as well as mentioning sampling sources. This can be done in a nested list, as in the example above. Using a table is recommended in more complicated situations (see Before These Crowded Streets for example). If a table is used, it should be formatted using class="wikitable". The column titles should be "#", "title" and "length" for the track number, the song title and the track length, respectively.

Any thoughts/objections?

I mostly agree, though I don't like using "&hash;" to indicate track number. I prefer "track" as it's more straightforward. If you want to see a nightmarish track listing I worked on, you should have a look at this. I'm pretty sure it took me a good 20 minutes or more to get it all done. (the page isn't a great guide as to how an album article should be, but the track listing should give you an idea of a nightmare).--linca^linca 10:30, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

If we are going to continue to recommend using tables for track listings, then I'm fine with this, but I'd rephrase the last two sentences as:

If a table is used, it should be formatted using class="wikitable", using column headings "#", "Title" and "Length" for the track number, the track title and the track length, respectively.

Changes include capitalizing the table column headings, using the phrase "column heading" instead of "column title" (for consistency with Help:Table), using the word "track" instead of "song", and adjusting the wording to sound less like we're suggesting using only those columns. (Oh, and I prefer "#" to "track" because the column is for the track number which the latter column heading doesn't make clear.) --PEJL 10:44, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

That sounds good to me! I wouldn't actually know if "track" is better than "song" or anything, but since you seem to know what you are talking about, I'll take your word for it. So this would be it?

Particularly for complicated albums (soundtrack or hip hop albums), it is helpful to list which members of a group (or guests) rap/sing on which verses/songs as well as mentioning sampling sources. This can be done in a nested list, as in the example above. Using a table is recommended in more complicated situations (see Before These Crowded Streets for example). If a table is used, it should be formatted using class="wikitable", using column headings "#", "Title" and "Length" for the track number, the track title and the track length, respectively.

I'd also like to add that inside a table, song titles actually should NOT be between " (hyphens), and that should a table have a title, it should be: "Album Track list", or "Track list". But maybe I'm just pushing things here, or you have a different opinion on the matter...Happypal 11:06, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Firstly note that (") is a double quote, while (-) is a hyphen (technically a hyphen-minus, but close enough). I see no reason not to have track names in quotes in track listing tables, as we have them in quotes everywhere else (see WP:ALBUM#Formatting), including in other tables. "Track" is a better term than "song" because it's the term we use consistently, and because not all tracks are songs (some are just instrumental, with no singing). I also see no reason to use a phrase such as "track list" for tables when we have standardized on "track listing" for everything else. I'm not sure what you refer to when you mention "table title", but if you're referring to a heading (==...==), WP:ALBUM#Track listing already states that track listings should be in a section with a primary heading "Track listing". (If the article isn't a normal album article, it may be acceptable to use "Album track listing" in a sub-heading, as previously noted.) --PEJL 13:05, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, my bad on those. In that case, forget I said anything. Thanks for the "double quote" clarification. let's just add the details on the columns names then, and keep it at that.Happypal 14:27, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Sure thing. (I like to wait a few days after proposing a change like this before actually making the change, to let others have a chance to comment.) --PEJL 14:39, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Dully noted. I just re-read myself. I typoed, and wanted to propose naming tables "Album Track listing", or "Track listing" (which I guess is what is written in the guidelines, albeit not explicitly). Not just "list". And I won't dispute you for the "double quote" thingy, but it's just that it seems redundant for me when the track title is placed in a cell all by itself. aren't the "double quotes" used to identify when a title starts and ends, making it useless in a table? Just a question really, don't want to push anything :) Happypal 14:47, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, in what way is the fact that the heading should be called "Track listing" not explicit in the guideline? (The reason I asked if you were referring to a heading or something else, is that there are a number of other names that can be given to tables, such as captions, titles and summaries. Our convention is to use headings for this purpose, for consistency with non-table content.) As for the quotes, one of the primary reasons it is useful to always have track names in double quotes is that it is a convention, which makes it is easier to recognize that something is a track name if that particular track name is in double quotes, and if track names in general are in double quotes. --PEJL 15:49, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Double quote thing makes sense. As for the "the heading should be called "Track listing"", I think what you say later is true, and we are not referring to the same thing. The guideline says that the "heading" (which, if I am not mistake, is what you get when you write ==Track listing==), should be "Track listing". I'm talking about the first line in the Table. This may not be clear, but checking out Music of Final Fantasy VII#Final Fantasy VII Original Soundtrack might make things clear. In this example, "heading" is NOT "track listing", but the album title, and the "Table title" in this case IS "Track Listing". I'm just saying the guidelines don't look THAT clear to me that this is the way the article had to be written. Maybe I'm just being tacky though... Happypal 16:09, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Right, that is a column heading (with colspan), yet another way to give a table a name (besides normal headings, captions, titles and summaries). Our convention is to use normal headings for both "Track listing" and "Disc one/two", as stated at WP:ALBUM#Track listing. (Note that that applies to table track listings as well.) The article you mentioned is a special case, for two reasons. Firstly, there are multiple albums listed in one article. As such, the heading levels should be adjusted down one step, making it "===Track listing===" rather than "==Track listing==". Secondly, the track listings are collapsible. Making that work with headings is a bit tricky. I converted the first album in that article to this format, see here. (In doing so I also fixed the problem that the "Show" link wasn't accessible for certain screen widths.) --PEJL 17:17, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and having looked at this example article, I don't see why using "Album track listing" rather than "Track listing" would be necessary, as it is quite clear from context that the track listings refer to albums. --PEJL 17:20, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

<--------- Humm... I proffered how it looked before, but I guess I brought this on myself. I don't like the fact that there is a track listing subsection, with no other subsections in that album. I'll just have to stick with the guideline (which I now understand better, thank you). I guess it's not really possible for everyone to be happy with every article, and follow the guidelines to the letter too.
As for "I don't see why using "Album track listing" rather than "Track listing" would be necessary", I don't remember saying "necessary", but I do think that the tables look better if the album name is also there, rather than just being titled "Track listing", especially since there are 7 tables in he article. It makes the browsing of the article just that much easier and more streamlined, even if the info is redundant. But I guess this doesn't really matter anymore, since we are replacing table titles with headings.
I'll stop complaining now, I came here looking for guidelines, and got what I wanted, even if I don't like how it turns out for this article -_-'. Thank you for your time, help and consideration. I'll put the knowledge to good use.Happypal 19:18, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

As for there not being any other sections, according to WP:ALBUM#Personnel each album should have a personnel section. You may also want to consider splitting that article into separate articles for each album. We don't currently have a guideline about that, but that is the convention. If the article was split the track listings wouldn't have to be collapsed. (There are a number of other problems with a collapsed section, such as it not being accessible to readers using assistive technology, or when printing.) --PEJL 19:29, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Happypal, I sense disappointment, but I think the article looks pretty good, and the differences between it and the original version are minor. As PEJL suggested, I think they really need personnel sections. If you can get those done they surpass stub level, and I highly recommend switching them out to individual articles. If you do that, you can keep them all in the current article as is, but I would move the infobox and track listings, keeping only the text sections, and linking ineach section to the main articles.

Question for the group: I don't care for the hash as the column header. Can we use the abbreviation for number, "No."? -Freekee 03:43, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Not disappointment, but I liked the way it looked befor (albeit minor diffs). However, I'm good for following the guidelines, and I do believe the article will look even better in the end, so no worries there.

For now, I'll keep all albums in the same section (as WP:FF wants it), but treat each section as an article of it's own (ie, just shift the title headings etc...).

As for "#" Vs "No.", I really don't that much of an opinion. As long as we all agree on a standard, I'll gladly follow it.

personally, i like "#" a bit more because it has a bit of a broader reach. I think in other non-EN speaking cultures, "#" is more common than "No.". I realize this is the EN wikipedia, but it's also the biggest one, and a lot of non-EN people come here. But as I said, as long as we choose a standard, I'm fine either way.Happypal 04:37, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, is there precedent for either "#" and "No."? I know both have been abolished from chart position sections recently. Does anyone remember any previous discussions about this, possibly in the context of chart positions? I couldn't find anything about this in WP:MOS. Also, shouldn't we use the proper symbol "№" rather than "No."? See also number sign and numero sign. I suspect "№" would be more easily understood than "No." for those not familiar with either. It's harder to type (on many keyboard layouts) though. --PEJL 10:00, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm for using "№". If I don't know a way to create something, I look it up or copy and paste it. I'm sure the same can be done in general. Alternatively, you could give instructions (or link to instructions). --linca^linca 10:18, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Why not just create {{Numero}} or something for №? Kariteh 10:37, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Or we just standardize on "#", which can be easily typed on all keyboards without templates or copy-and-pasting, is well understood by a large number (probably at least as many as "№"), is the default symbol in other parts of the English-speaking world, and isn't completely illegible when editing in certain fonts (both the monospaced font on my Mac and the one on my Windows box). --PEJL 11:33, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with PEJL. # the easiest and most widespread format. "№" looks nice and all, but it's just eye candy which will generate technical difficulties...Happypal 14:31, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done (using "#"). --PEJL 11:03, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

One album per article

As noted above, we currently don't have a guideline that articles on albums should cover only a single album per article. In the introduction we say: Below is a basic guide to writing an article on a specific album of music, which suggests it, but nothing else. I would assume that Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Summary gets confused by articles covering more than one album. I propose we add the following to the top of WP:ALBUM#Article body.

Articles on albums should cover a single album, including possible reissues. Each article should begin with the album infobox (see above), followed by an introductory paragraph.

Any objections? --PEJL 19:54, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Compilations (including live albums?) may not merit individual articles but might be better presented collectively. Ricadus 21:18, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Is that something that occurs now? I can't recall ever seeing multiple compilations or live albums in a single article. --PEJL 21:29, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

This shouldn't be used to dictate decisions among individual WikiProjects. WikiProject Final Fantasy has consolidated album articles into general articles on the music of each game (like Music of Final Fantasy VIII); several have reached GA, and almost all of them have potential to reach that level. — Deckiller 03:41, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Seeing that was in fact the motivation for this change, see the section above. A cursory review shows that the article you linked to doesn't adhere to many (any?) of the WP:ALBUM guidelines, notably not including any album infoboxes. While those articles are also within scope of Wikipedia:WikiProject Final Fantasy, I would argue that it would still be appropriate to consider the general album guidelines from Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums. --PEJL 03:55, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't believe it is appropriate to follow the guidelines for every single case, no matter what. It should be individually decided. I can guarantee you that the album coverage in Music of Final Fantasy VIII is essentially complete. There is no missing information - we've scraped the bottom of the barrel, and gotten wood in our fingernails. There is no reason to branch out to separate articles when they can be comprehensively covered in one. On the other hand, joint coverage strengthens the article by grouping related content. Perhaps the article can be given infoboxes, but the lack of them definitely does not warrant separate articles. The drop-down box can modified to adhere to WP:ALBUM guidelines too, although the current one is much better for accessibility. --Teggles 04:24, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

To be honest, I think those Final Fantasy pages, while thorough, need some work, and they certainly need infoboxes. The purpose of infoboxes (and they're not exclusive to this wikiproject, I might add) is to consolidate the basic info. Strip it down and display easily and uniformly. That said, with respect to PEJL's suggestion, I suggest we be implicit and make this recommendation for all albums that are released sperately with a unique track listing (one case where this is not the case is Jars of Clay and Jars of Clay Platinum, both of which indicate the same album but with different cover art and a modified name (which I think is superfluous, when this could easily be rendered into a single page using the {{extra album cover 2}} template.) though sometimes it may be appropriate to break them apart (such as I've been considering for the Recurring Dream: Special Edition Live Album by Crowded House). I don't know, but I do know that that whole page is too much information in parts. sure you've scrapned your nails, but you only needed to take a spoon and cleave out the necessary info and leave the dreggs. --linca^linca 05:23, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Yep, they need polishing. However, there's no reason to separate Music of Final Fantasy VIII and others, which is what I was arguing against. It's an illogical decision to split. --Teggles 05:34, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

First let me say that using a drop-down box is never good for accessibility. Secondly, with regards to Jars of Clay and Jars of Clay Platinum, such variants of essentially the same album share a single page in almost all cases. See for example all of the "Deluxe Edition" albums, all of the "Xth Anniversary Edition" albums and so on. We have provisions for including different covers (as noted) and different track listings (in sub-sections, per WP:ALBUM#Track listing, see example). I proposed standardizing this because since it is what we do in a vast majority of cases, it appears to be largely uncontroversial. I'd also be interested to know to what extent the automatic processing tools are tripped up by articles with multiple albums. Jogers, do you know? --PEJL 10:14, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't see a problem here. Jogers (talk) 10:38, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

OK, good to know. But what exactly is being counted? (If the number of articles, then I would think a multi-album article would trip it up. If the number of infoboxes, then a non-infobox article would trip it up. Is it using some other logic?) --PEJL 10:43, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

You mean Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Summary? It simply counts articles in relevant categories and lists. "WP:ALBUM articles" section counts articles in the Category:WikiProject Albums articles. Jogers (talk) 10:50, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) I guess this is not a concern then. (I incorrectly assumed we were counting albums, but I realize now we're counting album articles.) Based on feedback, let me propose a softer wording (which also avoids ambiguous words such as "cover" and "single"). I propose we replace the existing first paragraph:

The basics should be in the first paragraph: title, artist, release date, record label, and a word or two about genre and critical reception.

with these two paragraphs:

Articles on albums should normally be about only one album, including possible reissues. These guidelines assume an article about one album is being written, and will need adjusting for articles about multiple albums, for example by shifting the heading nesting levels down one step.

Each article should begin with the album infobox (see above), followed by the lead section which should include basics such as title, artist, release date, record label, and a word or two about genre and critical reception.

--PEJL 11:34, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I think the main difference is that the Final Fantasy music articles (of which FF8's is the only complete one) are discussing the topic of a work of fiction, so it takes more of a typical fiction subarticle format. Adding concise infoboxes for each section would probably be a good compromise. — Deckiller 11:59, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I like the implication that reissues could be included in the same article as the original. I'd prefer the direction that they should be included in the same article. -Freekee 03:21, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

So, what's the consensus? Kariteh 11:53, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, no-one has objected to the softer wording ("should normally be about only one album") so I assume that is acceptable to all. I'd like to wait a few more days to let others weigh in. --PEJL 16:21, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Y Done (using "should normally" rather than "should"). --PEJL 11:18, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

No references in infobox

Infoboxes sometimes contain references, most often for release dates and genres. As User:Unint said recently about the musical artist infobox, "[...] I would hope that we wouldn't need footnotes at all in the infobox, since the purpose of the infobox and lead is to summarize more detailed information found later on [...]". As such I propose we add the following at WP:ALBUM#Details:

It is not necessary to include references for facts in the infobox, as these should be referenced where the corresponding fact is mentioned in the body of the article. (In some cases a reference for a professional review is appropriate, as noted at #Professional reviews.)

--PEJL 13:10, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

You left "But I do see a serious need for these on heavily disputed articles." out of Unint's quote; an important statement I agree on. Emmaneul ^(Talk) 13:21, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes I left that out, because it referred to musical artist infoboxes, and because it wasn't clear to what extent it applies to album infoboxes. --PEJL 13:38, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Given that external links are only supposed to appear in the External Links section, I would prefer to have links to album reviews in the external links section, and not in the infobox. The review text line in the infobox should have the footnote link. There's really no reason to link it there anyway, since infoboxes are supposed to be concise, and you can see the rating there already. -Freekee 03:47, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that would be an improvement for readers. We don't really save much space in the infobox ("[1]" instead of "link"), in fact in some web browsers the infobox would be made taller (because the superscripts increase line height, in varying degrees depending on browser). Readers would have to click twice to get to a review (or thrice if they wanted to get back to where they were) rather than once. If we were to do this we'd probably want to have the review links in the "External links" formatted in some consistent way to make them easy to find separately, possibly in a "Professional reviews" sub-section. We'd also have to repeat the review source name for each review link. We'd either not have any ratings in that section (which would make it less useful to browse separately) or have them repeated (more redundancy). --PEJL 10:17, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

That sounds fair. As long as we understand we're breaking the rules, it's fine with me. And I like the text as suggested. Specifically, I like the reminder not to claim that text is not necessary because everything is in the infobox. -Freekee 04:14, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Oppose: Refs are the only way to prevent genre edit-warring that I am aware of. Skomorokh ^incite 02:28, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Limited support for this, so I won't make this change. --PEJL 11:27, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Skomorokh, for genre edit wars, the policy does actually say that we're supposed to use general terms rather than specific terms (i.e. you'd have "heavy rock" instead of "industrial acid gothic screamo metal" or "hip hop" instead of "psychadelic trip-hop" etc). Another thing of note relating to your comment is that it suggests that a reference solves the issue of subjectivity. Even "authorities" on the subject matter don't always agree on type or all sorts of things, really. Anyway, all of that aside, I'd be for this, though I'm not that sold on the wording of it. I don't know what I want, but not quite this. Needs tweaking. --linca^linca 13:41, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Granted, the problem of subjectivity remains, but there is usually no opposition to general terms - hard rock - only to specific ones such as those you mentioned. After months of edit-warring, introducing refs with a warning note has practically stopped all problems with the Queens of the Stone Age and Rage Against the Machine articles, both of which are pretty major bands. So, while acknowledging the theoretical problems you mention, I have found references in the infobox very useful in practice.

If there is consensus for removing references, can I suggest a warning note to the effect of "<!-- Please only add broad genres that are supported with citations in the main article -->"?Skomorokh ^incite 15:22, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Edit warring over genres is a problem, not just for band articles, but for album articles as well. I guess this boils down to to what extent referencing the genres in the infobox (as opposed to just in the article) would avoid edit wars. Lacking clear data, we can only speculate. I'd assume that a comment in the infobox referring to the referenced genres in the article body would at least work better than having unreferenced genres in both places and no comment. An alternative solution would be to have some formal process for deciding genres and/or an ability to lock genres (see WP:MN#Music Genre(s)) which would likely be much more effective at avoiding these edit wars, but more complex. --PEJL 16:11, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Certifications

I notice that this page has no mention of certifications. I am in the midst of creating a list for the multiple country organizations who certify albums (i.e. RIAA, CRIA, IFPI), and a list of links to their databases, or how to get there in some cases, especially on foreign language sites. I would like to share this list with the WIkiProject if we can fit it in somewhere. I was also thinking of adding what # of sales/shipments are required for a old, or platinum certification, but that might be making it too long. So when I finish, should I include it on the project page, or make a subpage? -- Reaper X 19:10, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Check out my progress: User:Reaper_X/Rockbox#Certifications. Will anyone give me a response here? -- Reaper X 06:52, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

That is an excellent resource that you are creating! I would think it best to have it on a subpage—linked from the Project page of course—but only because the Project page is fairly long already. --Paul Erik 12:01, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Certifications seems like a good place for it. --PEJL 11:25, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. It has been created. I plan to make a similar table for singles at WP:SONGS. Please help me complete this table, and offer any suggestions to improve it. Cheers. -- Reaper X 06:44, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Songwriting credit

I am late coming into this discussion, but I would suggest an additional change. The usual style guideline for a sentence fragment is not to include a period at the end. (This is the case with entries on disambiguation pages, or any lists whose entries do not consist of complete sentences.) So in the Track listing section, I would move the period outside of the quotation marks: ... can be stated at the top as "All songs written by Gordon Gano". If the majority of the songs were written by the same person, this can be stated as "All songs written by Gordon Gano, except where noted". Thoughts? --Paul Erik 01:54, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I proposed what I did because it was and is more common for the period to be included. If we are to adhere to the sentence fragment rule, I'd rather see us convert it into a proper sentence, for example by recommending: "All songs are written by Gordon Gano." --PEJL 07:47, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I've done that particular songwriting credit style with several of the album entries that I've done since I started here. -- CJ Marsicano 15:04, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, this would be a change from the most common practice. So if a change is to be made I would prefer to have it be a less drastic change, simply removing a period in most cases. Also, since the Track listing section is already essentially a list, it does not appear to be so out-of-place to have a sentence fragment there. And finally, let's keep things more brief where possible ...I say this despite my usual distaste for sentence fragments. :) --Paul Erik 16:08, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

We hardly ever have sentence fragments in normal paragraph context (not in tables, lists, infoboxes and so on). I guess I never realized this wasn't a complete sentence. Omitting the period just looks strange to me, because of the paragraph context. --PEJL 19:06, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

While rules of sentence structure dictate that the period be inside the quotes, it would be more appropriate to move the period outside the quotes, since the example text will appear as a sentence fragment. However, speaking as someone who's detail oriented, I must question why we're discussing this detail. I can't imagine anyone going out of their way to remove an improperly placed period in an article (but if they do, that's their prerogative) and I find it less likely that an edit war would begin over it - but the album project says there must be a period! (again, that's their problem). In short (too late!), Paul, this isn't really policy, so change it if you want. I'm sorry if I sound like a jerk here - I'm just trying to remind people to focus their efforts where they'll do the most good. Besides, notice I weighed in on the issue myself. :-D -Freekee 04:03, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I do not think that you sound like a jerk; I do need the reminding sometimes not to get too caught up in small details. And yes, I did notice that you weighed in with an opinion, Freekee. :-) --Paul Erik 11:51, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Exhaustive list of awards (gold, silver etc)

An anonymous user has added a lengthy and unsourced list of awards for 10cc albums at the 10cc page which are presumably for British sales, though this isn't stated specifically. It's a long list and probably less indicative of the sales and popularity of the albums than the chart placements, which are also on the 10cc page. The WikiProject Albums page contains no provision for such lists. I'm inclined to delete it, though the gold/platinum status etc could be added as a brief reference on the Wiki page for each album. Any opinions? Grimhim 11:55, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I'd say ask the anon about it, about their source and what these certifications are for. Then I would integrate it into the discography tables you already have there; just make a new column called "Certification (Country)". If you really want to get rid of it until what country the sales are for and a source is indicated (I would), I'd stick it somewhere temporarily, like a personal sandbox or something. That's my opinion. -- Reaper X 17:50, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I think a better place for charting info is the album article. The band article could use a summary. I don't think the awards are necessarily notable enough to devote a whole section to. At the very least, the awards should be listed in the discography tables, since the current list is a bit confusing. -Freekee 03:49, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Note: The figures indicated for what is silver, gold etc aren't what they are (or have ever been) in the UK, so i don't think that they're either right or for the UK. Now, I think that certifications are important, but here they're find of strewn about, when they should be centralised into the discography (which should be split out, in this case, to allow the page to be shorter).--linca^linca 09:02, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Love.Angel.Music.Baby

The article is up for FAC. So i request everyone to kindly review the article and do post your comments. Thanks a ton! Luxurious.gaurav 15:14, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

The article is now Featured. Thank You! Luxurious.gaurav 08:14, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Anyone know where I can find information about album sales?

I need figures :) Kamryn · Talk 06:13, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't know for exact figures, but you can always use certifications if the albums are popular enough for rough figures. See Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Certifications. -- Reaper X 00:59, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Nice work, Reaper X! Jogers (talk) 14:41, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Missing articles

Anybody knows what happened to over 2000 WikiProject Album articles? Here the count decreased that much after only one week. Jogers (talk) 10:38, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Article naming

I realize that when there are multiple albums by the same name (e.g., there are albums by the name Necessary Evil by Deborah Harry, Pat LaBarbera and George Marinelli), the artist name should appear in parentheses (e.g., "Necessary Evil (Deborah Harry album)") in the article title. However, what if (as in the example I've been using), the there is only one article on Wikipedia on an album by the particular name--should that article then occupy the "(album)" space? (In this case, I am considering moving Necessary Evil (Deborah Harry album) to Necessary Evil (album) if it would be appropriate.) --Evil1987 14:18, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think that would be appropriate. You can always move the page back when further disambiguation is necessary. Perhaps the guideline could be clarified in respect to this? Jogers (talk) 14:40, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. It would indeed be helpful if the guideline were clarified. --Evil1987 16:50, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I thought WP:ALBUM#Naming was pretty clear about this. Is it the "For multiple albums with the same title" part that is unclear? Do you have a specific suggestion for improvement? --PEJL 20:38, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Cfd:Albums without cover art

If it's not on your watchlist you may not have seen that this cat is up for discussion. (repurposing to talk pages, primarily, but a name change could happen too) See the Cfd for more.--Fisherjs 17:14, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

As I noted there, I believe repurposing will mean this category can no longer be automatically populated, which will make it much less useful. Coincidentally, I've been considering proposing we add more such infobox cleanup categories, albeit more transient ones. Specifically, I would find the following categories useful:

Album articles with infobox field compiled by

The field "Compiled by" has recently been changed to generate "Compiler" instead of "Compiled by". I want to rename the field to "Compiler" as well, for clarity and consistency. If we update all existing uses we don't have to support both variants, but having a list of existing uses is a prerequisite for being able to do so.

Album articles with infobox field language

There is an undocumented field "Language" in the infobox. I've been meaning to propose this be deleted, but seeing how it is currently used first would be helpful. --PEJL 02:46, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Album articles with infobox field extra cover

"extra cover1" and "extra cover2" are two other undocumented fields, alternatives to {{Extra album cover 2}}. I think we should update all existing uses of the former to the latter and remove support for the former, for consistency.

