The "The" in band names?

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The "The" in band names?

2006-02-04 23:34:57

What's the rule for which bands have a "The" in their name and which don't?

I'm trying to name all my music collection properly, but I'm never sure exactly when to include the definite article ("The") as part of their name. Sure, I could look up each band on the Internet, but surely there has to be some simple set of rules to correctly name them all, or at least most of them?

I've been trying to come up with a set of rules and here's what I've got so far...

Plural nouns get a "The":

The Beatles
The Killers
The Sex Pistols
The Stranglers
The Streets

Unless the name is long (4 or more syllables) and "The" would make them cumbersome:

Queens of the Stone Age
Red Hot Chili Pepers
S Club Juniors
Scissor Sisters
Supermen Lovers
Arctic Monkeys
Partners in Kryme

Anything else doesn't get a "The":

Oasis
Snow Patrol
Hot Chocolate
Status Quo

Unless the name would be ambiguous without it:

The Who
The The
The Move

Obviously, phrases don't get a "The":

Tears for Fears

These rules work pretty well for most bands, but how do you justify the exclusion of a "The" in these?

Steps
Gorillaz
Spice Girls
Sneaker Pimps
Sugababes

And how do you justify the "The" in these?

The Prodigy
The Human League
The Darkness

By the way, I realise that people always drop the definite article when the band name comes before an indefinite noun (eg: "I've been to lots of Beatles concerts" "I enjoy meeting other Killers fans"). But this is nothing to do with the actual name of the group.

So... can anyone offer any suggestions for my rules? Or better still, is there some list somewhere specifying which band names have a "The" in them?

The "The" in band names?

Reply #1 – 2006-02-04 23:44:39

I don't think there is a convention. Personally, I include the 'The' in each tag, but when I sort I parse out the 'The' and sort by the next word. IMO this allows the easiest time when you're looking for something, while still maintaining the proper band name.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #2 – 2006-02-04 23:54:42

It depends on the trademark the band uses, not band name length, or other "rules." For instance "The Beatles" is the trademarked name of the band, not "Beatles" or a shortened form, which would draw the eye of the band's lawyers should you use the shortened form publically. Conversely, a group like "Oasis" or "Red Hot Chilli Peppers" or "Rammstein" may choose not to use "The" in the trademarked name.

The real issue, however, is whether or not you organize your collection using the "The". The ideal solution, I believe, is to use a script that ignores the "The" if present, so you don't need to put it at the end of the title, e.g. "Beatles, The".

The "The" in band names?

Reply #3 – 2006-02-05 00:32:37

I organize my folders by the original artist, but tag with the name listed on the CD. For example, after 1994, Smashing Pumpkins began releasing all their music as The Smashing Pumpkins. Same with