Can anyone think of a good way to get the corresponding information without using categories? Perhaps this can be done by parsing database dumps? --PEJL 02:46, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Sounds feasible. I could create lists from the database dump. Jogers (talk) 10:02, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I fail to see why categorising's an issue? Is it because wiki maintenance is being promoted in the article space? If so, is that really an issue? Every page has an "edit" button and people will become savvy evebntually, if that's your issue. --linca^linca 10:34, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Linca, I can't tell if you don't see the issue with the current practice of having a category such as Category:Albums without cover art be automatically populated, or if you don't see the issue with the proposed repurposing of the same. Assuming you're referring to the proposed repurposing, categorizing is an issue because it has to be done manually. In this case it requires everyone to always remember to either add or remove [[Category:Albums without cover art]] to the talk page when they remove or add a cover image to the article (unlikely in practice), or someone else to do so afterwards (which means the category will be constantly out of date). If we have to update the category manually, I think we'd need either a bot to update the talk pages regularly or to drop the category and create lists from database dumps.

Jogers, thanks for the offer! I'll might take you up on it depending on the outcome of the CfD. --PEJL 12:31, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I believe it should be repurposed if we can find a way to do it automatically. Jogers, is that a "yes, I can do that"? -Freekee 22:43, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I only said that I can create lists of certain articles from the database dump so PEJL can look into them. I don't see any easy way to keep the Category:Albums without cover art constantly up to date if repurposed. Jogers (talk) 09:40, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the clarification...

What if we add a field to the album template on the talk page for "needs image." It's not as good as the current way, but it's a lot better than a user-maintained list. We already use such fields for article maintenance. -Freekee 02:47, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Anything maintained by a bot would be much better than manually maintained information, as it will be much more up-to-date. Agree that if we are to have the category on the talk page, setting this via {{Album}} seems better than setting the category directly. But if we are going to use a bot to recognize missing covers and tag these in some way, wouldn't it be better to just have the bot generate the list directly (like Jogers' other lists) rather than having the bot set the category on each and every article to end up with a category containing basically the same thing? We'd save a lot of edits by using a list rather than a category. --PEJL 03:50, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

OK, the outcome of the CfD was just rename, not repurpose to talk page, so we don't need any bots for Category:Album articles without cover art (the new name). --PEJL 16:30, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

ImageRemovalBot and Discography

I thought it apropos to alert this WikiProject of a problem ImageRemovalBot is creating for band pages with discographies in gallery format. I have requested feedback here. Chubbles 09:05, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

General fixes with Jogersbot

I've just unleashed Jogersbot to make some of the most straightforward fixes to album articles. Please let me know if you find any problems. Jogers (talk) 20:24, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Track listing credit fraction

At WP:ALBUM#Track listing I propose we change:

If all songs were written by the same person/team, this can be stated at the top as "All songs written by Gordon Gano." If the majority of the songs were written by the same person, this can be stated as "All songs written by Gordon Gano, except where noted."

to:

If all songs were written by the same person/team, this can be stated at the top as "All songs written by Gordon Gano." If more than a third of the songs were written by the same person/team, this can be stated as "All songs written by Gordon Gano, except where noted."

to make changes like this more in line with our guidelines. The current phrase using "a majority" was just something I chose without much thought (see discussion). I've since seen editors interpret this very literally, and remove "All songs..." lines in favor of credits on each track when only applicable to about 40% of the tracks. I think having albums use "All songs..." lines in such cases is preferable, because it avoids some repetition, decreases the inconsistency of using full names on some tracks and last names on others, and decreases the number of links next to track names (which some find visually distracting). --PEJL 12:18, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm opposed to this on the grounds of instruction creep. Hyperspecified and arbitrary rules should be avoided when possible, to avoid the impression that Wikipedia is some sort of bureacracy. Leave the guidelines vague and let users use their best judgement. Skomorokh ^incite 14:08, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Note that the proposed wording isn't more specific or arbitrary than the existing one, it just changes the fraction from one in two to one in three. So if the proposed text is too specific, the existing one is as well. We might change it to just say "If many songs..." :

If all songs were written by the same person/team, this can be stated at the top as "All songs written by Gordon Gano." If many songs were written by the same person/team, this can be stated as "All songs written by Gordon Gano, except where noted."

That leaves it quite vague where the cut-off point should be, but will hopefully in practice lead to a cut-off point somewhere below 50%, to achieve the previously mentioned benefits. --PEJL 17:22, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Cool, where do you stand on "most/several/than one" for the cut-off? Skomorokh ^incite 17:41, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Note that those are technically just as specific as the current text and the first proposal, with "most" being more or less the same as "a majority". They sound less specific though, which might be enough. I actually considered something like "multiple" but it seemed less appropriate, because it could be interpreted as a suggestion to use "except where noted" for two or more, which might make the cut-off too low (for example two out of twenty). "Several" is better in that aspect (three or more) but might imply it shouldn't be used for almost all. I'd prefer "several or more" which sounds less specific than "three or more" while technically meaning the same. --PEJL 18:21, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

I know that I might get a reputation for being detail-oriented, but since you are proposing a change anyway, I would like to make another plea for removing the period at the sentence fragment. Many album articles include it, but it looks strange to me, sitting at the end of a sentence fragment, and in particular when there is a list immediately below it, which, appropriately by rules of punctuation, has no period at the end of each entry. Another minor style quibble is that the MoS discourages the use of slashes, so I suggest "person or team" rather than "person/team". Oh, and (while I'm here...) I do think that this is a good idea to change "the majority" to "several" or something similar. :) --Paul Erik 04:57, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Details are nice. ;-) As I mentioned before, having something that is more obviously a sentence fragment in a paragraph context looks strange to me, as all other text in album articles at normal paragraph size and position are proper sentences. Can we possibly compromise and change it to a sentence (with "All songs are..." or similar)? That would also work better for cases like "All songs written by Foo. All music written by Bar." Definitely "person or team". Anyone mind "several or more"? --PEJL 05:14, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Ah! Now I understand what you mean by "in a paragraph context"—sorry I was slow to clue in to that. I do see your point and I would be fine with "All songs were..." or similar. I guess that the downside to making any sort of change here is that it may be bothersome for editors (and readers) to adjust to a new format for the songwriting credit when it has been stable for a long time. Given the absence of anyone else commenting, I will leave it to your judgment, PEJL, whether or not that sort of change is worth the effort and incoveniences of changing. As for the other issue, I do like "several or more". --Paul Erik 22:35, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

While changing articles and habits will take some work, I do think the change is worth it, because we want this guideline to be in line with WP:MOS. I'll change this to "All songs were..." when I make the change proposed above, unless objections to either change are raised over the next few days. --PEJL 12:41, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 13:59, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Article quality

I just had a look at the statistics for the project. At the moment, we are looking after over 60,000 articles and we have assessed the quality of almost half. Of the assessed articles,

• 92% are stubs (24951 articles)
• 6.7% are start class (1824)
• 1.2% are B class (322)
• 0.12% are GA class (33)
• 0.07% are FA class (18)

In summary, I think we're doing OK with regular maintenance tasks as we have a lot of nicely formatted start class articles. We could probably do more to help people get their articles further up the quality scale however. It may be worthwhile adding cleanup tags to the B class articles to help guide their editors to GA class. I'll start work on it soon. Anyone else interested? - Papa November 10:17, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Musical cast recordings

We've recently had a question raised over at WikiProject Musical Theatre regarding the naming conventions of the cast recordings of musicals. Someone came across Hairspray (2002 soundtrack), which is horribly misnamed as, strictly speaking, it's not a soundtrack. Should it be Hairspray (2002 album) or Hairspray (cast recording) or something completely different? If anyone has some wisdom to impart, the discussion just started here, and we would love some insight. —  MusicMaker5376 21:34, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

As an album, the normal album naming conventions (see WP:ALBUM#Naming) should apply, which means it should indeed be Hairspray (2002 album) (as there is a different album by the same name by this "artist" from a different year). If for some reason that naming scheme is unacceptable for these types of albums, we should update WP:ALBUM#Naming. --PEJL 01:02, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. An article is named for the title of the subject, and disambiguated by the medium (film, album, etc.) and year, if necessary. -Freekee 02:41, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree, though there's always a chance of duplicity when doing this, but I suppose in those cases, we'd just disambiguate further (i.e. Hairspray (2002 American album) vs Hairspray (2002 English album)). --linca^linca 03:06, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Nope, WP:ALBUM#Naming already covers this duplicity: For artists who release multiple albums with the same name, disambiguate by year, e.g. Weezer (1994 album) and Weezer (2001 album) (unless the albums were released the same year, in which case they can be disambiguated by some commonly accepted convention). So Hairspray (American album) and Hairspray (English album). --PEJL 03:24, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

But what if there were more than one American album and more than one English album? Never rule out the need for further disambiguation. :-) -Freekee 03:28, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Right, my point was just that the convention dab (CONV album) replaces the year dab (YEAR album), it doesn't add to it (YEAR CONV album), just like the year dab replaces the artist dab in the simpler case. --PEJL 05:18, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I was actually referring to the fact that many musicals, particularly, have multiple productions in the same year (Fame was on in 98 in UK, US and Australia, from memory). --linca^linca 10:44, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Ahh, OK. In such case the year might be part of the "convention" part. --PEJL 10:50, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I decided to take a look at an album for a film that would have had an important soundtrack to see what it was named. I chose Ray (film), and its associated soundtrack is at Ray (soundtrack). Is this the accepted convention for movie soundtracks or did I choose the wrong film to take a look at? Should that be at Ray (album) or do soundtracks have special naming conventions (and, should, therefore, musicals)? If I'm understanding the conversation correctly, they should be Wikipedia! the musical (album), unless there were international recordings, in which case Wikipedia! the musical (Ugandan album), unless there were several in a given locale, in which case, Wikipedia! the musical (2007 Ugandan album)? How about for something where the title of the article of the musical has the dab "(musical)"? Like Chess (musical) -- there are something like 30 recordings of this show, should they be titled Chess (musical) (2002 Swedish album) or Chess (2002 Swedish album)? —  MusicMaker5376 17:37, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

The naming conventions are at WP:ALBUM#Naming. From them follows that Ray should be at Ray (Craig Armstrong album), as there is another album named Ray, but no other album named Ray by that artist. Chess should be at Chess (2002 album) if multiple Chess albums were released by the same artist but only one in 2002. If multiple Chess albums were released by the same artist in 2002, it should be at Chess (SOMETHING album), where SOMETHING is something that sufficiently disambiguates the album, possibly including year and/or country and/or something else, but only the minimum needed to disambiguate. There should never be two sets of disambiguation, only disambiguation using (album). --PEJL 17:59, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Double album

There is an undocumented "Type" parameter value "double album" that is supported by {{Infobox Album/link}} and {{Infobox Album/color}}. Does anyone know if there is a reason this is undocumented, such as that it was intended to be phased out? I can see an argument for just labeling double albums as studio albums, as it's somewhat orthogonal to the other types (consider triple albums, double live albums, double compilations, and so on). If we want to support "double album", we should add it to the type and color table (which I moved to {{Infobox Album/doc/type}}), but we may want to add a shorter code for it first (like "double") for consistency with the other codes. Otherwise we can remap "double album" to output "Studio album". --PEJL 06:36, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think double album is appropriate since it is media specific, such as if an album is a 'double album' on 2 vinyls but then fits on one CD. -Joltman 13:00, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Any objections to remapping "Double album" to "Studio album"? --PEJL 05:11, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I've requested this change be made. --PEJL 14:23, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Just noting here that this change was made. --PEJL 14:31, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Label piping

I could have sworn WP:ALBUM#Label said to pipe away suffixes like " Records", but I see now it doesn't. I propose we recommend that, for consistency with Template:Infobox musical artist, to match current practice, and for space reasons. Let's copy the text from the artist infobox but make it slightly more general, by appending the following to the end of WP:ALBUM#Label:

Drop words like "Records" from the end of the label's name (e.g. use [[Universal Records|Universal]] rather than [[Universal Records]].)

That seems quite non-controversial, if it weren't for the fact that our main example infobox does not do this. Any objections? --PEJL 09:07, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps there was less of a space issue for albums because of generally shorter lists (of labels) for an album than for an artist...? Anyway, Template:Infobox musical artist/doc and Template:Infobox Album/doc ought to be consistent, one way or the other. --Paul Erik 22:47, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I believe it's not there, not for the purpose of inconsistency, but because it's a matter of context. If you say in the infobox "label: Columbia Records" then you're overexplaining, when the type is explained under "label". If you say "This album was released by Columbia", you'd be better of with putting the "records" after because some may think you're referring to another Columbia, like a town in Virginia, an Aircraft company, a University. I know I'm talking about the lowest common denominator here, since many people would know it's a record company, it would probably be unencyclopedic to rule it out. --linca^linca 11:57, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry Linca, I don't understand what your position is. Note that WP:ALBUM#Label and the proposal is only about the label in the infobox, not the article body. (I agree that piping away the label is inappropriate in the article body.) In the infobox the phrase "Label: " is always shown before the label, like "Label: Columbia". Do you disagree with the proposal? --PEJL 12:38, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with the statement based on it's tautological nature. You don't (well, I don't) say "I'm going to drive my Nissan car". You simply say one or the other word, as one implies the other. It's implied in the context, and so I don't see the need of having the word "record" in there. Am I not being straightforward enough? I can tend to give too many illustrations and confuse the point. Sorry about that. --linca^linca 11:56, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Wait, call me retarded. I just realised your proposal, which I was "disagreeing with" was actually what I agree with. I misread it thinking you were proposting to remove the piping protocol. Sorry. Yeah, pipe em all. --linca^linca 11:58, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 14:26, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

What's done? Calling Linca retarded? -Freekee 02:31, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Ehh, no, the addition of the italicized proposal above. --PEJL 04:15, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Nominations for deletion via WP:PROD

• From Behind the Shadows 12 August —Preceding unsigned comment added by ceyockey (talk • contribs)
  • Speedy delete A7: Article about non-notable band (decided at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A Thousand Falling Skies) Papa November 11:49, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

And this is being discussed here... why? --linca^linca 11:51, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Because there does not appear to be (to me) an nominations-for-deletion notification mechanism in place for this WikiProject. If one is in place, could you please inform here? Thanks. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:52, 16 August 2007 (UTC) (P.S. I did not sign the listing above as it was a notification and not a comment; I will sign hereafter as a matter of custom for this WikiProject - other WikiProject have not yet raised this question.)

Do you have a reference for this notification convention? WP:PROD contains nothing about notifying WikiProjects. --PEJL 01:13, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

There is no convention. This activity is a test action period initiated by me as the outcome of a discussion on Article for Deletion talk. It was determined that a) there should never be an obligation to notify as a part of policy and that b) it was a matter of good form to conduct some form of notification and c) notification of individual editors was problematic and d) notification of relevant WikiProjects was a reasonably neutral course. Many WikiProject use the resources created by Wikiproject Deletion Sorting now; WikiProject Albums appears to be one of those that does not. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:01, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think using the main talk page is appropriate for this. From User:Ceyockey/Notifying WikiProjects of Deletion Proposals I gather that we can use a separate page either at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Albums or Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Deletion. --PEJL 02:32, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Those are among the more commonly used options, yes. I would be glad to use and encourage the use of either. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 03:30, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• Green Day's eighth album 13 August --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:52, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
• Untitled Nickelback album 13 August --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:01, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• Speedy deleted - author blanked page. No other significant contributions Papa November 07:58, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

When I revamped The Rock Music WikiProject, I made a bunch of titles for a variety of things, from FAC's to AFD's as you can see if you go check it out. Maybe we can do this on a subpage, and interested members can keep it updated. I'd prefer that instead of making notifications on the talk page. There's too many album articles, and this talk page could build up and bury perhaps more important issues that deal with editors questions, and then we have to archive all that...
Ceyockey, I can help you with a subpage if you really insist, and other WikiProject members think it's okay. I'd rather go through the effort of doing that than crufting up the main talk page. -- Reaper X 08:41, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

• I wouldn't exactly characterize it as "crufting up", but I understand your point of not diverting the focus of the main talk page away from the most important and broadly impactful points of discussion and decision making. I think it might be best to get a consensus here as to which direction to go ... get a representation in the Deletion Sorting WikiProject or create a Deletion notification page specifically for this WikiProject. I think that discussion of adding a new topic to the Deletion sorting set would take place at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Deletion sorting/List control. There currently exists Deletion sorting representations for Music, Bands and musicians and Beatles (and some music genres), but not 'albums' or 'songs' per se. It might be useful to simply utilize the existing 'Bands and musicians' page and expand the scope to include 'Albums, songs and other products of bands and musicians'. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 11:53, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I've outline options and what I'm planning to do on the WikiProject Deletion sorting talk page if you would like to visit and comment. Regards, --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 00:59, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Robert Christgau review example

When I click the link at Robert Christgau link I can see no review. The documentation should probably use different example. Jogers (talk) 14:54, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with this site but I checked several random pages using {{Review-Christgau}} and none of the ones with bomb or scissors icon contained reviews. Ones rated with stars contained nothing more than a single sentence. If this is always the case they shouldn't be included in album infoboxes. Jogers (talk) 15:08, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Christgau's reviews have been discussed a number of times in the past. Besides here (most recently at archives 14–16) also at Talk:Robert Christgau#Links to reviews on album article pages and Talk:Robert Christgau#How legit is this guy? --PEJL 15:37, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, he may be "the most famous rock critic in the world" but still the "professional reviews" field is, as the name implies, for reviews not just for ratings or icons without a single word about the album in question. Jogers (talk) 16:06, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I didn't participate in those earlier discussions on Christgau. However, while I think your point has merit, Jogers, my belief is that even a short review and a rating by a professional can legitimately sit in the Professional Reviews section. Cheers, Ian Rose 16:14, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't mind a short review by a world renowned professional but in several cases there is no review at all. In case of the example given at infobox album documentation there is no single word about the album in question, only the bomb icon. Jogers (talk) 16:20, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

In general I agree that reviews with little or no text should not be included. The problem with Christgau is that it is only his "dud" ratings (represented by the bomb symbol) that don't include any review text, while his other ratings do. If we were to include only reviews with text, in practice we'd be favoring the more positive reviews, which doesn't seem very NPOV. As for the example, I believe an example with a "dud" rating was chosen intentionally, to imply that a such reviews/ratings are acceptable to include, as the understanding at the time was that they were. --PEJL 17:08, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

My point is that sole rating doesn't constitute a review. Jogers (talk) 18:04, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Why not? Christgau has reviewed these albums, hasn't he? --PEJL 23:53, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Has he? How can you know if the only thing he said is "dud"? :-) Seriously though, I was always assuming that by reviews we mean professionally written articles not somebody's mental process. A link containing only an icon next to the album name is not useful at all for anyone except those familiar with Christgau's rating system. Jogers (talk) 09:03, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I assume he has, as it would be quite unprofessional of him to give a rating of an album without reviewing it, but will admit that it is difficult to prove. Also agree that these ratings are not useful except for those familiar with his rating system. Still not sure that's reason enough to not include them, as we'd be removing the most negative ratings from one of our main review sources, which could skew the perception of many albums. --PEJL 10:06, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Some people may not even know that they are negative. When I saw the bomb icon for the first time I thought it means that the album is good because of connotations that the word "bomb" has in my native language :-) Jogers (talk) 10:31, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it's ambiguous, see the bomb (positive) vs bomb (positive or negative). --PEJL 11:33, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

The link to the review, even if it's just to a single icon without text, serves to source the information. Besides, these pages usually contain a link to all the artist's albums that Xgau has reviewed. / edg ☺ ★ 03:55, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but it doesn't alter the fact that it's not a review and it's useless to readers unfamiliar with Christgau's rating system. Jogers (talk) 10:04, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Besides, the problem is not with the link. I don't think that this information should be included in the "professional reviews" section of the infobox at all. Jogers (talk) 10:13, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Christgau doesn't publish text reviews for albums he rates as "bomb" — he only publishes the bomb icon. Similarly, the scissors icon is provided with one, or at most two, song titles from the album, no further criticism, and basically means "I like this song/these two songs, but don't have much to say about the rest of the album". There's really no point or value in citing Christgau on here unless he actually reviews an album in text (and even then, we should probably take into account that as influential as he's been, his writing style can be opaque and impenetrable to a novice reader.) Citing him if the review is a bomb or scissors icon doesn't really tell you why he disliked it (or only cared for one or two songs), though, so it's not helpful or useful to our readers. Bearcat 01:19, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Like I mentioned above, I agree that a rating without text is not useful in general, but have concerns because removing such ratings would effectively remove all negative reviews from one of our major review sources, which might cause NPOV problems. --PEJL 02:15, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with including a bomb rating. It does give the opinion of a professional source (if one understands what the symbol means), and it's not much less useful to our readers than a rating from a text article which is not linked, like from a print magazine with no online version. I wouldn't use the scissors icon without including which songs he likes (but personally wouldn't use it at all). -Freekee 04:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Professional review dates

I'd like to standardize the formatting of the dates in the professional reviews section (see last paragraph at WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews). We want the dates to be as compact as possible, but unambiguous and understandable to as many as possible (see issues with ambiguous date formats at Calendar date#Date format). Note that abbreviations such as "Aug" are acceptable in these space-constrained situations (see first bullet point at WP:DATE#Longer periods). Elsewhere dates are usually written as "August 15, 2007" for articles using US standards or "15 August 2007" for articles using UK standards (auto-formatting intentionally disabled for these examples). Given that, here is my proposal:

Because dates are not auto-formatted and space in the infobox is limited, they should be formatted as either "Aug 15, 2007" or "15 Aug 2007" depending on the date format used in the rest of the article.

--PEJL 03:58, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we need dates in the professional reviews section. In the reception/critical reception section, it's really to the discretion of the page author, I consider, wherther it's necessary and, ultimately, appropriate to have the specific date that a review or article was written. I mean, if you have someone wro wrote an inflammatory article about the USA that was printed on September 9, 2001, and then the whole country unites as they did 2 days later, then you might have cause for writing this. Otherwise, it's in my opinion, only appropriate to give a time if it's written drastically after the album's release, or a pre-emptive review written before the author actually heard the album (which got a colleague of mine fired, for the matter, and was cause for Uwe Boll to call a baxing match with several people who reviewed his film poorly despite not seeing it, but simply knowing it's Uwe Boll... but then again, you don't need to drink water to know it's wet... where was I?). Anyway, i don't think it's appropriate to encourage the practice, in short, in long or otherwise. --linca^linca 11:53, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Another reason to include dates is to allow readers to look up reviews in physical magazines. In some cases the dates are available at the link target, but not always. What do others think about discouraging dates? Looking through the archives for old discussions on this topic, I found Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 12#Professional review dates in infobox, which my proposal above is partially in line with. --PEJL 13:00, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

A continuation of this discussion, regarding possibly using an expanding box for reviews, was moved to User talk:PEJL/Template:Proreview#Professional review dates

So, there was some discussion (initially here, then moved to and continued at User talk:PEJL/Template:Proreview) about possibly using templates to show reviews differently than we do now. There are however some technical problems with using templates for this purpose. As that discussion has stalled, I would like to re-propose we adjust the current guideline (which already recommends using dates instead of the word "link"), to standardize the formatting of those dates, per my original proposal above. --PEJL 14:40, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Expert review: KBCO Studio C

As part of the Notability wikiproject, I am trying to sort out whether the albums linked in KBCO Studio C are notable enough for own articles. I would appreciate an expert opinion. For details, see the article's talk page. If you can spare some time, please add your comments there. Thanks! --B. Wolterding 10:15, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

My take on it would be that they are notable, but certainly need some wikifying. Though it may make a very long page, it might be a better idea, based on how short each article is, to merge them into one article. --linca^linca 11:48, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Chronology (yes, again, sorry)

Ok, I know this has been discussed many times in the past, but I haven't seen what looks like a clear resolution on the matter, so I'm going to bring it up one more time. I think excluding live albums from the chronology is ridiculous, and it's not, generally, what we do in practice, and most people agree that all (or at least most) of the cases where we don't do it are perfectly valid and correct, and yet, it still says studio albums only. Heck, I've got one band I've been working on where if I had to leave live albums out, I'd have to leave out their debut. So, I want to bring to this discussion a new issue that I have not seen mentioned in the past (and I just browsed all the talk archives, searching for the word "live"). Nobody else seems to make this distinction!

As a member of Wikipedia:WikiProject Musicians, I have browsed I-don't-know-how-many sites looking for information and references about all sorts of random musician-related topics, and the idea that live albums should be separate from studio seems unique to Wikipedia. Compilations are almost always separate. Singles are almost always separate. EPs vary—they may be listed with singles, they may be listed with albums. In the interest of keeping chronologies focused, I would support putting EPs in with singles on Wikipedia. But live albums should not normally be left out of a chronology. There are cases where exceptions may be justified, as with "Instalive" releases, where there can be so many that they will just clutter up the chronology, but I think those should be treated as exceptions, rather than being used to justify a bad general rule that we mostly ignore anyway. Thoughts? Xtifr _tälk 12:10, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you (though personally, I'd want to put EPs with albums). Jazz discographies include a lot of live albums (Cannonball Adderley, in particular, comes to mind), and there could be big gaps in the chronology if we left these out. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 13:12, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

P.S. This also brings to mind albums such as Impressions (album), Live-Evil, and I Sing the Body Electric (album). They are part-live, part-studio. Are they live albums or not? Do we count the number of live tracks vs. studio tracks? This regards color-coding the infobox, as well as whether they're allowed in the chronology. (Currently all of these are color-coded as studio albums.) -- Gyrofrog (talk) 13:25, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

In my view, live albums should not be omitted from chronologies. BNutzer 11:36, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

In my view, live albums should generally be left out of chronologies. There are certainly important exceptions, where such albums are a defining milestone in the artist's career, for example. Some bands just put out live albums every couple of years, and adding all of those would really clutter up the chronology. Notice that the project page specifies Only studio albums, usually excluding live albums, compilations... I offer my opinion as one explanation for those words. -Freekee 03:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I am suggesting that the project guideline is biased toward rock, or rather, popular music in general. I see your point when an artist releases two or three studio albums, followed by a live album which contains concert versions of the studio material and, more significantly, does not introduce any new material (e.g. David Bowie's Stage, though it is in his chronology; compare it with Jill Scott's Experience: Jill Scott 826+ which does introduce new material and appears in her chronology). With jazz, on the other hand, live albums may contain material completely different from other studio or live albums. If we decide to leave the project guideline with its current wording, that's fine, as the word "usually" provides for exceptions. But I think we want to make sure that we won't have to defend ourselves if we include (for example) Speak, Brother, Speak! in the Max Roach chronology. Thanks, -- Gyrofrog (talk) 13:53, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

This sounds reasonable. How about the following:

Only albums of mainly new material (primarily studio albums, usually excluding live albums, compilations, singles and most live albums and EPs) should be included in the chronology.

--PEJL 14:23, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Gyrofrog, one would hope that such albums in such genres would be included in the chronology, under the "usually excluding" clause, but I wouldn't have a problem with PEJL's wording. However, the first word, "only," is a strong one, so I suggest waiting for a little more feedback. -Freekee 04:09, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

In my view, live albums should generally be left in chronologies. Even if a live album doesn't contain new compositions, it often (usually) includes new arrangements or interpretations of the material. And as I said at the start of the thread, nobody else categorizes live albums separately. The notion perplexes me. How is it "cluttering up the chronology" to include what nearly everyone would consider to be the significant releases of an act's career? Perhaps if Freekee could point to some examples of discographies where he feels the live albums should be excluded, I might have a better idea of what he's talking about, but in general—in general—based on my experience, I think most live albums absolutely belong in the chronology. At most, for those (fairly rare) acts that release lots of unoriginal live albums (and I again, I'd like to see some examples), and for acts that release lots of "instalive" or retrospective "from the vaults" live albums, we might suggest excluding "minor live albums" or words to that effect. But the suggestion that we should "usually" exclude "most" live albums just strikes me as completely wrong. And I think you'll find that—despite what the guideline might say—in practice, most live albums are included in chronologies, suggesting that the guideline does not really reflect a general consensus as it stands (and that Freekee's position is very much a minority one). Xtifr _tälk 07:15, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

How about this wording, that softens "excluding ... most live albums" to "excluding ... many live albums":

Only albums of mainly new material (primarily studio albums, usually excluding live albums, compilations, singles, most EPs and many live albums) should be included in the chronology.

Is this wording acceptable to all? --PEJL 14:57, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Heh, appreciate the effort, PEJL, but I don't really agree with the 'new material' concept as the yardstick for including or excluding live - or any other - albums. I stick with my previous comments on this when it was raised a while back: what goes into a chronology should be what is 'generally' considered significant in the artist's canon, i.e. the best consensus we can arrive at from the literature on the artist. To take my frequent example, Bowie, not only are four of his live albums (David Live, Stage, Ziggy Stardust: The Motion Picture and Santa Monica '72) present in most or all chronologies in major books on him, regardless of how much 'new' material they contained (a song or two each at most) but the compilation ChangeOneBowie even made Rolling Stone's 500 Best list. So I'd really need the wording to allow room for such instances, which it seems to do - if not entirely for the right reasons - re. live albums but not necessarily re. key compilations... Cheers, Ian Rose 15:44, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, here's an example: King Crimson discography. They've got more live albums than studio albums. While you might be able to make a case for a couple of them being definitive enough to be included in the chronology, I'm not sure where you'd draw the line, and I definitely think the chronology as shown is a good one. Another band that I could say exactly the same thing about is Deep Purple discography. As for David Bowie discography The live albums included are not excessive (though I would suggest that Ziggy is not a live album, but a soundtrack). The other half of his live albums, that were not included, do not really lend themselves to being included, do you agree?

Am I really in the vast minority here? This seems to keep coming up, and I'd think it would have been changed by now if I was the only one opposed. Even in this thread, there doesn't seem to be a landslide in favor of inclusion (Xtifr, Ian, Bnutzer without any evidence, and Gyrofrog with an entirely valid point about non-pop genres). If we were to change the wording to allow some live records, how do we do it and still allow editors to include only the more important live releases? Maybe we need to ask what the purpose of the chronology listing is. -Freekee 15:50, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Collaboration task

I noticed that User:Jogers is looking for a new collaboration task. As I mentioned above, I think it would be good to do some maintenance work higher up the quality scale. We've done a lot to improve our low quality articles, but we should also aim to improve our high quality (B-class and above) articles to FA-class. Here are some suggestions for simple things we can do together to ultimately improve our GA/FA count...

• Check that non-free images in our high quality articles have fair use rationales, correct source information and correct license tags
• Check that non-free images are a reasonable resolution (< 300px). Large images should either be tagged with {{non-free reduce}} or replaced and tagged with {{non-free reduced}}.
• Add cleanup tags to B-class articles
• Reformat footnotes using citation templates

Does this seem like a reasonable approach? Papa November 15:28, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't mind the task but it would help if Jogers (or someone else) could create a list which could be whittled down (to be updated and maintained like the others or not). I don't look forward to clicking all the articles in Category:B-Class Album articles to check which articles have fair use rationales.--Fisherjs 16:23, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I think I would be able to create such a list. Jogers (talk) 12:59, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

How is it going with this task? Anybody working on it? -Freekee 02:33, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Soundtrack article naming

Is there a set way to name articles about soundtracks? Is there a standard for all of them, such as 'Title (soundtrack)', 'Title soundtrack' or 'Title (album), or should it be what the album says, like 'Title: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack' or 'Music from the Motion Picture Title'? -Joltman 12:21, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

It's simply [[Title]], [[Title (album)]] or [[Title (artist album)]], if you need to disambiguate that far. Preferably, just go with [[Title (album)]]. --linca^linca 12:25, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I know that's how it works for albums in general, but I figured soundtracks would have their own set of guidelines. -Joltman 12:32, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

In an effort to avoid instruction creep, we try to keep things as consistent as possible. It wouldn't really serve much purpose making things different in the same medium. --linca^linca 12:47, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

At some point in the disambiguation, "soundtrack" would be the preferred disambiguator. According to current rules, since the album likely has the same name as the film, you would call it title (album). If another album has the same title, you normally disambiguate by artist. But soundtracks generally don't have artists, so you'd substitute "soundtrack." Personally, I don't see anything wrong with just starting with "soundtrack" in place of "album," and would support such a change.-Freekee 04:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, lack of artist is a problem indeed. Thinking about this from the point of view of what would have to be changed at WP:ALBUM#Naming (which I think we want to keep as simple as possible), replacing "artist album" with "soundtrack album" for artist-less soundtracks would probably be the simplest solution. See how this would affect the guideline below (insertions usually rendered as underlined and removals as stricken-through):

...In cases where disambiguation is needed, the term (EP) should be used for EPs and (album) for other albums, e.g. Insomniac (album) and Gas Food Lodging (EP). For multiple albums with the same title, use the artist name (or the word "soundtrack" for multiple-artist soundtracks) to distinguish the different albums, e.g. Down to Earth (Rainbow album) and Down to Earth (Ozzy Osbourne album). For artists who release multiple albums with the same nameWhen there are multiple albums with the same name by the same artist (or for the same film, in the case of soundtracks), disambiguate by year, e.g. Weezer (1994 album) and Weezer (2001 album) (unless the albums were released the same year, in which case they can be disambiguated by some commonly accepted convention).

Replacing "album" with "soundtrack" (like we do for "EP") doesn't really solve the no-artist problem at the next step, so those guidelines would need to be tweaked as well:

...In cases where disambiguation is needed, the term (EP) should be used for EPs, (soundtrack) for soundtracks and (album) for other albums, e.g. Insomniac (album) and Gas Food Lodging (EP). For multiple albums with the same title (except for multiple-artist soundtracks), use the artist name to distinguish the different albums, e.g. Down to Earth (Rainbow album) and Down to Earth (Ozzy Osbourne album). For artists who release multiple albums with the same nameWhen there are multiple albums with the same name by the same artist (or for the same film, in the case of soundtracks), disambiguate by year, e.g. Weezer (1994 album) and Weezer (2001 album) (unless the albums were released the same year, in which case they can be disambiguated by some commonly accepted convention).

Another reason to avoid replacing "album" with "soundtrack" is for consistency, as we currently disambiguate all albums (assuming we don't count EPs as albums) using "album". The former solution seems to be more in line with how we handle other albums, which seems appropriate (unless we have a good reason to treat soundtracks differently). --PEJL 10:31, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The other possibility, as I mentioned in my initial post, would be if we used the proper title of the album. Pretty much every soundtrack I've seen says 'Movie: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack' or 'Music from the Motion Picture Movie' or something along those lines. Although I think I do like just using the (album) disambiguator better, but I just wanted to put that out there as another option. While we're on the subject, I notice above it's proposed to use (soundtrack album) for further disambiguation. What about a various artist non-soundtrack compilation? Would it then be (compilation album)? Actually, a various artist soundtrack more-or-less is a compilation album, so should we come up with something that works for soundtracks or compilations, or should we treat them separately? What about replacing 'Artist' with 'various artists', meaning it would be (various artist album)? -Joltman 12:45, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Your alternative to use the proper title as you call it gets us into another topic, which affects more than just soundtracks, which is how much is considered to be the proper title. There are lots of album titles like "Short title: Longer subtitle", where the longer title is often in smaller type, often on a separate line, and often more descriptive than original. The "Original Motion Picture Soundtrack" part is such a longer subtitle. In my experience, articles tend to be named after the short title alone in a majority of cases (I'd estimate about 80% of articles I've seen). It now occurs to me that WP:UCN should apply to these cases, which would mean the shorter title should be used in most cases. --PEJL 14:15, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I like PEJL's proposal. It keeps the added text to a minimum, but it clear, and covers the issue. -Freekee 04:04, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

To be clear, you are referring to the wording with (or the word "soundtrack" for multiple-artist soundtracks)? --PEJL 04:29, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

The second version. (It sounded like you wrote it as a correction for the first.) But I would change the wording to "or for the same film title," since there may be articles on different films with the same title. Not a big deal, but it's a one-word addition. -Freekee 18:29, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

I was actually arguing in favor of the first version, for the reasons stated in the paragraphs before and after it. Sorry if that was unclear. --PEJL 04:41, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Concerning soundtrack albums, I consider the "(soundtrack album)" suffix to the film or TV title the best expedient; I found that the actual TV-series and/or film soundtracks and the corresponding soundtrack albums occasionally differ in Song content. At present, I have a soundtrack album article, Akireta-Deka (soundtrack album), in alpha; the actual article post is contingent upon an article Akireta-Deka about the Tōei Television crime drama series to which the soundtrack album corresponds (see also Wikipedia:Requested articles/Culture and fine arts). Template:Infobox Album is plenty flexible enough for soundtracks, e.g. the Infobox Album from Fatal Beauty (soundtrack album) (the official title of Atlantic SD 81809 being Fatal Beauty – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack):

{{Infobox Album <!-- See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Albums -->
| Name        = Fatal Beauty (soundtrack album)
| Type        = soundtrack
| Artist      = various artisis
| Cover       = ATL81809Front.gif
| Released    = November 1987
| Length      = 35:30
| Label       = [[Atlantic Records|Atlantic]]
| Producer    = David Chackler, Sylvia Rhone
}}

What exceptions, if any, would be recommended? - B.C.Schmerker 07:55, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

The Name parameter should be the name of the album, without the disambiguation suffix. --PEJL 12:40, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Are there articles about soundtracks that aren't about albums? -Freekee 18:30, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Again, I'd like to point out that I don't entirely agree with singling out soundtracks as '(soundtrack album)' when the same issue applies to non-soundtrack various artists albums. I think the better thing would be to use '(various artists album)' or something to that affect, which would apply to all various artists albums, whether they are soundtracks or not. -Joltman 11:40, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

BitTorrent

I've noticed a mini-revert war on The Weakerthans' new album Reunion Tour, regarding the inclusion or exclusion of the fact that the album has been leaked to BitTorrent as of mid-August 2007. This hasn't yet gotten to the point of being a serious revert war, but it's been added and removed a couple of times now, so we should probably clarify nonetheless: should Wikipedia articles on albums include the information that an album has been leaked to P2P networks in advance? Or should we regard that as inappropriate and unencyclopedic trivia? Bearcat 00:57, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

We recently added a guideline about leaks to WP:ALBUM#Dating. --PEJL 02:03, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

It's partly unencyclopedic, but not entirely. It's more that it's potentially libelious and generally is unable to be adequately referenced. There are times where a leak is appropriate to mention, such as when the band draws specific attention to the leak (such as here or here) because of the media attention the leak itself attracts. Generally speaking, though, in 99.9% of cases, it's unencyclopedic cruft. linca^linca 08:38, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

PS: That article, being a stub, is unlikely to support such a claim anyway. It's definitely cruft in that case, because there's hardly even mention of the musical style, release, reception, personnel or recording infomation. A leak is far less important than any of these things. linca^linca 08:40, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth, that guideline doesn't surprise me at all. It seemed to me that the only conceivable reason to add that information to the article would be as a "hey, it's on BT, come and get it!" flag to other users — which seems to me like something an encyclopedia shouldn't be doing anyway. Bearcat 05:02, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

ISTM that what we are talking about is how an album is distributed - would we say whether an album was only available in certain stores? Would we say a certain DJ will be playing the album in full on his radio show next weekend? If not, I doubt if we should mention any P2P at all. --Rodhullandemu 09:59, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

If reliable secondary sources—such as news or magazine articles—report that it has been leaked, then you can consider mentioning it in Wikipedia. If you yourself are reporting the fact that it was leaked—live, from your favorite BitTorrent tracker—then it's original research and does not belong in Wikipedia. Punctured Bicycle 12:00, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Album covers

Album covers are not allowed in discographies. Please read WP:ALBUMS#Discography for further information. I have therefore reverted your edit on The Cramps so the covers have been removed. Please do not reinstate the covers. -- JD554 08:26, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I won't bother with it anymore. I Wish I would have known before I did all of that work a couple of months ago. I must say that I read the link you provided, but, ironically, it appears to be in direct contradiction to the very reason stated in Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria #8 and Wikipedia:Non-free content#Images, which states "Significance. Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding. Non-free media files are not used if they can be replaced by text that serves a similar function." Furthermore, All 10 of the non-free criteria specified at Wikipedia:Non-free_content_criteria are met with album covers; otherwise there would be zero album covers on all of Wikipedia.

Images of the album covers ARE significant, as it allows the user to quickly identify the actual recording, and if they are not, then I suggest that we start a clean-up campaign to remove them all. If text-only is good enough for a discography, then it should be good enough for an album page. Besides, I can't imagine a single record label taking exception with the use of low-res album art being published ANYWHERE, when it only serves to promote their wares. Be that as it is, I will refrain from posting any artwork for which I do not own outright from this point forward. SlimChance 03:05, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Can some others please weigh-in on this? Take a look at the historical pages at The Cramps for the specific issue. SlimChance 03:05, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

This has been discussed numerous times in the past. See for example Talk:The Beatles discography#Problem with album covers. To try to summarize briefly, fair use images such as album covers should only be used to a very limited extent, where album covers in album infoboxes are generally acceptable, but album covers in discographies are generally not. --PEJL 04:29, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree with PEJL that album cover art should be used in limited circumstances. As a rule of thumb, I think it's fine to use it in an article that dedicates at least a few sentences of prose to the album. Obviously, it's OK in the article about the album. It may be OK in an article about the artist or musical genre, if placed next to a section about the album. Just using it to make a list look pretty however, isn't acceptable. I started a discussion here about whether it is acceptable to use album art in a Song infobox for an unreleased single (e.g. Where Is My Mind?) I'd suggest it isn't, but please could I have others' opinions? Thanks Papa November 07:57, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I tend to agree that covers in discographies are more decoration than anything - a discography can easily survive IMO as a simple list or table. In album infoboxes I consider it a no-brainer. I also think they're legit in non-single song articles, as anyone who's seen my work on Bowie album track articles will know. On that subject, I note that my friend Papa November has deleted the instances of the "Heroes" album cover from its song articles and I think it's worth discussing in this forum. I'm not 100% certain if he deleted them because there wasn't a fair use rationale for its appearance in each song article or simply because he considers it unfair use no matter what - I suspect the latter! I'm not fussed from an effort point of view as all the infoboxes for the songs were copies from the first one I did, just changing the track info. However I would argue that as an intrinsic part of the album - where I think we all agree a cover is justifiable - the rationale for including the cover in a song article is similar, and I believe those song articles would be improved by reinstatement of the image. By all means the FUR on the cover image should list each song article and note that fair use is claimed for all of them, as well as for the album article. Anyway, those are my thoughts on the subject... Cheers, Ian Rose 08:52, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

You caught me red-handed, Mr Rose! I've been trying to improve the fair use status of the B-class article images such as Image:DavidBowieHeroesCover.jpg, so I've added a fair use rationale for its use in the "Heroes" article. I didn't feel I could justify its use in the songs articles such as Joe the Lion, so I removed it from those articles rather than adding a fair use rationale. The image should now have a pretty rock solid fair use claim attached to it. My feelings about song articles aren't set in stone, and if there was more of a consensus in favour of it, I'm sure we can put together fair use rationales where appropriate. My issue with use of album art in song articles is that song articles are not necessarily extensions of the album article. As an example, a song may appear on several different albums (e.g. songs recorded jointly by two artists, songs used in soundtracks, greatest hits compilations etc). In this case, would it be fair use to include every album cover in the song article? If not, which cover would be used? Songs are therefore distinguishable from the album(s) containing them and I don't think that the words "from the album..." are enough of a justification for use of the album cover art. Papa November 09:27, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I quite agree that song articles are not necessarily extensions of the album article, and that's a perfectly fair point about songs that appear in many albums, as even non-single (and sometimes quite obscure) tracks will pop up in compilations, soundtracks, etc. However the fact that there may be cases which are 'difficult' in that way shouldn't penalise the cases where the song was written for a studio album and the song articles are pretty clearly an extension of the album article (illustrated by the infobox with its 'From the album...' legend and the song's position in the album track list, etc). Even then there are people who will argue that we shouldn't bother with song articles at all but should just merge them into their 'parent album' articles. As you can imagine, I don't particularly subscribe to that view because I think a comprehensive album article can be long enough without an extensive discussion on each song, particularly when you consider all the cover and live version info you can go into re. individual tracks. To take "Heroes" and "Joe the Lion" for example again, the album cover - and the song infobox as a whole - serves to identify where that track originally came from at a glance, i.e. the album "Heroes". The fact it's appeared on a few compilations doesn't mean we're opening the floodgates for every man and his dog to put other album covers in the article as well. I can't remember ever seeing that in any song article I've had much to do with. If I did see it happening, I'd probably delete them myself. Cheers, Ian Rose 09:59, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd say it's appropriate to use album art in song articles, absolutely. The only thing is that song article should have a good amount of content, and be notable enough. It isn't worth violating #3a of the Non-free content criteria if the album art is used on a bunch of stubs. Besides that, good song articles should absolutely use the album art, because if it we're not for the recording sessions of that album, that song might not exist; it marks it's point of creation. A good illustration for the article. -- Reaper X 17:39, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Language field

Content

As I've mentioned before, there is an undocumented field "Language" in the infobox. AFAICT, it has only been discussed once, just after it was added. I think we should either document this field or remove support for it. I propose we delete it for the following reasons:

1. It is unclear what it refers to. It could mean any of the following (all of which can be different) or a combination:
   • The language of the songs on the album (assuming they are vocal)
   • The language of the title of the album
   • Possibly the primary language of the artist
2. Few articles use this field (279 out of 60420, which is 0.5%, see Category:Album articles with infobox field language)
3. It is the longest label in the infobox (and still would be even if we dropped the "(s)" for consistency with other fields), which means it makes the entire label column wider than normal
4. It is undocumented, and documenting it will require some work, deciding the meaning (see point 1) and other things. For example: Some articles use "Language=English". Should all English-language albums use that? (Probably not.) If not, then should any? (Possibly.) If so, which? And so on...

--PEJL 04:18, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I see it as appropriate. Not all English speaking albums on the English Wikipedia should be indicated, but a notoriously foreign language or notoriously bilingual artist (like Andrea Boccelli, Celine Dion, Ricky Martin, Shakira or Tatu) it might be appropriate to indicate, as all of these artists have multiple releases of some albums that are in English and other languages at the same articles. I propoe we simply define this term and advise that it only be used where an album is:

• In a foreign language
• Has multi-lingual releases
• Is in English by an artist known for their non-English body of work.

I don't know that my terminologies here are correct, but that's how I see it working. I vote against depreciating in favour of clarifying. linca^linca 08:28, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Note that indicating what language an album is in can be done in the article body, it doesn't have to be done in the infobox. If done in the article body, it can be done using proper sentences, and can be done in a way that avoids the ambiguities of something like "Language: French", for example "The lyrics are entirely in French..." or "The title is a French phrase meaning...". If we are to keep the infobox field, we need a clear guideline for what it should mean and when it should be used. --PEJL 09:41, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I thought this parameter was a no-brainer. Well, being one of those users who actually uses this parameter I guess I should provide some input. First of all, infoboxes provide quick info at a glance, so removing the parameter just because you could place the same info within the article itself is not a good reason to remove it. Second, this parameter is wonderfully useful when researching albums by a band from a country whose first language is not English and by a band from a country whose first language is English. Third, all instances of this parameter that I have seen (and didn't edit myself) have used it for what it was intended, to state what language the vocals/lyrics are in. --Leon Sword 01:48, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Since you seem to feel confident in the purpose of this field, would you mind proposing a definition of it? --PEJL 02:39, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm, I just noticed that the template documentation currently does not include a definition for this field, so yes, here is my proposed definition for it:

The Language field is to be used to identify what language or languages are used in the lyrics of the album assuming the music contains vocals. Do not forget to disambiguate and pipe link when necessary. For example, if an album's lyrics are in Swedish, disambiguate it and pipe link it to [[Swedish language|Swedish]].

So what do you think, is this definition good enough? --Leon Sword 01:40, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

It's a good start. We still need to decide when the field should be used. See point 4 above, and the comments by User:Lincalinca. How about something like:

The Language field should identify what language or languages are used in the lyrics of the album (assuming the music contains vocals), unless they are entirely in English by a mainly English language artist. Do not forget to disambiguate and pipe link when necessary. For example, if an album's lyrics are in English and French, you would use [[English language|English]], [[French language|French]].

This also hints at how to delimit multiple languages, where comma-delimitation seems appropriate for consistency with WP:ALBUM#Genre. --PEJL 02:18, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I thought the usage limitation might come up, and I do not think we should limit the usage of the field for the following reason. I listen and research a lot of bands from different countries and I always find it interesting/useful to know that a lot of these bands from Japan, Sweden, Finland actually write/sing their lyrics in English instead of the native language of their countries. I know that a lot of people probably assume an artist/band sings in English if nothing is stated in the article, but I don't think it hurts anyone or anything if we include a seven letter word that verifies the language. Also, commas should be used with multiple languages or with any other multiple something, however, I think we should be allowed to use line breaks if we so desire in addition to the commas. --Leon Sword 00:45, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

I do think we should decide some objective criteria for when this field should be used, if we are to recommend its use. What that criteria should be is of course up for debate. If we were to recommend its use for all artists from non-English language native countries (as I assume you mean) in addition to the cases listed in my proposal, it would mean it would be used in a lot more cases. Sure, "English" is a seven-letter word, but "Language" is an eight-letter word, and more importantly together they occupy at least one additional line in the infobox, which is the main space concern. The infobox should focus on the most important facts about an album, and each possible line in the infobox should include sufficiently relevant information to warrant its existence. As you say, many readers assume the language is English in these cases. For those readers the additional line saying "Language: English" isn't that useful. Also note that the infobox is mainly meant to summarize what is stated elsewhere in the article, not to provide a place to store additional facts about an album, so if we feel it is relevant to mention the language in such cases it should primarily be mentioned in the article body. As for using line breaks instead of commas, I don't really see the point in allowing editors to choose to use either, especially given that we only use commas elsewhere. Is there a specific reason you think this should be supported? --PEJL 08:18, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Defining "non-English language native countries" is a bit tricky. Canada has both English and French as official languages--do we need to list the language for Canadian albums? And if not, then what about India, which has Hindi and English as official languages? (And also more languages overall than any other nation, even including China, I believe.) How would we distinguish the case of India from the case of Canada if we wanted to distinguish them? Also, I question the usefulness of listing, say, Spanish for a Mexican album, Portuguese for a Brazilian album or (especially) Swedish for a Swedish album. In most cases, language will be redundant to nationality. I agree with PEJL's argument that if it's not worth mentioning in the body of the artice, it's not worth mentioning in the infobox. But I don't think we've quite put our finger on when it's likely to be worth mentioning in the body of the article. Perhaps, simply, "The Language field is used to identify the language(s) of the lyrics on the album. This field should only be used if the languages are noteworthy enough to be mentioned in the body of the article." Xtifr _tälk 09:30, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Xtifr, how can you even say that stating the language of the lyrics/vocals will be redundant to the nationality? That is serious stereotyping there. I know plenty of bands from Sweden who release most of their songs in English, I also know plenty of bands from Mexico that release several albums in English as well, I even know bands from Japan that release most of their songs in English as well, so saying language will be redundant to nationality is just wrong. Oh and PEJL, on the actual article only "English" would show up because it would be a piped link. On the bit about line breaks, commas are not used elsewhere, they seem to only be a guideline on this Wikiproject, and I'm not assuming bad faith here, but you PEJL seem to be behind that. While am at it, I would like to know why is there an Album articles with infobox field language category? What is exactly the purpose of this category? I don't see a category for "Album articles with infobox field genre" or "Album articles with infobox field label". I know there's a Album articles without covert art category that while not useful to users/visitors, is useful to editors. But I don't see the usefulness of the Album articles with infobox field language category to either users or editors. --Leon Sword 02:09, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

In addition, if the group is a Brazilian group, but there's no indication of this in the infobox, English-speakers may assume it's in English anyway. So unless PEJL is proposing that we add an "Artist nationality" field, I think language is a good idea in these cases. -- TimNelson 00:39, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Don't have much time to comment now, just some quick notes:

• Leon Sword wrote: "Oh and PEJL, on the actual article only "English" would show up because it would be a piped link." Are you referring to where I said that "Language" is an eight-letter word, in response to your comment that "English" is only a seven-letter word? If so, note that the infobox says "Language: English" (technically without the colon.
• With commas being used elsewhere I was referring to elsewhere in this infobox. Sorry if that wasn't clear. And yes, I was the one who proposed that be standardized.
• As for why there is a category, see #Cfd:Albums without cover art. The idea was to assess how it was used before deciding whether it should be deleted.

--PEJL 04:31, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Ah yes, I was talking about the wikilink itself not the field label that is automatically created. I really don't see the point in turning a simple guideline on the field into a overly detailed rulebook of when to use the field and when not to. It should just be optional just like every other field in the infobox. PEJL will the category be deleted after this discussion comes to a close? --Leon Sword 01:49, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I do see the point in clearly defining how this field should be used. It's currently used in 0.5% of all album articles. Depending on what we decide about when it should be used, it could be that it should be used in 10% of all album articles or 100% of them. That's quite a large change. Having a clear guideline will ensure consistency. As for all other fields being optional, I don't consider very many fields to be optional. Note that WP:ALBUM#Details says: Try to fill in as many of the details as you can. If some details are unknown, leave the section blank or fill it with "???" to make it obvious to other editors that the info is needed. And yes, I intend to nominate the category for deletion after this discussion is over. --PEJL 17:50, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I too believe we should clearly define how this field should be used, however I don't think we should over define when it should be used, which is what TimNelson is proposing. And yes, every other field is optional because any given editor only fills in what he can or wants to. Then any other editor can come and fill in what's missing. --Leon Sword 00:07, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

I've added text about how to use the field, but have skipped defining when it should be used (for now). We should try to come to an agreement on when it should be used as well. --PEJL 10:54, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Layout

How about doing things the way an RFC does. Allow me to propose a sample:

The Language field MUST be used when the album:

• Is in a non-English language, OR
• Has multi-lingual releases, OR
• Is in English by an artist known for their non-English body of work.

Additionally, the Language field MAY be used when:

• The album is in English, but the artist is from a country whose major languages include non-English languages

I guess the points I'm trying to make are:

• Have some specified as MUST, and others specified as MAY. We could also include some SHOULD items.
• We need to specify whether the points are AND or OR

I'm not suggesting that the MUST/MAY items I've listed are the ones to use. I recommend using this section to discuss the layout (ie. MUST/MAY, AND/OR, and that sort of thing), and the section above to discuss the content.

See http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2119.txt for definition of terms

-- TimNelson 00:39, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I still disagree that we need to label all non-English albums (and you mischaracterized my comments above). In many cases, it will be quite obvious that the language is not English. I also think this is getting into instruction creep. That said, something along these lines, but a little more casual, is probably workable. Xtifr _tälk 08:29, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

The RFC 2119 meanings are more or less what I've meant when I've used these words, but I've tried to make them more casual by not uppercasing them or referring to the RFC, because I assume most readers of this guideline aren't familiar with the RFC. --PEJL 17:30, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Chart Ranking

I have just created my first album article (Rattlesnakes (album)), doing my best to provide information as per guidelines. I took the information on the album's charts directly from the article about the band, Lloyd Cole and the Commotions. I do not know where to independently verify these figures, and they are not sourced in the original article. Is there a resource where 1980s songs can be tracked in this way? I'm sure this question has been asked before, but did not find it in a scan for the first few pages of your lengthy archive. Apologies if I'm accidentally hitting on a FAQ. :) --Moonriddengirl 20:21, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Deletion sorting

I have created a new deletion sorting page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Albums and songs, which emerges from discussions here and here. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 11:35, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Untitled hidden tracks?

I was working on Minority Rules, and came across an interesting problem. The album has four hidden tracks, with the first one being all silence and the last three being songs that don't appear to have names. Any ideas on what to do? I've searched over the net for names of the songs, but haven't found anything. As it is, I labeled the silent track silence and the other ones Untitled hidden track. I didn't use quotes for any of these, because I think quotes would only be used on a proper title. Anyone have any opinions on how to handle this? -Joltman 15:32, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Makes sense to me, unless and until someone can determine the actual titles. -- Gyrofrog (talk) 15:38, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Note that WP:ALBUM#Track listing actually has text about how to handle untitled tracks, saying that the word Untitled should be used (without quotes). This was added after a discussion here. I'd use Untitled (silence) – 1:11 and Untitled (hidden track) – 3:12. --PEJL 17:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

In the case of Minority Rules, you'll find the track names on the sleeve of the album with the credits, almost exactly like the sleeve for Double Allergic by Powderfinger, which had 4 hidden tracks. In cases where this is not presented, PEJL's suggestion is what I would agree with, or an alternative would be to simply not note a name on the silence tracks (such as track 13 issues like on Room For Squares). linca^linca 02:08, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Unless we have a good reason not to, I think the Double Allergic and Room for Squares examples should be updated to use the method in WP:ALBUM#Track listing. --PEJL 05:20, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Help needed for "Help" album title

No, not Help! I'm referring to Help- A Day in the Life, which — I'm hoping everyone here agrees — is a poor choice of article title. Please see my comment at Talk:Help- A Day in the Life#Bad title and reply there. - dcljr (talk) 18:39, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Project page instructions too long?

One thing I like about our Project page, as compared to other projects, is that everything is on one page. The problem is that it's getting a bit long. Half of the page is devoted to the infobox instructions. It's all transcluded, so I'm not sure how tough it is to change that. I certainly don't recommend reducing the amount of instruction at the template documentation page, but can we only transclude half the page, and cut it off at the advanced usage (and put a "see here for more info")? I'm guessing not, but does anyone have any suggestions or thoughts? -Freekee 16:02, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

We can do that. In fact I just did so. Comments? --PEJL 16:11, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Works for me. It seems like the information is just as easily accessible, but no longer intrusive for the masses who aren't likely to use it. (Like, say, me. :)) It never specifically bothered me, but length of page does impact readability. --Moonriddengirl 16:20, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Looks good to me too. Thanks a lot! Though I think we should include a little bit about the other things that are listed in the advanced usage sections. I'll do that later if no one else does. -Freekee 16:30, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I just made some adjustment (very minor ones) to reduce the width of the tables as it was wrapping outside of the screen for me (and I'm not on a small screen, so I can just imagine it'd be a paid for anybody on anything from 21" and under). I edited the navbox and the to do list and it seems to have helped it a bit linca^linca 01:44, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

List2 update note

The list of stub-class articles with more than 2000 characters and containing "personnel" or "credits" section has been updated according to the latest database dump. Jogers (talk) 15:59, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Assessment

The project page used to have album-specific guidelines for how to classify articles. For example, we used to say that an article needs an infobox, personnel and track listing sections, and a paragraph of text to qualify as Start class. What happened to this text? There is now only a bare mention of assessment in the album template section (and a mention in the To Do list). Did we decide that such guidelines were no longer accurate? Or useful? There still isn't very much album-specific info on the Assessment page. What's up? -Freekee 16:16, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

It's been moved to /Assessment. --PEJL 16:50, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

No, it doesn't seem to have been moved there. That page has been in existence for a long time. We used to have our basic guidelines on the main project page, and then we linked to that page. I've been wanting more detailed album-specific guidelines for a long time, and now we've gotten rid of the few that we did have. -Freekee 19:19, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, the edit summary says it was moved. --PEJL 20:19, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

I put the album specific guidelines in the table here. It contains everything that was in the original list, along with all the discussed changes. Did I miss something out? Papa November 00:42, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Nope. I just missed it. Sorry to bother you. =8-( Though I would like to see a little more mention of assessment on the project page. -Freekee 05:19, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Do we really need a "professional reviews" section in the infobox?

1. Articles on books (e.g. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone) and movies (e.g. The Godfather) don't.
2. There is no good criteria—and in my opinion, can never be—for deciding which reviews belong in the infobox. Dark Side of the Moon, for example, has probably had hundreds of reviews written about it. Listing every review would be absurd, but listing arbitrary reviews—the current practice—is biased.
3. Many reviews cannot be quantified into stars or microphones, requiring editors to interpret the review themselves using overly simplistic catchphrases like "favorable" or "unfavorable". There is no good criteria for how this should be done either.
4. It is unclear what value the section gives to the reader. You cannot provide a quick overview of critical reception in the same way as you can release date and length. Critical reception is a complex issue that can only be properly laid out and synthesized through prose. Ratings without the reviewer's accompanying reasoning are essentially meaningless. By painting an oversimplified and selection-biased picture, we are just warping the reader's perception of the album.
5. The only value, in fact, appears to be convenient links to All Music Guide (as well as free publicity for them). Often, that is the only link (or one of the few), even for popular albums.
6. There has been an absurd amount of energy wasted over how to properly represent ratings (as well as our own catchphrases) in the infobox. Numerous debates have occurred, and new templates emerge frequently. There is no end in sight.
7. They are essentially external links. External links normally go at the bottom of the page.

Punctured Bicycle 13:34, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I hadn't really thought about it before, but I have to admit that you make a strong case. Xtifr _tälk 11:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I've no issue with Professional Reviews in album infoboxes per se but you make some valid points. Responses to individual items:

1. True, and you could also argue why don't we have them in singles infoboxes as well - consistency across WP arts projects is a constant challenge.
2. Yes, there are potentially many reviews that could be included and we have to rely on the collective judgement of editors to pick a limited but reasonable cross-section - but then the same principle holds for the info that goes into the rest of the article.
3. Wholeheartedly agree with this one; I've raised the same issue myself previously but it didn't generate much interest at the time. Even if Professional Reviews remain in the infobox, I'd like to see this simplistic interpretation of reviews eliminated entirely.
4. I'd agree the main value with this section is in having links to full online reviews - anything else is questionable.
5. Valid observation, perhaps one is better than none though.
6. No argument there.
7. Yes, essentially external links but of a specialised kind, i.e. reviews. I do see some convenience in them being grouped together at the top of the article.

Cheers, Ian Rose 13:06, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Ian Rose that grouping them is valuable and with Punctured Bicycle that the infobox may not be the best place to group them. Personally, I think that a Professional Review section might be appropriate, perhaps as a component of the existing "critical reception" suggestion. --Moonriddengirl 13:36, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think they're the sort of info we should have in the infobox. I would much rather see them limited to a "critical reception section." On the other hand, such a section ought to be limited to prose. Unless no prose has been written yet. Or if enough notable reviews have been done that we use a bulleted list to show a summary in addition to the prose. *shrug* I'll give you a weak support for removal. -Freekee 03:27, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

What about including a subsection of external links, specifically for links to reviews? --Moonriddengirl 12:29, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I would like to see reviews in a text (prose, list or both) section. If this is the case, I think the reviews should be referenced, and would then appear in the References section as footnotes. -Freekee 05:22, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I view them as being put there by fans with a 'barnstar' mentality – badges of honour to flag up official approval of one's favourite band/album. Let's face it, there are very few 1 star reviews shown. Perhaps it's also to pre-empt charges of non-notability, but I still say its mainly a vanity exrecise by fans and personally ignore them when viewing entries. Ricadus 13:21, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Reviews with a low rating are often removed, probably by fans. That's something to keep an eye out for. As I've argued before, this is also a reason to keep Christgau's lower ratings, even though they are very short. --PEJL 13:33, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

"Personnel" vs. "Performers"

I've written many album articles and wanted to raise a point that always bugs me: I don't think "Personnel" is the correct word to use as the section title. In the articles I've written I've generally used "Performers" instead because that's really what the section is: a list of who performed what instruments/vocals on the album. The other information about studio contributors (mixers, engineers, cover artists, etc.) I usually put in a section immediately after titled "Album information" which also lists recording/engineering/mixing dates & locations and other such pertinent info from the album's liner notes. I realize that if you're listing both performers and studio contributors in the same section then "Personnel" may seem like a better title, but it just doesn't sound right to me. It sounds like we're describing a military operation or something. According to Wiktionary, "personnel" are "employees [or] office staff," when what we are really listing in this section are "performers," who are "one who performs for, or entertains, an audience." Basically I'm bringing this up because some other members of the project have changed the section title in some articles I've written to "Personnel," even though the section only lists the musicians. It's mainly those cases where I feel that term is incorrect.

Perhaps a decent way to deal with this be to use ==Personnel== or some other agreed-upon term as the overall section title, but then to have subsections for ===Performers=== and ===Studio contributors=== within the same section?--IllaZilla 16:06, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Note that including only musicians is acceptable for start-class articles, while B-class articles must include technical personnel as well. See WP:ALBUMA#Quality scale. For reference, the discussion that led to "Personnel" being chosen is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 17#Standardizing the credits section header. --PEJL 16:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I'm against using "Personnel" as well, it's such an ambiguous term. For album articles I work on I use "Credits" and then use the subheadings "Musicians" and "Album production" to separate performers and the non-performing people behind the album. I think this is more clear because most albums (and other media such as movies, video games, etc.) use the term "Credits" when referring to the part in the media where you can see the information about who did what on the album or video. --Leon Sword 00:18, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Very very bad idea to go off on your own creating your own private standards. If you dislike the current standards, you should lobby to have them changed, rather than inflicting more unprofessional-looking inconsistency on Wikipedia. That said, I have no preference on the terminology, but would like to point out that changing from the current standard will require changing thousands of articles. Is it really that big a deal? I suppose we could try to recruit a bot if there's a strong consensus to change. Xtifr _tälk 11:28, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Agree completely with Xtifr. --PEJL 11:33, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I myself think they should be separated and did exactly that on an album yesterday which I see I must now go and standardize. :) The idea of changing thousands of articles is not fun. Can bots really do that? </technologically clueless> --Moonriddengirl 12:33, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, bots can do that, and fairly easily, at least within certain limits (anything that involves making an intelligent decision or distinction is going to be beyond them). But for the most part, we have quite a bit of leeway in discussing changes here. Xtifr _tälk 20:11, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Disagree with Xtifr. One thing I'd like to point out: though we here at this project are trying to improve articles about albums, none of the "standards" that we may agree on here are policies or even guidelines about how to write album articles. WikiProjects are collaborative efforts, not policy makers. Not every album article needs to have exactly the same format in every place, so there is room for different uses of "Personnel" or "Credits" or whatever term/format an editor chooses to use, as long as it communicates the information clearly. If someone thinks they've come up with a better way and used it in articles, that in no way implies that we have to "standardize" all other album articles to fit that model. So there's no need to chastize Leon Sword for his method, or to say it creates "unprofessional-looking inconsistency." Some of us weren't aware that collaborations like WikiProject Albums existed when we began writing, so we used terms and formats that worked for us and that we thought looked professional. Even though an idea is generally accepted here, there may be other editors outside or even (in my case) within the project who have other ideas. There is room for diversity of opinion and of method in Wikipedia, even though we are working toward a common goal. --IllaZilla 16:21, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

As seen in the archived section, I prefer "Personnel," and I certainly don't think it sounds impersonal. While I think our rules should be given deference because we've had a lot of people look at them, and also because standardization is a good thing, they shouldn't be seen as straitjackets. I would say that some of our rules are more important than others, and this is one of the less important ones. -Freekee 22:14, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Also, I'm glad that you bring it up in the first place. We are always open to possible improvements. And if the community doesn't agree with the proposed change, it gives us a chance to explain why the rules are as they are. -Freekee 22:16, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Wow? What the-? I make one comment about a preference and suddenly you guys jump on me like I have violated some Wiki policy. I too would like to point out that wikiprojects are not policy makers and all the "guidelines" we set here are optional. You know suddenly I feel like quitting this Wikiproject if such an attitude is what I get for participating in it. By the way, I never said I wanted to change the current guidelines the wikiproject follows. --Leon Sword 04:20, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Consensus is official policy, and guidelines are determined by consensus. Guidelines can change because consensus can change, but they're still reflections of consensus. When you blithely ignore the only consensus we have so far to set off on your own to apply your own private standards, without any attempt to discuss whether the current consensus is appropriate or justified, that is against policy. If you want to get picky and technical. On the other hand, you are here, discussing the matter, so that's all to the good. As I said before, I don't care what terms we decide to use, but I do care about consensus and consistency and the five pillars. If you want to change, and you're willing to come here and discuss it, that's excellent. If you want to change, and don't care what anyone else thinks, and are determined to do your own thing no matter what consensus may arise, that's bad. If you really don't believe that you're able to go along with whatever consensus may arise, then perhaps you're not temperamentally suited to be editing Wikipedia at all. But I hope that's not what you meant, and it's certainly not what I intended to imply. (p.s., I'm not a member of this project, but I still try to follow its guidelines.) Xtifr _tälk 05:02, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

With your reasoning you have just promoted all guidelines and wikiprojects to policy. Yes, Wikipedia:Consensus is an official policy but you're misusing its definition. Anyways I never set out to "blithely ignore the standards here and apply my own private standards" I was not aware that this wikiproject preferred "Personnel" over anything else, until I noticed this section in this talk page. However, now that I'm aware of this "guideline" I still think "Credits" is better for the simple reason that it's a common standard in the real world. --Leon Sword 05:39, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

No, I'm not trying to promote guidelines to policy. I think we're all aware of the differences. I'm simply pointing out that they're not entirely "optional" because they are grounded in policy. Anyway, I obviously read too much into what you said originally about your editing—if you were unaware of the guidelines at the time, then your behavior was beyond reproach. Nevertheless, now that you are aware, discussing the standard rather than ignoring it is the right thing to do, as I pointed out. And since that is what you're doing, everything is copacetic, and everybody should be happy. I know I am. As for your proposal, I think it sounds reasonable, but I suggest that you contact the people who formed the previous consensus to see if they might be willing to change their opinions. Cheers, Xtifr _tälk 09:00, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

That's sort of what I was getting at with this discussion initially, was proposing a change to see if I could get any support or consensus for it. Getting back to point, I really like Leon Sword's idea of using "Credits" and the subheadings "Musicians" and "Album production." I feel those are more accurate and specific than "Personnel." Does anyone agree or disagree, or have another suggestion? --IllaZilla 06:10, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Note that I wasn't trying to suggest that anyone was ignoring any guidelines purposely, just that it would be a bad idea to do so. Like I mentioned in the previous discussion, I think the term should be standardized, but have no strong preference on which term is chosen. As I wrote there, "Credits" and "Personnel" are the two most commonly used terms, so using one of those will mean less work with updating articles. Since this was standardized to "Personnel", I've updated quite a few articles to use that (from "Credits", "Performers", "Musicians", "Line-up" and others). I have no problem with changing "Personnel" to something else, if there is consensus to do so. We should try to avoid changing standards back-and-forth too much though. I'd also like to point out two arguments made in the previous discussion in favor of "Personnel". Firstly that it makes it clear that only persons should be listed, not studios and companies. Secondly that it makes it clear that persons should be listed first, rather than last. As what "sounds better" is often quite subjective, I give these types of arguments more weight. --PEJL 07:30, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Ho-hum. As I think I said last time the issue of this wording was raised, I don't lose a lot of sleep over the section title used, nor about the wording being consistent across all articles. That said, I prefer Personnel (for similar reasons to those PEJL has articulated above) and I prefer articles to be consistent. If we are to change from Personnel, I'd support Credits as the best alternative - Performers is inappropriate for a section that can include technical/production roles. If we were to standardise subheadings underneath Personnel, I'd probably go for Musicians and Production ("Album production" is redundant, the article's all about an album). But from a practical point of view I'd recommend against changing from Personnel - it seems quite satisfactory to me. And if there was a new standard adopted, I'd hope a bot can be used to implement it - I for one can't see myself volunteering to change a few thousand articles, there's more important work to do. Cheers, Ian Rose 09:06, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

"Musicians" and "Production" seem like good choices, if we are to standardize the next level. "Production" already exists in quite a few articles. So does "Additional personnel", which seems less appropriate as it is longer yet devoid of meaning. Hmm, perhaps "Performers" would be better than "Musicians", as the former more obviously includes vocalists. Isn't "Personnel", "Performers" and "Production" a nice combination? On the other hand "Musicians" might be more widely understood. Like I said, I have no strong preference. --PEJL 10:53, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

The distinctions aren't always clear, and sometimes people may fit into multiple roles (as with a performer/producer, probably the most common example). Also, if we're going to subdivide it, we're going beyond the bounds of what a bot can do. For both those reasons, I think it's better to stick with a single section, or at least make subsections optional. There's also a question about programmed digital effects (which may be added by either the producer or by musicians)--is that performing? Or production? With modern digital production (and with some older non-digital production), the distinction between musicians and producers can often be blurred. Xtifr _tälk 11:41, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it matters enough to hire a bot for the task. Sounds like a change it only if you happen to be editing the article anyway kind of task. And I don't think it's a problem to have people listed in both the performers and production sections. Is it okay to put album cover artists in the production section? -Freekee 15:32, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

But what about people where it's unclear whether they belong in the performers or the production sections? As with digital effects? Also with sampling and remixing, the borders between production and performance are increasingly becoming blurred in a lot of modern music. Xtifr _tälk 20:22, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I prefer not to use headers to separate the lists, partly for that reason. I usually just use bulleted lists separated by a blank line. If I feel the need to combine them into one list, I can just omit the blank line. I can also add another blank line to separate band members from hired musicians. I prefer a little flexibility here. -Freekee 05:13, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

If it's unclear in which section they belong, either should be fine. I'd prefer either using a single list or multiple lists in separate subsections with subheadings. Using subheadings will make it easier for a reader to find the information they are looking for in general, even if we account for cases when the grouping is unclear. This will hold especially true if we standardize the headings. --PEJL 05:38, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Well I see the valid arguments made in favor for using "Personnel" over "Credits", but I think that if the main reasons for using "Personnel" are simply to imply to editors to only list people and to list people first, then it would be much better to simply include that wording into the guideline. So what if we standardized the section title to "Credits" but included in the section usage guideline that only people should be listed and they should be listed first? --Leon Sword 19:04, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

The more I think about it, the more I'm inclined to agree with you. Why should the section be limited to individuals? In a lot of cases, the entire band will be credited with production, but I don't think it's appropriate to change that to listing each member as a producer if that's not what the credits on the album say. Further, if credits for production or editing or mixing or whatnot are given to a company, I don't see any reason we should leave that out. In many cases, producers or editors are credited as a company when it's really a one-man operation. I think we should just include the credits, call them credits, and be done with it. Xtifr _tälk 20:28, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that using the term "personnel" necessarily limits the listing to individuals only. Companies or groups are made of people. -Freekee 05:13, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

In response to Leon Sword, using "Personnel" to imply to editors the preferred format rather than explaining it in the guideline (which we more or less already do) has the advantage that it conveys the format to those editors who don't read the guideline, which will likely be the vast majority. --PEJL 21:37, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Lyrics

I think lyrics should be added to all pages about an album. It just seems like it makes sense to have everything about the album. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.239.198.12 (talk) 18:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

See WP:ALBUM#External links. --PEJL 18:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

There are copyright issues regarding lyrics – you cannot publish them (including display on a web page) without permission of the owner. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ricadus (talk • contribs) 18:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I note that the project proposes "Appropriate links may include links to chords or lyrics for the tracks on the album. Note however that lyrics may be protected by copyright, and external resources that reprint lyrics may be violating that copyright, in which case they should not be linked." I take that to mean that if the lyrics are published on a reasonably official site, such as the band's official website or that of the record label, then it would be appropriate to provide a link to that source? I've never done it, just curious. --IllaZilla 19:20, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Note that "should not be linked" is linked to Wikipedia:Copyrights#Linking to copyrighted works, which suggests that that would be acceptable. --PEJL 20:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Separation

I feel that genres / producers etc. should be separated by a break rather than a comma. It looks much more organised and is easier to read, especially for people on lower resolutions. SouperAwesome 03:58, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I completely agree with you, SouperAwesome. --Leon Sword 04:24, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't really understand the lower resolution argument. The infobox is a fixed width. The text in the infobox does not wrap differently on a lower resolution. As for which looks more organized, that's quite subjective. IMO using commas looks more organized. I also find lists delimited using commas easier to read, simply because there is a visible delimiter (a comma).

See for example the section for the label at the infobox at Courtney Love. "Sympathy for the Record", "Industry" and "Caroline" seem like plausible names of record labels. (There isn't an Industry Records, but there is an Industrial Records.) Using a comma avoids this ambiguity. --PEJL 07:11, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Further to that, on a lower resolution vertical space is limited as well. Using commas makes the infobox more compact, which means there is a lower likelyhood that scrolling will be required. --PEJL 10:34, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree that commas should be used for the same reasons you present PEJL, what I disagree with is that we should be restricted from using line breaks. Ideally I would prefer if we used both commas and line breaks. I really don't think having to scroll through a page bothers too many people since it has to be done on a majority of websites already and the only articles you probably wouldn't have to scroll through are stubs. --Leon Sword 19:13, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Using commas and line breaks is certainly better than just using line breaks. Personally I prefer a more compact display so that values ideally fit on a single line. I tend to use {{nowrap}} in some cases to tweak how multi-word phrases wrap, where this doesn't cause more line breaks than not using it would. --PEJL 21:47, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote lower resolutions. I do feel that it's much easier to read something seperated by line breaks than just commas, but I think that using both commas and line breaks is also good. SouperAwesome 06:53, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Release date

It says the date in the infobox should be the earliest known date. So that means you don't add the U.S. release date of Curtis (Sept. 11, 07), instead we add the EU date, Sept. 7, but what are we supposed to do about the article body, still say it was Sept. 7? --- Who's the one you call Mr. Macho? The head honcho, swift fist like Camacho 21:04, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

In the article body you may mention multiple release dates and explain what region they correspond to. In this case, mentioning at least the European date and the U.S. date in the body of the article seems quite appropriate. --PEJL 05:13, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Artist cats should match article

One of PEJL's recent grammatical edits highlighted something I hadn't noticed before. Under categories, it says, "For consistency, the artist name should be the same as the title of their article (in terms of punctuation, "&"/"and", use of "The", etc.) excluding any disambiguating terms" (emphasis mine). Categories that lack the disambiguating terms are routinely renamed at WP:CFD to match the full article name (usually with no dissent), so I don't think this correctly describes consensus. I was bold and removed the highlighted phrase. If anyone really thinks it should be re-added, they can explain why here. Xtifr _tälk 12:32, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

We're supposed to have categories named Category:Cake (band) albums? Like nobody understands that Cake is a band, even though it's followed by the word "albums." This is contested? You've got to be kidding me. I think Category:Cake albums is fine. I could see it if there would be confusion. Let's say there's a band named "Photo." Category:Photo albums could be very confusing, indeed. -Freekee 03:20, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It's a matter of consistency. Consistency with the lead article is something that's usually valued highly at CfD. Of course, it's the ambiguous or confusing ones that are brought for renaming most often, and I don't personally feel strongly about the unambiguous ones. But at the very least, we shouldn't flatly forbid using disambiguating terms, since that directly contradicts a broader consensus. I could see something like "with the possible exception of disambiguation terms", though, which would leave it open. Note that there's also cases where there are multiple musicians with the same name, and again, disambiguation is required there. Xtifr _tälk 09:56, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

How about: "...excluding any disambiguating terms (unless needed to disambiguate the category)"? --PEJL 10:20, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

That would contradict precedent at CfD. Matching the full main article name (including disambiguating terms) is always allowed--in fact, it's been proposed as a speedy-renaming criterion. And while I don't necessarily want to make dab terms mandatory (although some people do), I definitely do not want to forbid them under any circumstances. Xtifr _tälk 11:52, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It's definitely a good idea not to contradict policy. I wouldn't say anything more than necessary, though. -Freekee 01:50, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, it's not policy yet. And, although I saw someone mentioning having nominated it as a speedy rename criterion, I haven't tracked down where that discussion is located. But it is a strong consensus, affecting more than just album categories. For example, Category:Kings of Georgia (country) was renamed to have the dab tag for consistency, even though the state hasn't had any kings. But consensus can change, so I agree that a neutral stance on the matter is probably the best position for the project to take. Xtifr _tälk 08:32, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

To be as useful as possible for editors, I think it would be better if we described what they should do, rather than remain vague on the issue. If there is consensus for including the disambiguators in general, I think we should mention this. If consensus changes, we can change our guideline as well. How about: For consistency, the artist name should be the same as the title of their article (in terms of punctuation, "&"/"and", use of "The", and even any disambiguating terms). --PEJL 10:15, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I've noticed before that you and I, though we agree on many things, tend to disagree on the value and importance of Wikipedia:Avoid instruction creep. I'd still prefer neutrality to avoid creep, but if we must say something, then your suggestion sounds good. Xtifr _tälk 19:14, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe that an editor that reads that section may well make the reasonable assumption that disambiguating terms should not be included. It's what I would have assumed, it appears to be what Freekee assumed, and the old wording ("minus any disambiguating terms of course") shows that the original author assumed so as well. I feel it is quite useful to mention what should actually be done, since it's clearly not obvious to all. In the interests of decreasing our instruction creep, how about we simplify this to: For consistency, the artist name should be exactly the same as the title of their article (even including any disambiguating terms). --PEJL 19:41, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

(outdent) The current phrasing is For consistency, the artist name should be the same as the title of their article (in terms of punctuation, "&"/"and", use of "The", etc.). I think this is good because (1) it keeps instruction creep to a minimum, (2) allows editors to include disambiguation if they wish to follow a certain consensus, (3) allows editors to exclude disambiguation if they wish to follow common sense (IMO). -Freekee 17:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Well (1) the current phrasing longer is than my proposal, so depending on what you mean by instruction creep, it does not keep it to a minimum. (2) assumes that editors know about the consensus, which given this thread seems unlikely. (3) doesn't seem very appropriate if there truly is broad consensus on this issue. That said, I'd rather have this dab instruction in some general category guideline, to which we could defer. --PEJL 18:21, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

(1) That one would also be great without the parenthetical phrase. (2) My point was that we don't direct them to do it either way. (3) The common sense way is to only disambiguate the cat if it helps with comprehension. I would rather not instruct editors to do it any other way. Nor would I direct them to violate this strange consensus. So I suggest leaving the instruction as vague as possible, while still giving direction to name articles in a way that makes sense. If it makes you feel any better, a strict interpretation of For consistency, the artist name should be exactly the same as the title of their article, could be to include the disambiguation.

This whole thing bothers me. First of all, we have been told since day one, not to disambiguate reflexively. And now a group with a consensus is changing that, and thereby adding a whole level of uselessness in category titles. It goes against common sense. It pisses me off. I will say no more on the subject. -Freekee 05:00, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I understand your issues with the matter, but "don't disambiguate reflexively" still applies to articles. I would say that the new guideline which is evolving is "don't disambiguate reflexively, but once you do decide to disambiguate a name, do so consistently." Which doesn't strike me as being that far from common sense. Xtifr _tälk 20:22, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Using templates in albums & songs

Has anyone seen how the Finnish Wikipedia is formatting the albums and songs? There are templates for both album and song. Those templates would be quite easy to adapt also here, wouldn't they? Even I might be able to do that at some time. Lasse 13:38, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

See WP:ALBUM#Discography, and note that there are no explicit guidelines for how a discography should be formatted. (Those templates are for discographies, right?) --PEJL 13:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Sample articles for albums & songs etc.

There is also a very good sample article of an album at the Finnish pages. I found only one other example so far from a project page. Is there a collection of sample pages somewhere that I have not peeked? Please let me know. Lasse 13:38, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

There are currently 20 FA class articles, see Category:FA-Class Album articles. Will any of those do? --PEJL 14:05, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

musicemissions.com spam

Hi, I hope this is an appropriate place to post this. I work with WikiProject Spam and we recently found several accounts spamming musicemissions.com reviews (see the spam report available at this link for the next few days and then in the September archive.) While we have found some definite spammers there are also good faith additions by long standing editors, so it's clear some people think this link is appropriate in some circumstances. Do you have any process for watching for this sort of thing - or can you provide advice or assistance in controlling the links that are spam? Thanks -- SiobhanHansa 01:16, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

We have a list of notable review sources that are commonly included but should not be (at WP:ALBUM#Non-professional). At this page I found the following: How do I become an editorial reviewer? Open up an account on Music Emissions and start posting your fine "user reviews". Once you have reached a certain threshold (25 reviews) a red light goes off in our offices and alerts us that we have a "hot reviewer". Our editors will have a look at your writing quality and if it is above average we will contact you and approach you about being an esteemed editorial reviewer. Start writing. My interpretations of our guideline (at WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews) is that this should qualify these reviews as a professional reviews. --PEJL 10:27, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I understand these can be appropriate links - it's the inappropriate spamming of the site I'm concerned about and how to distinguish between appropriately added reviews and spam. For the most part the editors we identified did not add other content to Wikipedia or reviews from other sites, they simply promoted the musicemission reviews - which is pretty much our definition of spam. Is this not something that has come up before? -- SiobhanHansa 14:21, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I've seen that happen before with less professional sites, where an editor's entire history is adding reviews from one particular site. In that case it's pretty blatant spam, since their only goal on WP appears to be to promote a particular website. My past response has been to leave a polite notice on the user's talk page explaining WP's spam policies and our agreed-upon criteria for reviews, and to revert where appropriate. Also PEJL, my interpretation of Music Emission's criteria as you posted above is that the site will post almost ANY "user review," but only certain people are given the status to post "editorial reviews." In that case I would say that the "user reviews" are definitely not professional and should be excluded, and it's highly likely that those are the reviews being added. --IllaZilla 15:00, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

If you look at any of the reviews from that site, you'll see that the link is always to an editorial review. User reviews (if any exist) are shown below the editorial review, in a clearly marked section. So I don't think user reviews were being added, or can be added. --PEJL 15:17, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

In that case it looks fine, though I'd still guard against editors whose agenda is to blanket WP by mass-adding links to one website, as that's still viewed as spamming. --IllaZilla 15:24, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I have added an explanation to the discussion on the wikiproject Spam. There are some problems which seem to come up, and I think that it should be streamlined somewhere. I have earlier blacklisted another review site (though that was mainly to stop the sock-attack they applied, the spam-bots went nuts), but I indeed feel that this case is more in good faith than that.

Still, these accounts were performing link additions only, with a quite single point-of-view: adding their reviews. The template albums have does in my humble opinion also invite this a bit. There are several links there, and it is then only a small step to add your professional review as well. That does result in some cases in true linkfarms (see e.g. this, 18 reviews. Would that comply with 'Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files'?).

I have suggested the editors to contact an appropriate wikiproject (I will add a link here to that suggestion), and I think that will be the way forward. I am now inclinded to treat such additions of links by accounts as spam, until the reviews are endorsed by this wikiproject as notable (and have been added to e.g. the list on WP:ALBUM). Additionally, would it be feasable to restrict the number of reviews in the boxes, e.g. via a guideline? Thanks. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 19:46, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

As I noted before, reviews from Music Emissions appear to pass our criteria for professional reviews. We don't have a white-list of acceptable review sources; the sites listed at WP:ALBUM#Review sites are merely examples. Note also the discussion above about moving the review out of the infobox. Restricting the number of reviews does sounds like a good idea, see below. --PEJL 20:21, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Restricting the number of reviews

More instruction creep and randomness: I propose we add the following:

Include no more than ten reviews. When choosing which reviews to include, consider the notability of the review source and keeping a neutral point of view.

--PEJL 20:21, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I support that. In some cases there are way too many reviews and it becomes just a repository of links, even if most or all of them are reliable & professional. One criteria I would suggest for selecting reviews is giving priority to ones that are contemporary with the album. For example, a Rolling Stone review of a Jimi Hendrix album taken from an issue published around the time the album was released would carry more weight than a review written in 2007 on, say, All Music Guide or Pitchfork Media. --IllaZilla 04:44, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Well I think you need a balance, contemporary (i.e. when originally released) and more recent - reason being that views change and you want both the immediate reaction and the long view. Cheers, Ian Rose 05:59, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Good points. How about:

Include no more than ten reviews. When choosing which reviews to include, consider the notability of the review source and keeping a neutral point of view. For older albums, try to include not just contemporary but also some more recent reviews.

--PEJL 20:21, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Sounds really good to me. There are a lot of articles that could use this type of balance. Is there a good website with a repository of contemporary reviews that maybe we could recommend in the list of recommended sites? Like, do Rolling Stone or other publications have online databases of original reviews from past decades? --IllaZilla 07:25, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Old reviews from Rolling Stone can be found using the normal search on their website. --PEJL

This sounds indeed like a very good plan. I asked User:Eagle_101 to query a recent version of the database for the number of links in the {{Infobox Album}}. He will probably be reporting that here soon (the script is running as I speak).

I am quite active in the wikiproject on spam, and every now and then someone adds high numbers of reviews (and we do see most of those additions). We are inclined to remove all links added by such accounts, even if they would be working for the Rolling Stone, per quite some policies and guidelines (I wrote a treatise for Archivists, I guess these can be included as well: User:Beetstra/Archivists. As can be seen there, such additions, however reliable, can be questioned against quite some policies and guidelines). One of my solutions there is that an appropriate wikiproject is contacted, and they endorse the link (and probably guide/tutor the editor(s)). At this moment we then enter in a grey area, and I therefore would stronly endorse a) restriction of the number, b) a guideline on what criteria one should have to add a certain link to the infobox .. and when you exceed the number, which one to remove (well, it is then for sure -> do not add the link, go to the talkpage or to a wikiproject).

I do want to say, 10 is IMHO a bit high, 5 would be more the number to aim for, 2-3 from the past, in the time of the album, and 2-3 recent ones. I mean, is the 6th review really going to tell more about the album, something that is not in the other 5 (and then, this rule is not set in stone, in that particular case the 6th one can ben endorsed, e.g. via a remark and an explanation on the talkpage)? Hope this helps. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:07, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I"m working on running a scan of the database dumps for you guys, I did happen to notice http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/69_Love_Songs has quite a few non-free iamges. What do you all think? I think thats above what is normal, I just don't see how we can justify that much fair use in a free encyclopaedia. If there is something unique about the cover, fine thats one image. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 10:51, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

It does not appear that many have this problem (over 5 external links), so this looks to be less of a problem then we thought. The real problem I'm seeing here is that most of the articles you guys have under your care are unsourced. There is not a reference or a notes section. When the output finishes, I'll let you guys all have a look, its really a good overview as to the status of your project, what needs work and what does not need work. Its up to you guys to do something about this though. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 12:26, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Note that not all reviews have external links. Counting the number of list items would be a better method. --PEJL 12:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

External links is the problem from the spam point of view. We can re-run this later when you guys manage to clean up what has already been identified below. You guys have a large number of albums missing references, which makes it hard to tell if they are a) verifiable, and b) notable, the problem of references needs addressed, as does the problem of spam. The spam problem is the one highlighted in the report below, but I ask you guys to please take pains to get some decent references for these, or determine that the garage band is really not notable and delete them. There should be an assertion that the album is notable somewhere, that is where references are good. (note you can probably make use of some of the reviews as references, but you should find other references as well. —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 22:59, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Eagle_101 has completed the full scan. The original list can be found here (zipfile on toolserver), I have sorted the list (decending on number of links in the infobox), and isolated the more concerning parts (the total list is huge), resulting in the current version of the page User:Eagle 101/AlbumSpam. As Eagle_101 says above, the lack of references in the documents is a bit concerning, as are some pages which have abnormal numbers of external links. A third thing may be that I found some links to lyrics pages. Though I am not sure about the nature of the case I saw (a Björk album with 98 external links), those links may be in violation of WP:COPYRIGHT.

I'll leave up to you what is to be done, I'll keep an eye on the link-additions. Keep up the good work! --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 20:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Do you guys need any further help with this? —— Eagle101^{Need help?} 06:22, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. I've added the text proposed above, which limits the number to ten. Five might be more appropriate, but that's a much larger change from current practice, for which I think we'd need a stronger consensus. --PEJL 16:55, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Have you also pruned the links from the pages which at this moment 'violate' this guideline? And I also think the other issues should also be addressed. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 08:31, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

No. --PEJL 09:37, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Fixing articles in violation is something I would do only if I happened across one of them. I'd rather spend my time fixing something that is in danger of deletion. BTW, what do we do with the excessive reviews? Move them to a reviews section? -Freekee 01:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Uhm, delete them? The argument that we have too many external links applies just as much outside the infobox as inside it, I would think. --PEJL 15:24, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Hm. I'm more concerned about the excess of info in the infobox (so I hadn't really noticed that you weren't talking about only the infoboxes). Just the basics for the box. Having more info in the rest of the article doesn't bother me much, as long as it's not trivial drivel. But whatever. I really don't care that much either way. -Freekee 01:33, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Album dab should match artist article

In my experience album names that use the artist as a disambiguator generally include the full artist name, include a possible "The" at the beginning. Prompted by the move proposal at Talk:Zeitgeist (The Smashing Pumpkins album)#Moving the page to "(Zeitgeist (Smashing Pumpkins album), I thought it best to discuss the general issue here. WP:ALBUM#Naming just says to use the artist name. I would argue that the disambiguator should be exactly the same as the artist name, for correctness. That would also be consistent with #Artist cats should match article. --PEJL 07:18, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree and really don't see why some people insist on leaving out "The" out of band names like "The Beatles" or moving to the back with a comma like if it was a first name of a person. The band is not called "Beatles" it's called "The Beatles". --Leon Sword 02:34, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

This issue varies on a case-by-case basis. For example The Beatles used a "The" in front of "Beatles" on nearly all of their record covers, with only a few exceptions. Therefore the band's full official name is almost always recognized as The Beatles (note capital T). The Ramones, on the other hand, never used a "the" in front of "Ramones" on any of their albums, just "Ramones," so "the" is technically not part of their name. So it would be proper in those cases to disambiguate, if necessary, "Help! (The Beatles album)" or "Rocket to Russia (Ramones album)." Then there are bands like the Smashing Pumpkins, who are inconsistent in whether or not they print a "The" in front of their name or not (the earlier albums didn't, then there were 3 that did, and the new one doesn't). So in those cases I really don't think it matters, or maybe we should go with what's on the individual album covers. I mean, we're dealing with something that only happens rarely, with 2 levels of disambiguation: the album title matches the title of another article, there is an article about another album with the same title, and one of the groups has a possible "The" in its name. Does it really matter at that point, as long as the disambiguation links to the proper article? --IllaZilla 03:55, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair Use Rationale

This has been brought up dozens of times and I thought our last round of discussions really did the trick. I have since edited nearly all of my FURs to include much more relevant information consistent with the most recent discussions. Image:No Regrets (album).jpg is an example of the one I have been using and until now none of the images I have updated have been tagged for "bad rationale". Can someone please enlighten me on the problem(s) with this rationale so it can be further updated. Thanks in advance. (Sampm 18:09, 14 September 2007 (UTC))

You should ask Betacommand. It's probably his bot malfunction again. Jogers (talk) 18:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I saw this post and its reply (which is not exactly assuming good faith). The bot is certainly not malfunctioning, if it is reporting, there may be something wrong, e.g. a typo somewhere. In this case, the rationale is for No Regrets (album) (which redirects to the disambiguation page No Regrets), while the image is actually used on No Regrets (Andrew Copeland album). Hence, there is no fair-use rationale on the page for the latter. You might want to correct this (minor) mistake. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:25, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. I wasn't assuming bad faith. Bots make mistakes and I'm perfectly aware of this as Jogersbot operator. Thanks for clarifying the issue. Jogers (talk) 10:39, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

It's fine, I know what mistakes bots make, maybe it was me, feeling that things get blamed too easily on User:Betacommand. By the way, the above scan gave this hit, would that be allowed under our Fair Use Rationale (though that is not my specialty)? Is only the last image not enough? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 10:53, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Added WP:NOLEAK redirect to the "dating" segment

I don't think I need to elaborate on the title. I've made the shortcut WP:NOLEAK to map directly to the dating segment so that it can be put into edit summaries to explain why any leak information is removed. I might also make up a banner to post onto talk pages to this effect also. I'll get to that later. This works for now. linca^linca 01:54, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok, so I was a little bored, so I created this:

It has been identified that this article has had information about a music download of the album leak added to it. In accordance with the WikiProject Albums guidelines, such a date is non-notable information and has been removed. See WP:ALBUM#Leak for further information.

It doesn't require much to pop into a talk page, simply {{noleak}}. What do you guys think? linca^linca 02:55, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Shortcuts to a section of a page are problematic because they don't work in all browsers. In some browsers they just go to the top of the page, which is confusing. As such, I recommend against using such shortcuts. WP:ALBUM#Dating on the other hand works in all browsers. --PEJL 05:12, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I use all browsers interchangably whether I'm at work (IE6), on my brother in law's computer (Firefox 2) or my own (Safari, Opera, AWB, IE7) and have never experienced any trouble with this, but I'll take your word for it. What if we were to expand the rationale on leaks and make it its own section, so you could have WP:ALBUM#Leaked albums or something, as I'm a fan of not being ambiguous about steering people to the right section for their issue.

Perhaps (and this is possibly a big effort job) we could split the page up into segments such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Leaked albums and Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Dating, and transclude the information to the main project page. This means we could just link using a shortcut to that sub-page for instructional use. It could also make editing the page itself simpler, because you simply edit the section you need to update. linca^linca 05:27, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

At a glance, it makes the guideline look more copyright-motivated than it really is, which I'm concerned might cause more knee-jerk reactions than it should. Maybe play that down a bit, a little less stern-sounding, and play up the notability issue more? –Unint 06:14, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Are you saying that the template sounds like that? Or the WP:ALBUM guideline sounds too copyright originated? Is there a probem with stating this? I mean, there are liability issues relating to this, so to harp on that I don't think there's an issue, but you're right that notability is definitely an issue since, there's only about 3 or 4 albums out there that would justifiably have this on their article. I think there's enough information and clout behind the topic to warrant its own section on the project page. Thoughts? --linca^linca 11:15, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I implemented a much simpler solution, by just supporting WP:ALBUM#Leak. Personally I don't see any problem with just referring to WP:ALBUM#Dating. --PEJL 15:35, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Can we see a little more explanation of the problem on that template? Something like, Such a date is non-notable information and has been removed. For further information, see the WikiProject:Album guidelines, WP:NOLEAK. -Freekee 03:34, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

What about the adjustment I've made? I've made it so that it equally addresses both issues, i.e. notability and legal implications. As to my earlier suggestion, what does everybody think? About segregating the page into several different sub-sections to allow things to be more easily organised? --linca^linca 13:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I tweaked the wording further. There are already sub-sections, so I assume you're referring to your previous suggestion to split it into sub-articles and transclude those on the main article. How exactly would things be more easily organized if we did that? I just don't see the benefit. --PEJL 15:11, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Looks good. Thanks guys! -Freekee 01:35, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

It makes linking to sections easier for a start, plus it means that whenever rearranging anything on the page, it doesn't involve a massive cut and paste that could ultimately foul things up (even though it's revertible). I've seen it happen (hell, I've done it a couple of times to pages myself) and I think it'd make matters simpler for providing a link. It means that, in this case, the WP:NOLEAK redirect could be directly to Wikipedia:WikiProject Album/Leak or if a person needs to refer to the discography section, they can use Wikipedia:WikiProject Album/Discography (which could also have a redirect set up, if there was a need/demand for it). I just think for this purpose as well as your concern of mid-page redirects, this would be a suitable solution. Is there any particular reason it shouldn't be done? If it's to do with server issues, that's not our problem (there's a policy on that, but I can't remember where). --linca^linca 03:33, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

The advantages don't sound very convincing. I'm not sure we'd be less likely to muck things up if we had more transclusions, since that introduces additional complexity. Supporting WP:NOLEAK also doesn't seem very important. Using that shortcut rather than one using WP:ALBUM#Leak has the disadvantage that it isn't obvious to a reader that it is in fact part of WP:ALBUM. I would argue that WP:ALBUM#Leak is a better shortcut, for that reason. I really don't see any advantages to doing this.

We have an example of a guideline which uses transclusions as you propose, at WP:MUSTARD. I've always found that difficult to use. For example, to add WP:MUSTARD to your watchlist you have to add all of the transcluded pages to your watchlist, but this is not obvious from the guideline itself, because it hides the fact that it uses transclusions. Granted, we wouldn't have to hide that fact, we could use {{template doc page transcluded}}, but that would involve adding a number of such notices, which wouldn't really be an improvement. Furthermore, we'd get a number of additional talk pages, which would make discussions more difficult to follow. Granted, we could redirect those to the main talk page. In short, I think this adds considerable additional complexity for very little gain. --PEJL 06:35, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

You pose a good argument. Though, if we were to simply transclude those sections that would need it...? Such as the leak section (because it's becoming an increasingly popular thing to add to pages despite the warnings about it) and anything else that people want to refer regularly (this is the most common to me from here, but there may be others). --linca^linca 10:29, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I still don't see the need, and question whether there are "sections that would need it". I refer to various sections of WP:ALBUM daily using edit summaries like "rv, per WP:ALBUM#Genre". What's the problem with just referring to WP:ALBUM#Leak in a similar manner? --PEJL 11:11, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Backlog at List6

SkierRMH is on vacation, BetacommandBot is running, and we have backlog at the list of album covers with disputed fair use claim again. Jogers (talk) 16:33, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Ask for help / exchange of experiences

Hello everyone! I have just one question about minimal requirements for the films and music albums articles... The story is: in Russian Wikipedia (200.000+ articles) we are working on minimal requirements for the articles about films (here) and music albums (here), basically it's all about the main information which must be covered in each article on film or music release. Background is the following: lots of films and music albums articles end up in ru-wiki on the "Articles for Deletion" page, because: first - there is a plenty of such stubs, second - some users find them too short and do not think that such articles can ever be developed to overgrow the size of a short stub. I was looking for such minimal requirements or criteria for articles about films and music releases in other Wikipedias - a kind of experience exchange. Is there something like that in English Wikipedia? You know anything similar in other Wikipedias? Thanks in advance! (also asked here: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Films) Alex Ex 18:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

You can find our standards at Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Assessment#Quality scale. If an article meets our standard for Start class, I would hope that it would be complete enough not to be deleted. -Freekee 07:15, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! And what usually happens with an article which is a short stub for years? Alex Ex 18:18, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Usually nothing. --PEJL 18:20, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Short stubs are often expanded at some point, because it is so easy to grab the record, copy the track listing, list the band members and copy a few more key bits of info into the infobox. It's an easy way to help expand Wikipedia. I think most albums languish in the Start phase. -Freekee 01:15, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Track list automation

Are there tools that will automagically pull track lists from freedb?LeadSongDog 04:34, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't know. I use a script to generate stub album articles from albums in iTunes, including track listings. --PEJL 18:23, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Non-English reviews

It has been proposed that non-English reviews should be prohibited unless the language is "particularly relevant". I don't think this is compatible with presenting a world-wide view, so I would like to get a clear rationale for this. I think the reason it is being proposed is that non-English sources are hard to verify, is that correct? Kappa 13:02, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

The guideline about normally not including non-English reviews has been in effect since June, albeit with a different wording. As for the rationale, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 17#Non-English language reviews. The point of the current wording "As the number of reviews should be limited..." is to explain why we cannot just include the non-English reviews in addition to the English ones. I don't think it is appropriate to make this guideline only apply to cases when there are more than ten reviews (which there should never be, per WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews). --PEJL 13:20, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

The link to WP:MOS-L mentioned in the archived discussion no longer works. The current link is WP:MOS-L#Non-English-language sites. --PEJL 13:24, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

OK here we are, from that discussion the rationale is "Editors who don't know Polish are also unable to assess if that review source meets the requirements on review sources ". How about we exclude foreign-language sites unless they are in the list of acceptable professional sites? Kappa 14:19, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

That was one of the rationales mentioned. The other rationale is the one which the current wording refers to, the one which the WP:MOS-L link above backs up, and IMO the more important one—that most readers will find a review in a non-English language less useful than a review in English simply because they don't know the non-English language. As for your suggestion, what list of acceptable review sources? No such list exists. --PEJL 14:31, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

"Less useful" is a reason to prefer an English-language review over an equivalent non-English review, but not to prohibit non-English reviews altogether. The list I am referring to is Wikipedia:WikiProject_Albums#Professional_reviews. Kappa 14:46, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Huh, there is no list at WP:ALBUM#Professional reviews. Such reviews are generally less useful, so they should generally be avoided. That's what the guideline currently says. --PEJL 15:46, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Note also that "less useful" is putting it mildly. "Completely useless" is a more accurate description for a reader who doesn't understand the language in question, which can be assumed to be a large proportion of readers. --PEJL 15:48, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, it's at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Albums#Review_sites. A link to a foreign language review is informative in two ways, even if you don't speak the language: it will have a star rating, and it will tell you that the album was notable enough to be reviewed by that source. Kappa 02:21, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

As I've noted above: "We don't have a white-list of acceptable review sources; the sites listed at WP:ALBUM#Review sites are merely examples.". Ratings are generally not considered useful without an accompanying review, per previous discussions on this talk page. I doubt many readers who don't understand a certain non-English language will be familiar with many review sources in that language, especially ones which would enhance the notability of an album which has already passed the notability criteria for inclusion on Wikipedia.

Can you give a specific example of a review which you feel the current guideline inappropriately excludes? --PEJL 10:50, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

No? Then I'll remove the disputed tag. --PEJL 15:53, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

single vs 12" single vs EP vs album?

I've noticed that What a Fool Believes (Matt Bianco 12" Vinyl) was tagged jazz-stubb in June and jazz-album-stubb on 10 September. Also, Talk:What a Fool Believes (Matt Bianco 12" Vinyl) was tagged album|class=Stub today. I have a couple of questions:

• This recording is an "EP" not an "album". With-respect-to tagging, does it matter if it's an EP and not an album?
• What's the difference between tagging the article, and tagging the talk page?

Thanks, Pdfpdf 12:41, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

EPs fall under the auspices of the Albums Project. Is that really an EP, though? It looks like a 12" single. I notice it's not listed on Matt Bianco's discography. Also, I think it is named incorrectly. It should be What a Fool Believes (Matt Bianco single) (or EP, whichever). In addition to that, this article could be speedily deleted, since it doesn't assert its own significance. Is this song or record significant? Did it chart? Is it on a major label? I recommend you expand it as much as possible. -Freekee 16:22, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Agree, except it should be "(Matt Bianco song)", not "(Matt Bianco single)", per WP:SONG#Naming conventions. --PEJL 18:42, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't have time for a full answer now, but:

• Is that really an EP, though? It looks like a 12" single. - I agree, but that's the label have classified it as ...
• No, it shouldn't be renamed to either be "song" or "single", because they would refer to a different recording of a different version.
• However, perhaps it should be merged into a page with that name that mentions all of their different versions of this song. Yes, I'd agree with that.
• I notice it's not listed on Matt Bianco's discography. - Significance of comment? I'm sure there are many recordings "not listed on Matt Bianco's discography".

More later Pdfpdf 22:15, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Why wouldn't a record be listed on a band's discography? If it's not even important enough to be listed in the band's discography, I question whether it should have its own article. Since the article doesn't assert the song's significance, I don't know whether it should be an article. I trust you will have time to expand this article in the near future. And unless it's going to be deleted, the name needs to be changed from 12" Vinyl to EP. Articles should be about releases, not the physical format. In other words, you don't find one article entitled Joshua Tree (LP) and another Joshua Tree (CD). -Freekee 03:13, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Why wouldn't a record be listed on a band's discography? - One reason might be: because the list is incomplete.
Articles should be about releases, not the physical format. - That seems sensible. Sometimes it can be ambiguous; e.g. many artists have separately released a '12" single' which is a quite different version of a song than the "original" single (mostly, much longer), and these are known as the '12" single' version - this is a different situation from your Joshua Tree example, but I still think your point is relevant.

So, I'll go back to asking questions:

• Can someone explain the difference between tagging the article, and tagging the talk page please?
• It seems to make a difference whether it's classified as a 12" single or an EP. Can someone explain the significance of the difference in their treatments on WP please?
• How do you decide if it's a 12" single of an EP?

Thanks in advance, Pdfpdf 07:39, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

"*How do you decide if it's a 12" single of an EP?" a single is a promotion of one track or song, an EP is a release that doesn't have that many tracks on it. If it's only boosting one song, then it's a single. -^Violask8₁₉₇₆ 19:09, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Another way to tell is to see what the record company calls it. As for how we treat full albums versus EPs... we treat them the same. Same templates, same project guidelines. The only difference is that we call them EPs or albums. EPs really are just short albums. Singles, on the other hand, like Viola mentioned, are intended to sell a single song, even though they have other tracks added, to make them more appealing.

That's a good point that the format sometimes differentiates different releases that have the same title. But I would also point out that these different releases would most likely be included in the same article here at Wikipedia. For example, a band could release a song as a CD single, a 12" vinyl single, and again as a CD, but with different songs as "b-sides." All three of these releases should be included in the same article, since we write articles about the songs, rather than the plastic. We really are most interested in the song itself. How it is released is part of that, but the different formats can be included in the text of the article. Also, keep in mind the (currently vague) notability requirements. Although we write articles on every album ever released (if by a notable band), we only write articles about notable songs and singles. Usually this means a single has charted. -Freekee 03:28, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Sorry for the delayed response - I didn't notice your reply.
I found your and Viola's replies quite helpful. Thank you.
Applying all of the advice above, I would conclude that this information (data?) should appear on the Matt Bianco page, and that the What a Fool Believes page should contain a link to the relevant section on the Matt Bianco page.
Do you agree? Pdfpdf 00:02, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the song, should be wikilinked to that article. I would have set it up exactly that way, with the exception that I would not have made an article for the three-track 12" vinyl. I recommend grabbing the infobox template from this project page and filling in the info for the album articles. That's pretty simple to do. -Freekee 00:46, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Proposed new section: Release history

Our guideline is that the infobox fields "Released" and "Label" should include only the original release date and label, and that additional dates and labels should be included in the article rather than the infobox. Despite this, quite a few articles include more than one release date and label. Many articles that do adhere to the guideline include such additional information in table in a section commonly titled "Release history" or similar. To make our guideline about release dates and labels easier to uphold, I think we should recommend using such a section. Thus I propose we include a new section "Release history" between the sections WP:ALBUM#Certifications and WP:ALBUM#External links in the guideline:

Albums are often released on different dates, on different labels, and on different formats in different regions. This information can be included in a a table. Note that the infobox should only include the first release date and label.

Followed by an example table, based for example on The Beatles (album)#Release history. I'd also like to propose we make a minor tweak to that table, changing "Country" to "Region", to encourage using "Worldwide", "Europe" and similar where appropriate. We could also make references to this section from the release date and label sections of the template documentation. Any objections? --PEJL 19:25, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I sugggest that the text within the table be a smaller size than that used for prose text in articles, as the frequent use of capital letters in titles, country names and catalogue numbers (which are all capital letter height) in that Beatles example creates an optical effect whereby the text appears larger than the general prose text. Also, some albums are going to have very extended release history tables, yet for most readers such tables would only be supplementary information to the general prose of articles. Some tables may need extra columns adding to them (e.g. where there are different language versions, such as Kraftwerk's albums, e.g. Trans-Europe_Express_(album)#Release_details), so a smaller text size would minimize the risk of tables clashing with info boxes that are placed aligned-right or running too wide to be viewed in full without horizontal scrolling. Ricadus 20:00, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Optical effect? That seems very subjective. The text seems just as large as normal prose to me. On the other hand smaller text would look smaller, implying lesser importance. Tables using class="wikitable" have a default formatting that is generally considered appropriate for tables. If using smaller text was generally considered appropriate for tables, that's what class="wikitable" would generate. Note also that changing the font size is discouraged per WP:MOS#Formatting issues, and that chart information tables and track listing tables both use normal table formatting per WP:ALBUM#Track listing and WP:CHART respectively. In fact I think the example you provided would be improved if it used class="wikitable" and proper table headings. --PEJL 20:37, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea. Certainly clearer than prose in cases of albums with long and complex release histories. Not necessary in all articles though, especially if the album's only been released once or twice and this is already expressed in prose. --IllaZilla 22:45, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 14:43, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Genres:commas vs. breaks

I'm assuming there's already been a long discussion about this, but I must disagree with the current protocol of separating by commas, because for many recent pop music artists, genre designations become a subject of ridiculously heated debate and must be sourced extensively. Separating by commas makes this look ungainly, whereas separating by <br>'s is much tidier. Chubbles 20:42, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Genres do not generally need to be sourced in the infobox. It's better to source the genres where they are included in the body of the article. Remember that the infobox is only meant to summarize facts stated elsewhere in the article. Do you have an example of such an article which you think looks ungainly? --PEJL 20:55, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Articles such as Red Jumpsuit Apparatus and Hawthorne Heights are frequently subject to genre warring, and so multiple sources have been added in the infobox. I suppose the genres and their sources could be moved to the first sentence of the article, but past practice (from what I have seen) has usually been to key the notes to the infobox. Chubbles 22:37, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

That would be an improvement. Note though that the articles you linked to are not album articles, so this guideline doesn't apply to them. --PEJL 07:03, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

The discussion was only a couple of weeks ago. Personally, I don't see compelling reasons for either method. -Freekee 03:21, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

It's also been discussed at length on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Musicians. Doesn't make much sense to me to have a different guideline for albums. Like Freekee, I'm pretty neutral on the whole topic, but like PEJL, I'm strongly opposed to cluttering up the infoboxes with citations. Which is exactly why {{Infobox musical artist}} says "aim for generality" for the genre field. A comment I think might be useful to add to {{Infobox album}} as well. Xtifr _tälk 13:07, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Agree, but I'd instead say that it doesn't make much sense to have a different guideline for musicians (because there is a guideline on how to delimit for albums but no guideline for musicians). --PEJL 13:14, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

The inclusion of refs in infoboxes isn't always a bad idea. It's better not to have refs in the infobox but is some cases, mainly when genre edit wars focus on the infobox, it's a good idea (Metallica's St. Anger come to mind). Refs have a restraining effect on disruptive edits. For the <br /> versus comma seperated genres: we should apply what looks best. Each infobox has different content, some contain 4 long genre names, and others contain 2 short names.

I think <br /> separated genre sections always look good, even with citations (like Lamb of God (band)). However, it looks better when the genres stay on 1 line using commas as separator (like Revolver (album)). When genres get wrapped I prefer having <br /> separated lists (certainly when 1 genre is displayed on two lines). Best is to have the same guidelines for both albums and musicians. Emmaneul ^(Talk) 14:50, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

DVDs

Are DVDs still a scope of this project? BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 06:30, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, music DVDs are, yeah. --linca^linca 06:31, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the immediate reply. BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 06:47, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Are they? Shouldn't we be mentioning Template:Infobox music DVD on WP:ALBUM then? Looking at that template, it differs very little from Template:Infobox Album:

• It has an undocumented field "Rating".
• It has a field "Region".
• It has a field "Director".
• It uses different names for the "Last album"/"This album"/"Next album" fields, but they work the same.

Perhaps we should merge that infobox with the album infobox, by adding support for these fields to the album infobox (and noting that they only apply to DVDs, for example by prefixing the field names with "DVD ", like "DVD rating" and "DVD region". I know we shot down a proposal to merge all the music release infoboxes a while back, but these two seem quite similar, and apparently both fall under this WikiProject. BTW, the edit history of the template suggests that it's intended to be used for video releases on non-DVD media as well, so the name is a bit misleading. --PEJL 11:02, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

For reference, the proposal to merge all music release infoboxes is here. --PEJL 11:18, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

By the way, i am supposed to put an "upcoming album" tag on this particular DVD page but i think its not appropriate. yes it is, its not. However, i just can't leave this page more stub if i will not put any template, which is supposed and need to be appropriate. And i think there is no such template as "upcoming dvd" which is more clearer to researchers. BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 12:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Do EPs use {{Future album}}? If so, perhaps music DVDs should as well. Maybe we should add a new parameter to {{Future album}} so that for example {{Future album|type=ep}} used "EP" in place of "album" in the template output. --PEJL

that's another point also. we should set parameter to this different thing. BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 23:39, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

For our purposes, EPs use all of the same templates as regular albums, because they are considered to be just short albums. Multi-track singles, on the other hand.... -Freekee 02:57, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Loads more album covers under threat!

There are lots of album covers (among other things) sitting in Category:Disputed non-free images as of 13 September 2007, which are in the process of being deleted. I'd appreciate any help adding/improving fair use rationales for the covers which are being properly used. Remember you can only use album covers to illustrate an article or lengthy section about the album. i.e. you can't use them in lists or galleries, and you can't use them to illustrate an object/person whose picture is on the cover. Template:Album cover article rationale may be useful! Papa November 09:47, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

gahhh, this is rubbish. i will join with you in trynna save some of these. tomasz. 11:00, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

See also the list of album covers with disputed fair use claim. Jogers (talk) 17:40, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll lend a hand. I replaced one yesterday that was not only disputed in rationale but also much too big. --Moonriddengirl 17:42, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

In fact, it's on the list--Image:Cherry Pie.JPG is gone, but the article Cherry Pie (album) is now using Image:Cherrypie.jpg. I don't know if I should delete the redlinked or not. --Moonriddengirl 17:45, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Assessment on Tour pages

I just come to know that tour pages are unassessed. What proper template should be added? BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 09:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I have to raise this in this talk page since Tours are very much related to music especially albums. BritandBeyonce ^{(talk•contribs)} 09:44, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

It's probably more appropriate discussion on the WT:MUSIC page, since tours and albums are autonomous entities (as sometimes, a tour may be in support of an album, though this isn't always the case). Maybe a taskforce of WP:MUSIC could be put together to tackle the subject? Just a thought, but nevertheless, not really the right topic for discussion here. --linca^linca 09:59, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok. Thanks for that. I'll ask same thing to WT:MUSIC. ^{(talk•contribs)} BritandBeyonce 10:09, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Removing Robert Christgau's Reviews From Album Pages

I think REAL music fans should start a protest to have Wikipedia remove Robert Christgau's reviews from album pages. Unlike Rolling Stone and All Music Guide, Christgau's reviews are very biased and pretty useless to people who want a properly critiqued opinion.

This is what he has to say about Paul McCartney's masterpiece "Band On The Run": "The instrumentals are doodles, the songs demos by a man who scores the occasional hit only to prove he's genius. Which he isn't."

I'm assuming he's jealous of the fact that McCartney's album outsold all of his hero John Lennon's albums. Lennon, by the way, is pretty much the only person Christgau gives perfect reviews to. I'm a big fan of Lennon's music, but like most fans, I can actually admit that a lot of his solo stuff was absolute crap.

Here's what he said about 8x platinum album "Core" by the Stone Temple Pilots: "the whole band should catch AIDS and die."

If that's his opinion, fine. But I don't see how it helps out people that are curious about the ACTUAL MUSIC ON THE ALBUM!

Pearl Jam's "Ten": "in life, abuse justifies melodrama; in music, riffs work better"

How exactly does that help me figure out what this album sounds like? Oh wait, it doesn't have to. Because 3/4 of this album is STILL PLAYING ON POPULAR ROCK STATIONS!!! THAT'S RIGHT, POPULAR!!!

The Doors' self-titled album: "Jim Morrison sounds like an asshole."

Aerosmith's "Pump": "If fried brains is your idea of a rock dream"

And finally, Elton John's "Yellow Brick Road": "this is one more double album that would make a nifty single."

Once again, thanks for the opinion, but that doesn't help anybody at all.

Look up your favorite album, if it's not one of Lennon's, prepare to see it trashed with no reasonable explaination.

I say we remove all of Christgau's review's from Wikipedia. All Music Guide and Rolling Stone are enough and both present unbiased, non-judgemental reviews of albums while giving music fans explaination for their reasonings. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ralphtheman23 (talk • contribs) 18:06, 28 September 2007

I see the change you made prior to this proposal was this edit. I'm sure we'll all give your proposal appropriate consideration. --PEJL 18:34, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Personally, I think AMG is crap and Rolling Stone is unreliable at best. I don't always agree with Christgau, but that's just how things go. I would sooner propose their removal, were it not for the fact that they're so highly regarded. It's deemed broadly that Christgau is also, and as such, his opinion is one that's suitably kept here. --linca^linca 00:13, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

All sources mentioned are imperfect but they all count as professional reviews. Use them all and ultimately people will make up their own minds with the information provided. Cheers, Ian Rose 08:26, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Robert Christgau, whether anyone likes him or not, is a music critic, and a respected one at that, and believe it or not, that is one of the reasons his opinions are well known. I do not think his reviews should be removed, I do think that readers should have a choice of reviews to select. There are more than enough review sites out there, and of course they should be taken into consideration. --Johmbolaya 02:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

chronology of Sigur Rós

I just added the EP Rímur (album). I'm not sure how to list the chronology section. The chronology of Sigur Rós albums and singles is a little messed up. Should albums and singles and EP's be mixed up? --Steinninn 20:01, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Do you mean the chronology links at the bottom of the album infobox? Only albums and EPs should be included there. There is a separate infobox for singles, and singles will have their own chronology. Video releases also do not go in either of these chronologies. (Thanks for reminding me - I intended to fix one of those I found the other day.) -Freekee 04:39, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Hardcore Jollies

There is something that needs to be changed on this page. The song Hardcore Jollies was played by Eddie Hazel, not Michael Hampton. It is an obvious mistake on the page when the song is referenced in "title track" because Hardcore Jollies is an insturmental. Please change this mistake. Also I appologize for posting under this discussion topic, I have yet to figure out how to start my own thread. --Chiknfulio 11:51, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Reviews format

In what format should dates be put in reviews section? Is "9/4/07" fine? Me and the other contributor have been arguing about that, and in my opinion such date format confuses non-American editors, because in other countries the date format is usually DD-MM-YYYY, not month, then day. Daniil Maslyuk 06:34, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

I recently proposed standardizing the date format (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Albums/Archive 20#Professional review dates) but nothing came of it. An alternative that I've considered since then is to just use the year, which is about the same length as "link", and sufficient to tell if it's a contemporary review or not. Full dates could be included (and auto-formatted) in a reference. --PEJL 13:00, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

The current "link" usage is still fine by me but if people are dissatisfied with it I would support just using the year for the reasons PEJL puts forward. Admittedly it will look like a linked date fragment, which is a stylistic no-no, but better that than the dd/mm/yy or mm/dd/yy alternatives. Cheers, Ian Rose 13:37, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, we currently recommend always using a date and say to only use "link" if a date cannot be found. Granted, that's not reflected in current practice, with most reviews using "link" instead of a date, but always using a date is the current recommendation. If that's not what we want, then we should change the guideline. As for the year looking like a linked date fragment, it will be discernible from that because of the different styles associated with external links (slightly different color and symbol). --PEJL 14:18, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, fair point about the symbol, and clarifying the current standard. Well then, I propose we change the guideline to use just year for the link (if available). Cheers, Ian Rose 15:08, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

If so, let's change this:

The third bit is preferably a link to the actual review on an official page; it may also be a summary of the review located elsewhere (if the original publisher doesn't include it online). If there are no online sources, you may include no link at all, but should then cite the information properly. The link should display as the date of the review being published, preferably including the page number—even if there is no link, this information should still be included. If you can not find the date of publication, the word link will suffice. Either a link or a date must be included though.

to this:

The third bit is preferably a link to the actual review on an official page; it may also be a summary of the review located elsewhere (if the original publisher doesn't include it online). The link should display as the year that the review was published. If you can not find the year of publication, the word link will suffice. If there are no online sources, you may include no link at all, but must then cite the information properly. The citation should include the full date of publication and preferably the page number.

The only issue I have with this is that it will mean we get ten links which say "2007" for albums released this year, which may seem redundant. I don't think it's a huge problem though, as "2007" is no more redundant than "link", and starts becoming useful next year without having to change the articles. So I'm in favor of this change. --PEJL 15:47, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Reads well to me. Cheers, Ian Rose 15:55, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me too. As you said, "2007" seems redundant, but no more than "link" does...

...That said, I'm still more a fan of having the expanding box to detail info about each proreview and add as a reference. It's a shame we couldn't get that to work. I quite liked the idea of it. --linca^linca 02:20, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Y Done. --PEJL 18:10, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Archives
1 · 2 · 3 · 4 · 5 · 6 · 7 · 8 · 9 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20 · 21 · 22 · 23 · 24

Contents 1 Usage of Non-free album covers 1.1 Special explanations advisable for Album cover images larger than 300 x 300 2 Delimiting genres 3 What about UPC / Catalogue #? 4 The endash in the track listing 5 Why don't we have a new section for each Album page called... 6 Help requested 7 Non-English language reviews 8 Sputnikmusic's placing on non-professional list 9 Template:Album cover article rationale 10 Labels 11 Sourcing lists (specifically track listings and credits) 12 Should track listings include lengths? 13 Back covers for original realeases 14 Conflicts in Album Names 14.1 Byrne album should not be retitled 15 Sittin' on Top of the World 16 Assessments 17 Moving ABBA to Abba (band), per WP:MOS 18 How should this be handled? 19 A class review 20 Update on tagged album articles 21 Stubs requiring sources? 22 Professional reviews with no links or dates 23 Logos for album names 24 Rolling Stone review links 25 Standardizing the credits section header 26 Professional reviews sorting 27 Error in template 28 Maintenance list update notice 29 Release dates 30 Chronology 31 Making artist names show up in categories devoted to albums by a specific genre 32 Live tribute albums 33 TfD nominations for album infobox alternatives 34 Category:Uncategorised albums 35 Personnel 36 Chronology conflicts 37 Category:Jazz albums by artist 38 Album article names vs WP:UCN 39 Proposal for a change to album categorization 40 Unofficial cover art 41 Category:Albums by artist 42 Quick question about recent edit summary 43 Yet another proposal 43.1 Proposal to include artist names in all album titles 44 Heads up - Crowded House 45 Relevance of "leaked dates" 46 Disputed album covers 47 real album cover 48 Star rating template broken 49 Track listing numbering 50 Artist+genre+album 50.1 Contradiction? 50.2 Technical fix? 50.3 Another technical fix 51 Category weirdness 52 Album covers 53 Infobox edit proposal 54 Proposed new infobox to replace 4 others 55 Album Project Summary 56 Tracklist table guideline 57 One album per article 58 No references in infobox 59 Certifications 60 Songwriting credit 61 Exhaustive list of awards (gold, silver etc) 62 Love.Angel.Music.Baby 63 Anyone know where I can find information about album sales? 64 Missing articles 65 Article naming 66 Cfd:Albums without cover art 67 ImageRemovalBot and Discography 68 General fixes with Jogersbot 69 Track listing credit fraction 70 Article quality 71 Musical cast recordings 72 Double album 73 Label piping 74 Nominations for deletion via WP:PROD 75 Robert Christgau review example 76 Professional review dates 77 Expert review: KBCO Studio C 78 Chronology (yes, again, sorry) 79 Collaboration task 80 Soundtrack article naming 81 BitTorrent 82 Album covers 83 Language field 83.1 Content 83.2 Layout 84 Chart Ranking 85 Deletion sorting 86 Untitled hidden tracks? 87 Help needed for "Help" album title 88 Project page instructions too long? 89 List2 update note 90 Assessment 91 Do we really need a "professional reviews" section in the infobox? 92 "Personnel" vs. "Performers" 93 Lyrics 94 Separation 95 Release date 96 Artist cats should match article 97 Using templates in albums & songs 98 Sample articles for albums & songs etc. 99 musicemissions.com spam 100 Restricting the number of reviews 101 Album dab should match artist article 102 Fair Use Rationale 103 Added WP:NOLEAK redirect to the "dating" segment 104 Backlog at List6 105 Ask for help / exchange of experiences 106 Track list automation 107 Non-English reviews 108 single vs 12" single vs EP vs album? 109 Proposed new section: Release history 110 Genres:commas vs. breaks 111 DVDs 112 Loads more album covers under threat! 113 Assessment on Tour pages 114 Removing Robert Christgau's Reviews From Album Pages 115 chronology of Sigur Rós 116 Hardcore Jollies 117 Reviews format 118 Release dates listed pre-release 118.1 Release dates listed pre-release (section break) 119 Scaruffi 120 Stubs 121 Categories 122 Is there a naming convention for soundtracks? 123 Cat:automatically assessed Albums articles 124 Question regarding tracklist 125 Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Image placeholders 126 Pulp Fiction (soundtrack) 127 FAC: Halo 3 Original Soundtrack 128 Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (soundtrack) 129 EP formatting 130 Capitalization of the word 'so' 131 Foreign language capitalization 132 "The Beach Boys Love You"? 133 Is this an OK use for a track list table? 134 Unreferenced ? 135 What to do with WP Film Music? 136 Loose (album) on hold 137 Producer categories 138 Francophone album articles needed 139 Fairport Convention 140 iTunes review excerpts 141 Hiding the reviews 142 Proposed category: Sync albums 143 Capitals question 144 Virgin Killer album Cover 145 Track list 146 Task Force: Record Labels? 147 Professional review lists 148 Proposal for new album type 149 Category:Albums in the 33⅓ series 150 Reliable sources for genres 151 Crocodiles (album) peer review 152 Album category discussion 153 Compilation albums and band categories 154 What constitutes a professional review? 155 Tracklist template 156 ==Personnel== & ==Track listing== 157 Mixtape albums 158 Single vs Album vs EP

Release dates listed pre-release

I noticed a lot of editors removed the release dates of upcoming albums, citing Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums#Released as policy against release dates listed before it. I will quote this section for you:

Only the earliest known date that the album was released should be specified, using a single occurrence of  (), for example July 31, 2007 (2007-07-31) (or July 2007 (2007-07) or 2007 (2007) if the exact date isn't known). Later release dates can be mentioned in a Release history section.

I don't notice anything prohibiting release dates inserted before the album release. So, that should clear it up once and for all, right? If not, please be so kind as to point out what I'm missing. Tom Danson (talk) 06:22, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree, the section says nothing about the scheduled release dates of upcoming albums. I think that as long as those dates are referenced for verifiability, it is perfectly appropriate to have them in the article and would be fairly neglectful not to include them. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:33, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

The issue is not whether or not upcoming dates (when sourced) should be included in the article, but rather where in the article. Certainly, upcoming, sourced dates in the body of the article are fine. The "Released" section of the infobox, though, is a bad place for this.

I often run across articles where a future date was added in that section (usually, the source (if it exists) is buried in the article somewhere), time passed, the album was delayed or cancelled, and no one updated the infobox. Once the "Released" date (which was actually a "Scheduled release" date) passed, the article wrongly stated that the unreleased album was "released" (no vandalism or ill-intent required) on that now-past date.

It seems to me that either the infobox should be adjusted to include a "Scheduled release" field or any future date should be augmented by "(scheduled)" (or somesuch).

At present, though, the field calls for "Only the earliest known date that the album was released..." Before an album is released, there is no date that the album "was released". The field is "Released". Yes, put the date in the article, just not in the infobox where it can create problems later. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 14:00, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

This was also discussed at Template_talk:Infobox_Album/doc#Release_date (with links elsewhere). - Mdsummermsw (talk) 14:06, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

• For my money, the infobox is as editable as the rest of the article and thus future release dates, where aptly sourced, are as appropriate there as in the rest of the article. tomasz. 14:23, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Editable, yes. Include cited info? You bet. I'm talking about making it clear what the date is, no matter how long it stays there. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 14:43, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I agree with what Mdsummermsw says; I'm not sure if I can add anything to the discussion because she has managed to cover all the bases. In trying to clean out (not too successfully) the Unreleased albums category (cancelled albums, not-yet-notable future releases, albums that have been released but still are tagged as unreleased, etc.), I frequently find albums where the infobox "Released" date has passed yet the album has not been released. I am all for future release dates appearing in the body of the article (properly sourced, of course), where it can be put in the proper context ("The album is scheduled to be released on April 3, 2008"). I would be amenable to a "scheduled release date" field being added to the infobox. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 14:31, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

(Exdent) I have just invited several other editors who have crossed my path on this issue (sample invite). I am specifically trying to avoid "stacking" this discussion, but would like as many voices on this as possible. So far, I have posted messages for User talk:Freekee‎, User talk:Torc2‎, User talk:Huntster‎, User talk:Hello Control‎, User talk:Tom Danson‎, User talk:Admc2006‎ and User talk:Spellcast‎. Without intending to speak for any one of them, I think Freekee is for some kind of change, Torc2 is weakly for, Hunster is for, Hello Control is for, Tom Danson is against (or at least disagree with my interpretation), IllaZilla is against, tomasz. is against, Spellcast is against, Admc2006 is against and you all should know where I stand. I think we have a decent sample of those involved, but bring more if you find anyone else interested. Again, my goal is to find a solid concensous on this so we can all move ahead. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 14:43, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I'm for it. Since the release date is already specified in the body of the article, we should wait until the release date occurs to add it in the Released section. Admc2006 (talk) 15:18, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

On further thought I think I agree with Mdsummermsw. The fact that the field says "released" (past tense) causes confusion if the date listed is a future release date. That being the case, I say leave it out of the infobox but put it in the opening paragraph with a reference for verifiability. Once the album has been released, add the date to the infobox (and adjust the opening paragraph wording, of course). I think this is a simpler solution than adding a "scheduled release date" field to the infobox, esp. since that field would only apply to a particular category of articles. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:41, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Although people know what a future date in a "Released" field means, it's not grammatically correct so I don't think it should be added. Two possible solutions is changing the "Released" field to "Release date" or modifying WP:ALBUM#Released to say future dates should only be said in the article. I prefer the second option because the less redundancy in the infobox, the better. Spellcast (talk) 08:33, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the best answer is to change the infobox field to "release date". That would be better than changing the guideline to exclude future dates, since that's harder to police. Having said that, I wouldn't complain if the guildeline were chaged. The third option, adding a field for "Scheduled date," would be fine too. The fourth option, to make no changes (or to explicitly allow future dates with no changes in wording), would not upset me either. It's only a minor grammatical issue. But my preference is for the first thing I mentioned. -Freekee (talk) 01:27, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree with Freekee, changing the field caption to "Release date" would be the most sensible route. Excluding future dates from an infobox would unnecessarily gimp its one-glance value for the reader and make things more complicated for editors as well. If anything, the template manual should be updated to include a "refs still go into the article body" rule; I still have nightmares from previous revisions of Blink-182 and System of a Down. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 10:11, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Changing "Released" to "Release date" is fine with me. I think a lot of people don't even read WP:ALBUM and they'd add future dates anyway, so the first option works for everyone. If there's no objections or anything in a few days, Template:Infobox Album should be slightly modified. Spellcast (talk) 22:19, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Simply changing it from Released to Release date doesn't solve any of the problems (other than the semantic ones). I say either add "Scheduled release date" or disallow future dates from the infobox. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 12:19, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Putting an extra field like "Scheduled release date" is WP:RECENTISM and isn't useful in the long-term. There's always going to be future albums and people will always be adding it even if the template says not to. Changing it to "Release date" solves the issue altogether. The template should be made in such a way that it's applicable at any point in time. Spellcast (talk) 17:54, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. In the instance of a pushed-back or shelved release, once the "Release" date has passed, it would give the appearance the album has been released even though it hasn't. If there are "Scheduled" and "Released" fields, it would serve much the same purpose as (and more clearly than) Amazon's "original release date" field and the actual release date that appears in parentheses next to the album format. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 18:06, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

On second thought, that idea sounds ok. I've just released the problem with "Release date" is it's totally redundant once an album is released. Once future albums are released, "Released" is much better and less redundant than "Release date". Adding an extra field or disallowing future dates are both fine with me. Spellcast (talk) 18:14, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Just to be clear, the point of having separate fields is that you'd only use one of them - the future or past field, and the one that's blank wouldn't be visible. -Freekee (talk) 04:57, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

^I agree with this one 100% (almost posted the suggestion myself). Makes the most sense to me. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 12:26, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Moving ahead. 1) Any objections to change? 2) Which option: a)change "Released" to "Release date" or b) add "Release date" (or similar) to be used pre-release only or c) update infobox guide to bar future dates from the box?

My opinion: b. Changing to "Release date" just changes the nature of the problem. Usage instructions are widely ignored. Adding the new field preserves the "at-a-glance" nature of the box for future albums while avoiding the "we're saying it was released because we haven't updated it yet" problem. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 13:19, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Option A is out the question. I'd choose C. For B, once an album is released, the template will have a useless field in the source (even though it may not show in the article). Since a future date is only a small piece of info and that it's only temporary, an extra field just isn't worth it. The template not having a future date is hardly a loss and it would already be said in the article anyway. Spellcast (talk) 19:18, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Release dates listed pre-release (section break)

Okay, I think we need to be clear on this issue. Let's answer this question first, and then decide how to handle it, if necessary: Should scheduled or projected release dates appear in the infobox? -Freekee (talk) 04:54, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Some of the opinions seem to be:

- No, because the field is never updated as the future date is missed.

- Yes, because future dates are going to be added no matter what.

- Yes, as long as it is clearly identified as "projected future".

- No, because it can't be identified properly given space constraints.

- Umm... what else?

-Freekee (talk) 05:03, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't feel strongly that it needs to be in the infobox. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 09:14, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

How about we just put TBR next to the date in the infobox in <small>? Then someone would see that, say Oh the date has past and change it. Grk1011 (talk) 16:05, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Scaruffi

A minor debate over at Talk:Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band has led to the fact that Piero Scaruffi's web site is listed here as a suggested/acceptable source. According to the criteria at Wikipedia:SPS, it shouldn't be since:

• Scaruffi's training and area of recognized expertise is not in music;
• His website and books in the area of music are self-published and therefore not citable.

Discussion? Jgm (talk) 01:41, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

the last few were self-published. the old ones in italian werent. i think his publisher was called Arcana? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.167.148.170 (talk) 08:59, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I would agree with your observations. That situation is not limited to the Sgt Pepper debate. I have noticed it a few times for other pages with similar circumstances - and similar consensus that the unverifiable sources shouldn't be used. Peter Fleet (talk) 01:55, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

• It seems possible that he has become notable for listmaking itself. Please see the 2006 New York Times article, "The Greatest Web Site of All Time", I think it grants him and his reviews a bit of cred:

"MUSIC magazine editors have few more tried-and-true formulas for boosting newsstand sales and Web traffic than best-of lists. Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time; Spin magazine’s 100 Greatest Albums 1985-2005; Pitchforkmedia.com’s Top 100 album lists for the 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s: vast digests of gathered knowledge and opinion, usually the work of teams of editors, journalists and musicians, painstakingly assembled. But their collaborative efforts pale in comparison to the solo work of Piero Scaruffi...

In the cases where there are many reviews available (e.g. Sgt. Pepper, perhaps though currently the article only cites a few reviews), I'd like to leave it up to the editors of a given article to decide if Scaruffi's content is worthy of the album infobox.

Given that he covers a lot of albums that others don't, however, I'm hesitant to say that his reviews aren't fair game. Besides, is there really formal training in music criticism?

I guess I should note that my opinion is one of a few that has been solicited by Jgm, but not in a way that I think violates any policy. I assume I was contacted for one of two reasons: (1) I've participated in similar discussions on this page in the past and/or (2) I've occasionally cited Scaruffi in album articles (usually for somewhat obscure albums). -MrFizyx (talk) 21:54, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Stubs

Some of the album stub categories are getting rather large. I have been working through the Cat:2000s album stubs and this has led me to propose some further splits (breaking down jazz, folk and R&B by decade). Any comments are welcome (especially here). Waacstats (talk) 08:18, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Categories

I want to re-open the issue dealing with categories. I think that it is a waste of space to create a category that contains only one or two albums in it. Please shed some light on this issue. Undeath (talk) 20:08, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Space is cheap. And it's a navigational aid. Once one knows that every artist has a category for its albums, one can always find them with ease. One can go through the band's articles, or through the category tree. -Freekee (talk) 04:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Is there a naming convention for soundtracks?

Is there a naming convention for soundtracks? In a list I am creating in my user space, I have been using film name (soundtrack) or television series name (soundtrack). I added The Big Chill on the list as The Big Chill (soundtrack) only to find it as The Big Chill (album). Several of the soundtracks use (soundtrack) after the name to disambiguate them. Which would this project prefer? - LA @ 08:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

afaik (soundtrack) is much the preferred format. tho if i am wrong, i suspect i will be quickly corrected. tomasz. 11:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

That's correct. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 12:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! - LA @ 12:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Is it not by the actual title as printed on the soundtrack itself, ie "xxxx Original Motion Picture Soundtrack" or "Music from xxxx", rather than just by the film title? I would tend to use the title as it appears on the album cover. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:43, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, I guess it depends. I looked at Category:Soundtracks briefly and the articles there are very inconsistent. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 21:06, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

My inclination is to title the article as the title appears on the album cover (as mentioned above), but then defaultsort it as "xxxx soundtrack" for categorization purposes. --IllaZilla (talk) 21:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd say it depends on what the article is about. If we are dealing with a single soundtrack album that bears the exact same title as the film/TV series/video game/etc. the music was taken from (with none of the usual additions IllaZilla mentioned) the standard "[Title] (album)" disambiguation should be sufficient. If the intended scope of the article goes well beyond an individual album, elaborating on several different records or (if still notable) the music alone, the "[Title] (soundtrack)" or "Music of [Title]" formats would be more accurate. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 21:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

And here I thought this was a simple question with a simple answer. I am looking at the cover of The Fifth Element soundtrack. The words "Original Motion Picture Soundtrack" are in a different font and at least 2 font sizes smaller, so if an article was to be done on it, I would title it The Fifth Element (soundtrack), the same for The Big Chill (old cover, same font just smaller and not directly attached to the film title). - LA @ 22:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I dunno, there seem to be a lot of variant titles for different editions of The Big Chill soundtrack. This is definitely a trickier question than I thought it would be. I think that even if the words are smaller and in a different font, they are a subtitle and should "count" as part of the article title. Kind of like Spawn: The Album or Alien Resurrection: Complete Motion Picture Score. The subtitle "Original Motion Picture Soundtrack" or whatever is largely how the music industry distinguishes soundtrack albums as soundtrack albums, I think. When in doubt I think it's better to use the subtitle that's on the album cover in order to differentiate it from the film itself, rather than imposing (soundtrack) or (album) as an arbitrary disambiguating term. Of course, if the album has no subtitle, I'd say go with (album) as the dab. --IllaZilla (talk) 23:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I mostly agree—my suggestion is name the article either The Fifth Element: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack or The Fifth Element (soundtrack), preferring the former. There should be some cleanup in this regard and a standard established. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 00:56, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Based on the cover art, Fifth Element and Alien seem to have the the soundtrack phrase as mere descriptions, while Spawn seems to intend "The Album" as part of the title. I'm not sure what you mean by "standardization." -Freekee (talk) 04:59, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I think I agree with most people here, so I'll just reiterate: take your best shot at determining the actual title. Then, if it needs disambiguation, tack on (soundtrack). And feel free to set up some relevant redirects. -Freekee (talk) 02:42, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Would someone here be willing to help me find the titles of various soundtracks for a special project I am working on in my user space? I am trying to put together a list of media franchises from a list of my favorite films and television series which will possibly be used as a base by WikiProject Media franchises. You could also use this as a base for WikiProject Albums, maybe as a little side project or task force since there are soundtracks and scores for a good number of films released. (This is an invite to edit that page in my user space, so if I don't have the right title, please correct it. If a seperate article has not been started for the album, please make the red link. Click on the numbers in the soundtrack column to get to the headings for each franchise. Feel free to expand any section that is incomplete.) - LA @ 07:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Cat:automatically assessed Albums articles

This category page is a redlink, but is being heavily populated by {{album}}. Should this actually be at Cat:automatically assessed Album articles, say? If so, someone needs to fix the twisty maze of nested templates that will put about half the article-space on the job queue. Otherwise, the page could just be re-created. Alai (talk) 19:01, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, for the time being I've filled in the category page. Feel free to adjust it to some other solution. Alai (talk) 20:50, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Question regarding tracklist

On a few pages, I'm seeing mini edit wars based on the composers and producers of certain tracks. Can the liner notes themselves be a reference, or must there be an actual print source somewhere else stating the fact? I'm sorry if such a question sounds stupid, as to me, the liner notes should suffice, but it seems as though not everyone agrees, so I want to bring it up here. Thanks in advance. SKS2K6 (talk) 20:21, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

• I would think that the liner notes would be acceptable regarding the composers of tracks. I use them as a reference in album articles all the time. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells•Otter chirps)} 20:24, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Unless contradicting information can be found in a reliable source (e.g. the album credits one person but it later turns out that it was someone else). In this case I would think a more-or-less unimpeachable source should be used. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 20:27, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I can readily think of cases where the liner notes were deliberately "wrong" (Motown songwriters getting shafted, EVH's guitar on "Thriller", Stings vocals not credited on first pressings of "Money for Nothing", Eric Clapton/the BeeGees as "the Bunburys", etc.). That said, any reliable source mentioning the "true" writer, guitarist, etc. almost invariably makes not of the conflicting label/liner info. Basically, Ten and HC have this wrapped up, but I'd just add that a source that is conflicting the label/liners that isn't noting the conflict is probably simply wrong. - Mdsummermsw (talk) 21:04, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I try to use Template:Cite album-notes in most album articles as a primary source, or at least list the liner notes as a "general reference". This at least gives evidence that the basic info in the article as based on some good source. If there's a conflict between the liner notes and the actual songwriting credits, as in the examples above, that bears further discussion in the article and should reference secondary sources. --IllaZilla (talk) 22:47, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Image placeholders

The discussion at Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Image placeholders may have an impact on the widespread use of Image:Nocover.png so comments from members of this project would be appreciated.Genisock2 (talk) 14:57, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Pulp Fiction (soundtrack)

This article is looking much better. It could use some help sourcing the composition section, which should be fairly easy for someone with access to the liner notes. Viriditas (talk) 02:30, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

FAC: Halo 3 Original Soundtrack

Eh, it's sorta under your scope, and its the first album article I've written, let alone put up for FAC, so any comments would be appreciated. You can find the FAC page here. Thanks, Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 17:53, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (soundtrack)

I wish to edit the section of the article regarding one of the cues not in the Special Edition. It says that the film version of 'Funeral Pyre for a Jedi' was replaced with the Alternate verision, but that info. is flat-out wrong. The tracklist from the SE called 'Light of the Force' uses both versions of Funeral Pyre for a Jedi, with the alternate version played first followed immediately by the film version.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.91.27.59 (talk • contribs) 04:03, April 28, 2008

Wikipedia is "the encyclopedia anyone can edit", so feel free to make the changes. The only thing you should be careful of is that the info is absolutely correct. And if you don't prove it, your changes could get reverted. So please source your information. If you can't figure out how to place the proper citations/references on the page, feel free to explain them on the discussion page, and someone else can take care of it. And please sign your comments on talk pages with four tildes (~~~~) -Freekee (talk) 05:42, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

EP formatting

So, just to clarify what is on the main page, EP is always preferred over E.P.? And EP should never be included in the title unless the name of the EP is already an article? I know this is made pretty clear, but there seems to be a need for unification. SorryGuy  Talk  02:17, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree; we should come to a consensus on how different kinds of releases are disambiguated. I see a lot of EPs and singles dab'd as (album), when I figure it ought be (EP) or (single)/(song) (I prefer "song" in the latter case as it's a more descriptive dab term than "single"). Anyway, yes, it's usually "EP" or "LP" as opposed to "E.P."/"L.P." I'm not sure why that is, though I tend to agree with it. I think it's just an industry standard not to use the periods. In record stores & on release titles I see it without periods more often than with. But you're correct, the disambiguating phrase is unnecessary unless there is another article with the same name as the title of the release. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:29, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I dont like that we use "song". Often ill be making a page for a cd single where theres say 4 tracks, all different. Sure its good when its one song with remixes, but it gets confusing when its basically a mini-album. Grk1011 (talk) 02:32, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

You're probably right. It should be (single) if it was commercially released in single format (ie. a CD single or a digital single on, say, iTunes with its own tracklist & cover art). If it's a song that wasn't commercially released as single, then (song) is probably better. Of course, this is only if a disambiguation is needed in the first place. --IllaZilla (talk) 02:52, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Song is better because—in most cases—the record would have achieved notability because of the a-side charting and the bulk of the article would likely be about that one song. It's easy enough to say "'Blahblahblah' is a song by The Blahblahs and was released as a single" and then include the track listing for said single. My rule of thumb regarding singles/EPs is that if the title of the record is the same as the first song on the record, it's a single, otherwise it's an EP. Mini-album is kind of an out-dated marketing thing and I avoid it unless the record specifically uses the term. —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 09:17, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

That's usually my criteria too. Does it have more than a couple of songs on it? Does it have its own title, not just the title of the lead track? Then it's probably an EP. If it's clearly meant to promote a single track, ie. the first track title is the title on the cover, then it's a single. --IllaZilla (talk) 09:41, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

"EP" should not be in the article's title unless (1) it is part of the record's title or (2) it is within parentheses as a disambiguator. -Freekee (talk) 02:34, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Capitalization of the word 'so'

According to album capitalization guidelines like WP:ALBUM and WP:MUSTARD, conjunctions in album titles should not be capitalized. Depsite this I see the conjunction 'so' capitalized numerous times in articles such as "Don't Stand So Close to Me", "You Are So Beautiful", "You're So Vain", "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding", So Far, So Good... So What!, "You Look So Fine", etc. Can someone clarify for me what the official stance on this word is? Xnux the Echidna 22:04, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

In those instances, so is being used as an adverb, and adverbs are capitalized in titles. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 22:09, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Foreign language capitalization

Is there a rule as to which words should be capitalized in a foreign language song? For example, in Mi Sangre by Juanes, all the songs are always capitalized. But in Nuestro Amor by RBD, the songs are capitalized in the "Track listing" section, but not when you open up the articles for the links to the singles themselves (e.g. Tras De Mí/Tras de mí). -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 00:07, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Usually the MusicBrainz standards are what we use here. The Spanish rule is that only the first word (and proper nouns, etc.) are capitalized. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 00:21, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

I have noticed the same inconsistent capitalization on some Danish language albums (e.g. Efter endnu en dag article name vs. contents) which shows that this is an issue in several languages. The MusicBrainz standards clarifies it completely (thanks), and I would propose to add that as a rule in Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums#Capitalization. – IbLeo (talk) 11:32, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I fully support it. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 13:48, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I am quite new to Wikipedia, so I am not sure where to take it from here. We are two people who think this is a good idea, nobody have expressed their opposition. Is that sufficient to go ahead and update Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums#Capitalization? If yes, I would need assistance on this as I don't know how to indicate an external source (i.e. the MusicBrainz standards) as a standard for the project. – IbLeo (talk) 11:50, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

The MusicBrainz approach is not quite applicable to Wikipedia. Our naming conventions implore use to use English, hence we would either apply English language capitalization standards right away, or at least consult reputable English sources on how they handle the respective medium/language (and then choose a format that provides the most consistent results). The style guide of a user-maintained online community does not quite fall into that category, an example for an appropriate source would be The New York Times. One a side note: The MusicBrainz style guide suggests to give preference to an artist's preferred format, which would open a back door for the use of stylized typography, something WP:MOSCL, WP:MOSTM and the current revision of WP:MUSTARD are intended to prevent. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 15:09, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah... I'm not convinced that WP:UE applies heavily to albums. I have always been encouraged when dealing with this issue to use the "official" (foreign-language) titles for songs and albums, especially since I started a big debate here and found out that I was wrong about wanting to use title caps for that album. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 16:42, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Not really. Your motion was well grounded in our guidelines, had good support among other editors and reflected every single review and reference used in the article. It does not get much clearer than that. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 08:37, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

If we apply English language capitalization standards to titles in other languages here (i.e. in the English Wikipedia), then I deduct that we should apply Danish language capitalization standards to all titles in the Danish Wikipedia, German language capitalization standards to all titles in the German Wikipedia, and so on. So Danish band Gasolin's album should be called Efter Endnu en Dag here, Efter endnu en dag in the Danish WP and Efter endnu en Dag in the German WP. Likewise, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle should be The wild, the innocent & the E Street shuffle in the Danish WP and The wild, the innocent & the E Street Shuffle in the German WP. Besides creating total lack of synergy btw. WP's in different languages, it would make language cross-referencing a nightmare. Conclusion: The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me to use the capitalization rules of the original language for an album or song title (or any other title for what it matters). – IbLeo (talk) 12:10, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

That's exactly how I see it, and I think that's a very strong argument. Cyrus, I'm a little disappointed you moved Rossz just now, especially when there's disagreement here about how we should do it; even though you cited the MOS and 'outside sources', the MOS can be changed and outside sources don't have to follow any rules whatsoever, and I don't think they should be used for determining whether we should capitalize things or not. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 12:24, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Outside sources like Allmusic, Rollingstone or The New York Times have their own internal style guides, in order to achieve a consistent, professional presentation. Our own Manual of Style operates under the same credo but since we don't do any original research here, we are bound to refer to those outside sources not just for content but also on how stuff is formatted in English general purpose publications. Opinions among editors on whether to rely on outside references on a per-case basis or just to get the general practices down may vary (personally, I more often find myself in the latter camp, given that the former again opens up back doors for stylized typography among less publicized subjects), but the notion that established style guides should have no bearing whatsoever on our own is quite unheard of. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 13:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I would use the capitalization found on the original album, since it is a title. I think it should be preserved as published... Unless the Spanish album had a title using English words that used Spanish capitaliztion.... -Freekee (talk) 01:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. On many albums all song titles are written with all letters capitalized for cosmetic reasons (example). I don't think it makes sense to repeat this in the article on that album. Furthermore, there is not necessarily any consistency between the way capitals are used on the cover, booklet and on the disc itself. So which one should take precedence over the others? – IbLeo (talk) 11:05, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I was talking about how a title is written in its original language, and not the form that it appears on the cover art. I agree with your statement below regarding titling in the Opera Project. -Freekee (talk) 03:19, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Yea, we def wouldnt want to write it as it appears on the cover, its all about how it looks on the covers. Also, i dont like the music brainz idea, tho it makes sense, we're writing these in english letters (from greek for example) so i think the capitalization rules should follow the english rules unless written in the original alphabet of the album. Grk1011 (talk) 11:29, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

There recently was a similar discussion on the talk page of the Manual of Style for Japan-related articles, which came to the same conclusion, i.e. capitalizing romanized Japanese titles, save for mid-title particles. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 13:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

The Japanese issue is in my opinion a slightly different matter as Japanese is written in a different alphabet. In that case it makes sense to establish a rule for writing transcriptions of Japanese into our roman (latin) alphabet. On the other hand, the MOS for French works of art states: "For consistency of French titles on the English Wikipedia, the general consensus has been to follow the rules used on the French Wikipedia, which are those used by the French National publishing house (l'Imprimerie nationale) and put forth in its Lexique des règles typographiques en usage à l'Imprimerie nationale." Likewise, the naming conventions for original language opera titles (within WikiProject Opera) is: "When listing operas by their original language title (provided that language uses the Latin alphabet), the spelling in the original language, including any accents and diacritics, should be preserved, (etc.)". So in both cases the rule is to use the capitalization rules of the original language. I would strongly support to adapt it for albums as well (provided the original language is written in the Roman alphabet). – IbLeo (talk) 16:06, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

"The Beach Boys Love You"?

The page appears to be at the wrong title. Can someone look into this? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 02:38, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Moved to Love You (The Beach Boys album). = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 02:50, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

And of course; I messed it up—it should have gone to Love You (album). Crap. Well, a request would have had to have been put in at Wikipedia:Requested moves anyway. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 02:52, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

I have now done so. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 02:54, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Is this an OK use for a track list table?

I was just looking at some of the album pages for Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, who are a punk band who only do covers. Would this be an OK time to use a table for the track listing, so that it will show number, title, writer and original artist? It seems like it would be a bit much to have a separate section just to list who the original performers were. As it is, they usually list the performer and not necessarily the writer in the parenthesis next to the title. -Joltman (talk) 15:31, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Rather than a table, see if Template:Tracklist would work. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 15:46, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Unreferenced ?

Mikeblas (talk · contribs) appears to be working through an alphabetical list of albums, adding {{unreferenced}} to articles where it would appear to be patently obvious that the article content (track lists, personnel, etc) is likely to be pretty much wholly verifiable from the product itself.

I don't really want to get involved, but this doesn't seem particularly useful behaviour to me. So I thought I'd bring it here, in case anyone else thinks it's worth taking up. Jheald (talk) 18:19, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

I've gone through a few of Mikeblas's recent contributions and I do see some merit in them, in so far, as that many of the {{unreferenced}} tagging seem to be tied to notability concerns and some of the articles I've taken a quick glance at also contained unsourced information on things like creative process, which is not commonly covered by liner notes. Still, you could ask the user to be a bit more specific, by employing {{fact}} tags as well and use {{cite album-notes}} yourself to cover the obvious ... well, more obviously. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 19:25, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

I hate that {{unreferenced}} tag. I tend to delete it, unless there are specific concerns stated, or obvious ones ({{Fact}} is not usually so bad, as long as it's attached to a sentence or paragraph). I think the proliferation of those tags throws the veracity of the entire encyclopedia into doubt, so please only use them when there's a real concern. Don't place them simply because an article has no references. And if you come across one, please consider finding a reference for the offending material. -Freekee (talk) 03:01, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

What to do with WP Film Music?

We've had some discussion at WP Films because an editor requested that we merge the Film Music project into the Films project due to the former's inactivity. However, since the actual subject matter is the music, we thought maybe this project would be a more appropriate place for deciding what to do with the moribund project, be it merging, deleting, etc. Any thoughts on the matter would be greatly appreciated! Thanks, Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 18:26, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Loose (album) on hold

I have reviewed this Good Article nomination and placed it on hold for one week. The editor who nominated this article tends to nominate articles that he has not contributed to and then ignore the concerns brought up during the GA review, so I am hoping that editors from this project can help out with the remaining issues. Overall, the article is very good and I don't think that it should take a ton of work to get it to GA level. Thanks, GaryColemanFan (talk) 16:31, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Producer categories

I've run across a bunch of album articles that are categorized as "albums produced by (whomever)" even though that producer only did one song on that particular album. So this seems wrong to me. The category shows that the album is produced by that guy, when really, it was only the one song. You'd get the wrong idea if you were only looking at the category page. It doesn't seem like a good excuse to say, "well you should really look at the article," when we have a responsibility to be clear. Does anyone else have an opinion? -Freekee (talk) 04:29, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

For rap albums, etc., where individual tracks are produced by different people, rather than the full album being produced by one person, these albums could end up in five, ten, fifteen producer categories. But what is the alternative — Category:Albums with tracks produced by X? − Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 07:36, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Whether a producers is responsible for one track or ten, he or she is still, ultimately, a producer of the album. Countrymusicfan (talk) 08:08, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

i disagree. Especially in rap circles, where this is most relevant, they may be a producer on the album, but if they've done one track on the album, the album can't be said to be produced by them. Like Twas Now said: with some rap albums this could end up in rakes of categories. For me the best solution is to leave such categories off albums with large amounts of diverse producers like this one. tomasz. 12:16, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

A number of these categories are beginning to appear at CFD, and the objection to some of them is the notion of categorizing albums with a half-dozen producers will result in category clutter as each of the six categories gets created and added to the article. I have made a proposal at Category talk:Albums by producer and hope that you all will lend your thoughts to building a consensus on how to handle the category structure in general. Otto4711 (talk) 21:37, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Francophone album articles needed

How many separate articles on Francophone albums exist in the English Wikipedia? I would like to create several of them as it clearly meets notability guidelines have been notable in Quebec. If anyone familiar with Francophone albums, can some of you help for on the creation of articles of albums by artists such Bruno Pelletier, Eric Lapointe, Marie-Mai, Garou, etc and also on older albums in the past. Thanks! --JForget 00:05, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Fairport Convention

I'm taking a long look at this large collection of articles at present, usually managing to write-up two albums a day to standard and finding sources; there are a lot of redlinks and a few omissions in {{Fairport Convention}} itself. Also I've tabulated the albums section of the Fairport Convention discography and am proposing a similar table (in a separate article) to show the various line-ups over the years. Hopefully some of these articles can get to GA without much more effort, but if anyone wants to take a look and stop me, or even help, that's fine. I'm up to Unhalfbricking now and will tackle Liege & Lief & Full House a little later. --Rodhullandemu 11:39, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

iTunes review excerpts

I've recently noticed a trend on many album articles in which there is a quote box containing a quote from the "iTunes review" of the album. First, I'm not really sure if this is encyclopedic or not, and second, iTunes tends to take all of its reviews from All Music Guide. So my question is 1. should these quote boxes be there in the first place, and 2. if so, should all of them be changed to say "excerpt from All Music Guide review"? Glassbreaker5791 (talk) 02:20, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm opposed to quoteboxes in this case. I'm not opposed to quotes at all, in general, but they should be in the body paragraph. Setting one or more in a quotebox makes it seem like they carry more weight than other reviewers' comments, which certainly isn't the case if it's coming from a source like allmusic or itunes. If there's a particularly iconic quote from a very notable source, then maybe it could go in a quotebox. I can't think of a good example offhand, but let's say that highly renowned music critc x called album y "the most important album of all time"...that might merit a quotebox. Or maybe in the Nervous Breakdown article if there was a quote from Henry Rollins about how much it affected him, that might merit a qoutebox because it's a notable source directly connected to the album & act. --IllaZilla (talk) 03:14, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

If the reviews are originally from Allmusic, iTunes should get no credit for them. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 03:16, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm curious: is this a general trend you're noticing, or can it be traced to a particular editor or group of editors? If so it might qualify as spam. --IllaZilla (talk) 03:29, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

iTunes is a store—we wouldn't include a "Walmart review" or even a "Tower Records review"—so no. If the quote is taken from somewhere else originally, the original source should be used (if, indeed, the quote is appropriate for use in the first place). —Hello, Control ^{Hello, Tony} 09:10, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Hiding the reviews

I've just edited the infobox to add a show/hide button to the reviews section. See Template talk:Infobox Album for discussion. Flowerparty^☀ 23:48, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposed category: Sync albums

Would it be of any use to make a category with sync albums (double albums of which the two discs synchronize, or albums that sync with other albums, such as Dronevil, The Galilean Satellites, Times of Grace/Grace, Zaireeka)? I think this would be an interesting thing to look into. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 16:56, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Might be interesting if the sync can be reliably sourced; any idea what sort of numbers we are talking about here? --Rodhullandemu 17:15, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea how many articles would use it; I only know of the ones above for sure. I can guess that there would be quite a few. However, sourcing would not be a problem at all, since discs that sync are usually marketed and promoted as such and the fact is also usually mentioned in reviews. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 17:35, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Sync album? Is that a term that's in common currency? Flowerparty^☀ 21:14, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the official term is. It's really hard to search for this sort of thing… = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 21:21, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Capitals question

Does the five letter rule apply to all words? The way it is currently written it is not 100% clear. Should words with 5 or more letters always be capitalized? BeastmasterGeneral 19:17, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Virgin Killer album Cover

Just thought I'd let this Wikiproject know I've initiated a request for comment on the album Virgin Killer as the cover contains a borderline child pornographic picture which has recently received press coverage and has initiated a swarm of people trying to unilaterally delete/remove it from the article. The RFC is at Talk:Virgin Killer#This is child porn.

Track list

Might it help to use the words mintds and seconds to make it clear the numbers are play times? i thought they were hymn numbers to begin with.DavidPaulHamilton (talk) 02:01, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

You thought that times listed next to the tracks on an album were hymn numbers? That's the first time I've ever heard of that misunderstanding. Unless you were reading an article about a gospel album, I can't imagine where you got that idea. Many, many albums print the song lengths right next to the track titles on the back covers of the albums and even on the CDs or LPs themselves. It's pretty self-explanatory. IMHO listing the track lengths is largely unnecessary. Many album articles have them, many others don't, and I'm happy either way...but I don't think they need any additional text describing what the numbers mean. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:10, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Hymns have colons separating the digits? -Freekee (talk) 15:16, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Task Force: Record Labels?

Does anyone think that it would be a good idea to create a task force for record labels? Izzy007 Talk 18:48, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I think so, but I don't think this is the right project for the task force to be under. Perhaps WikiProject Companies would be a better home for it. Record labels are, after all, companies or brands, so that project's guidelines are probably going to be a lot more helpful in improving articles about record labels than this project's would be. In fact, they already have some guidelines for what types of record labels they include in the scope of their project. --IllaZilla (talk) 19:33, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I set up the Task Force. Anyone who would like to join can do so HERE. Izzy007 Talk 21:08, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Looks good! I'll probably sign up, as I've worked on a few label articles (punk/indie labels mostly). --IllaZilla (talk) 21:41, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Professional review lists

In November 2006, Template:Infobox Album/doc was given a major update and one of those changes was this: "due to their proliferation and dubious value, lists (e.g. Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Punk Rock Albums of the Early 1980s) may not be included." Is removing those review lists still the consensus now? I couldn't find this specific issue in the archives. Spellcast (talk) 03:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

IMO it seems to be the consensus based on the general view that such lists are increasingly trivial and meaningless. As sources like Rolling Stone or VH1 keep making lists like these, the criteria for the subject matter gets narrower and narrower until we're ranking London Calling among the "Best albums by The Clash in which the bassist is pictured smashing his guitar on the cover". Also there are lists like this on dozens and dozens of websites that are not known to be reliable sources with regard to music criticism, yet their lists were being cited as sources of critical commentary in dozens and dozens of music-related articles. I've never read the discussion on it either, but I agree with the statement that these proliferations of lists are of dubious value and inappropriate for mention in encyclopedia articles. I obviously can't speak for anyone but myself, but I believe that would be the majority opinion amongst most members of the project. I certainly feel that way, anyway. --IllaZilla (talk) 03:27, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I asked because I frequently saw Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in the reviews. It should be ok to mention it in the article, but probably not the infobox. Music publications frequently release these kind of lists and the infobox could eventually look cluttered (especially for influential albums) if articles like Spin magazine's 100 Greatest Albums or Blender magazine's The 100 Greatest Indie-Rock Albums Ever were added. Spellcast (talk) 04:15, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Possibly suitable for inclusion in the article body under "reception", "influence", or the like, but not appropriate for the infobox. The infobox field is for reviews, and although such lists may sometimes have review-like critical commentary in them, they usually don't or only have commentary in the context of the subject of the list. --IllaZilla (talk) 05:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposal for new album type

We have a type for almost every album out there, studio, live, comp.etc..., but not one for split albums. I think we need one for splits. Undeath (talk) 05:53, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

If you're referring to the various album types for Template:Infobox Album, we do have that. In the "Type" field of the infobox, use whatever type is appropriate (studio, EP, live, etc.). Then add the field "Longtype" directly underneath "Type" and put "split". You should get a result like this. The reason it's kind of complicated is that a split release can be of many different types. It might be an EP, a studio album, a live album, or whatever. The "Type" field displays the type and gives it the appropriate color, while the "Longtype" field adds "(split)" to the display. There's even an option to add an extra chronology for the second act, as you can see in the example I used. --IllaZilla (talk) 06:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm talking about a new, completely new, category. Not a sub part of EP. Splits are a different type of album in their own. I think we should make a new color and a new part for it. Undeath (talk) 18:00, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Maybe, but not always. For example, I have many split singles, split EPs, and a few split albums in my collection. They are splits, for certain, but whether they are classified as a single, EP, or full album is usually a larger consideration. You'd have to create separate album types for each of these in order to cover all the bases, which is why we simply allow "split" to be added as long type to any of the existing types. This could probably be better explained on the template page, I'll grant you, as it doesn't give instructions for dealing with a split release. But these topics should really be brought up at Template talk:Infobox Album rather than here, as they are specifically about proposed changes to the template. --IllaZilla (talk) 21:33, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Category:Albums in the 33⅓ series

Can I get people to comment on this cfd. It's hungry from a dearth of participants. Flowerparty^☀ 11:43, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Reliable sources for genres

Are there any sources in particular that are generally accepted for album genres? Professional reviews? SouperAwesome (talk) 10:01, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The All Music Guide comes to mind. – Cyrus XIII ^(talk) 10:32, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I think anything that's specifically mentioned in a professional review could be cited as a source for a genre. AMG is pretty good on that. Alternative Press also sorts their reviews into general genre fields like punk/indie/metal (in the magazine, anyway). --IllaZilla (talk) 18:24, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Crocodiles (album) peer review

I've recently expanded the Crocodiles (album) article with a view to getting it to GA standard. I've requested a peer review and would be grateful for any suggestions. Thanks, --JD554 (talk) 12:01, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Album category discussion

I was wondering if a couple of project members could weigh in on this discussion and offer their opinions. Does anyone know of any previous consensus on this issue? I'm not watching this page (and comments here won't be seen by the discussion's closing admin) so could any thoughts please be directed at the discussion page. Thanks. J Milburn (talk) 12:23, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Compilation albums and band categories

I recently cleared out Category:Black metal albums, moving all albums to the appropriate artist sub-category, and was left with a batch of compilation albums. They are all in the appropriate year category and the category for compilation albums, but they have no single artist, and, being black metal albums, it could be argued that they belong somewhere in the category. Should they be placed in the category for every one of their artists? Stay in the parent category? Be removed? Get a new category altogether? ('Black metal compilation albums' or something?) Anyone have any thoughts? J Milburn (talk) 12:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Nice work! My suggestion is to either move them to Category:Black metal compilation albums or leave them as they are. = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 13:42, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

What constitutes a professional review?

I have been removing reviews from infoboxes that come from non-notable review sites. It has come to my attention that policy doesn't really permit this, and I have stopped for the time being. I would like to clarify what is an acceptable review.

Any blog is unacceptable. This is a given, I think. But pretty much anyone can set up a site that's not a blog and get volunteers to contribute reviews. This is my problem with the current policy, which allows "any online or print publication having a (paid or volunteer) editorial and writing staff". I could go register professionalmusicreviews.com (really!) and start putting up wildly biased reviews, but as long as it was not a blog it would seem to be an acceptable source for infobox reviews. Is this really the case?

I would like to propose that preference be given to review sites that are both reliable AND notable. Notable in this context means worthy of an article here on Wikipedia. If no reliable and notable reviews of an album can be found, it would then be acceptable to fall back to reviews that are merely reliable. Thoughts? 66.93.12.46 (talk) 03:43, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Not having a Wikipedia article doesn't always equal a non-pro review. A review is ok as long as it meets the criteria for reliable sources—not notability, which is a different issue. Some publications are reliable despite not having an article. For example, AllHipHop was deleted but it's a reliable source since it's used by noteworthy publications.[4] If an unprofessional writer started professionalmusicreviews.com and wrote bias reviews, it wouldn't be acceptable because it's a self-published source from an unreliable author. Spellcast (talk) 07:32, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

There's not really an all-purpose litmus test for reviews. Most of the time an editor with sound judgement can tell when a review source is appropriate or not. Obviously blogs, self-published sources, and most sites with user-submitted reviews (ie. Amazon) aren't appropriate; whereas professional music magazines and websites (Rolling Stone, All Music, Pitchfork, etc.) pretty obviously are. As Spellcast points out, the guiding principle is WP:RS. If the source of the review doesn't appear to be reliable, then go ahead and cut it. If it's questionable, you can bring it up here and we can collectively try to determine whether it's a reliable source or not. That way we'll also be able to add it to the list of review sites on the project page (either as acceptable or unacceptable). --IllaZilla (talk) 07:49, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good. Let's try it out in practice: Diorama (album) currently contains a review from Yahoo! Music which is not currently listed as a reliable source (nor the opposite). For me it is not clear what category it falls into. WDYT? – IbLeo (talk) 08:26, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Hmph. I had a nicely cited reply to this all drafted and lost it. In short, I think it's reliable. Yahoo! is a reputable company, and they claim that their reviewers are music journalists, here. I don't know if I'd make it my "professional review" cite of first resort, though, so I personally would probably not be inclined to add it to either list at the moment. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 16:50, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Based on the link provided by Moonriddengirl, it looks reliable to me. I'd list Yahoo Music as an "acceptable" review site (as opposed to "unacceptable", though based on just that one example I probably wouldn't prefer it as my first resort either). --IllaZilla (talk) 18:50, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Y Done I have added Yahoo! Music to the list of reliable sources per above.

One point that needs to be made is that blogs by nature are not excluded based upon this group's policy. The language both clearly sates and clearly implies that "personal blogs" are not professional sources--and that makes perfect sense, because in the example given above (professionalmusicreviews.com), that author would not be a reliable source--but it does not ban new media as a bloc. There is a blurred line between old media and new media, and I think it's dangerous to exclude "blogs" as a whole simply because of the term used to describe them. What's the difference between a web publication and a blog? What's the difference between the online section of a newspaper and a blog, if that blog is published by respected persons within the field? Where do we draw that line? If we exclude new media as a whole, what we're really saying is that the only reviews which are worthwhile or "credible" are those which are presented by major, mainstream media. And frankly, I just don't think that always gives a fair or accurate reading of an album's reception. Do we really want to force the reviews contained in infoboxes into such a narrow frame of reference? From the credibility standpoint, I think we have to judge each publication on its own merits, especially when dealing with new media. Countrymusicfan (talk) 11:26, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

←I don't think it does exclude personal blogs due to the use of the word "or". :) It says "may include only reviews written by professional music journalists or DJs, or' found within any online or print publication having a (paid or volunteer) editorial and writing staff (which excludes personal blogs)" (emphasis added). Given our difference in interpretation, though, I can see that this may not be clear. WP:V says "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications." Personal blogs should, I think, be fine in that context. It's on the basis of the former, I imagine, that we accept [5], as Robert Christgau is a professional music journalist. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 11:45, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Tracklist template

For those of you who haven't seen it, there is a template for setting up track lists. It is {{Tracklist}}. Its use has slowly been spreading, but there are certain people who are reverting it because they say it hasn't been approved (whatever that means). It has both advantages and disadvantages, so most people feel that it should not be used in all cases. Does anyone feel that it should not be used at all? -Freekee (talk) 15:49, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Excellent move towards presenting a standard "look & feel" for album articles, although not compulsory of course. Two minor points- could it be extended to cover "Various Artists" & Soundtrack compilations & samplers by having "Artist"/"Original Album" fields, and is there a way of having indented listings, say for medleys, as in Live at the Palladium (Carpenters album)? Cheers --Rodhullandemu 16:11, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Various artists albums be tagged using the "Music" field (see this article for an example). = ∫_t^c 5th Eye 16:46, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Excellent. Thanks. --Rodhullandemu 16:58, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I'll try it out on Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band Duty Now for the Future to see how I like it. Fantailfan (talk) 14:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Didn't like it, I take it? Why not? -Freekee (talk) 23:56, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

==Personnel== & ==Track listing==

What are the rationales behind using en dashs (–) for these sections, instead of using bullets and tables, which is more readable, legible, and more standard with wp:mos and other standardization projects?68.148.164.166 (talk) 20:37, 5 June 2008 (UTC)68.148.164.166 (talk) 20:39, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Custom? Ease of use? These are just my guesses, mind you. :) I've used tables for complex situations (e.g. The Best of the Girl Groups), but I believe they would be a lot more difficult to implement with not a lot of pay-off in some others (e.g. The Complete Hank Williams). That's as regarding track listing, anyway. In terms of personnel, I'm not sure that a table would make things any more readable under most circumstances. And, of course, those are already bulleted. But you may be thinking of situations that I've not run into. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Mixtape albums

So you can't create articles of mixtape albums then? why?-SCB '92 (talk) 13:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I assume you mean here? If they have "significant independent coverage in reliable sources", then they are notable per general policy, but I suspect few will attain such coverage. The reason is that there are many such albums around and not many will be by notable artists or be notable in themselves, per above criterion. --Rodhullandemu 13:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Or are you suggesting that we add "mixtape album" as one of the album types for the "Type" field of the infobox? If that's the case, you should bring it up at Template talk:Infobox Musical artist. --IllaZilla (talk) 18:19, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Single vs Album vs EP

Hello! I've been doing some editing on an article for a Korean release, Scandal. In Korea, this type of release is called a "single album" or (less commonly) just an "album." They seem to often be releases by brand new artists prior to any album releases, "special projects" to commemorate an event, or special collaborations, and the songs don't seem to generally wind up on a regular full-length studio album (except for those of the first type). I've seen these categorized as both singles and albums on Wikipedia (haven't run across any listed as EPs yet), but they actually seem to fit what I've always thought of as EPs better. Should these all be handled the same way or is it more trouble than it's worth? If consistency is your choice, what method do you think is best? Thanks for your time! --hamu♥hamu (talk) 06:36, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Updated - I learned from the article history that it was created as an EP, and was changed to Album by a user who left no notes or explanation. For further info, Show Me Your Love is also called a "single album" in Korea, though it clearly does not approach being a full-length album. The time guidelines set by Wikipedia aren't followed in Korea. hamu♥hamu (talk) 13:00, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Usually, the answer is to find out what the record company calls it. In this case, they call it a "single album", so you need to find out what that means. It sounds to me like a marketing term, where they're trying to make a single sound more substantial. The track listing has two different versions each of four songs, so it looks to me like a single. -Freekee (talk) 02:08, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Well this particular release (4+ unique songs, 2 music videos, multinational promotion) seems to meet at least Wikipedia's definition of an EP. What I'm trying to determine is if it should be treated as an album or an EP. The only differentiation I've seen in Korea between what Westerners call singles, mini-LPs, and EPs is one- or two-song digital releases (see Bae Seul Ki as an example) which are indeed called singles. Everything else is a "single album," marketing term or not. My underlying query was if all Korean "single albums" should be classified the same way on WP, but on second though that's clearly not appropriate, so I answered my own question. I think I'll bring this up at Wikiproject Korea, and see what they think, as well. Thanks for your time! Consistency can sure be a challenge, huh? :) --hamu♥hamu (talk) 03:45, 9 June 2008 (UTC)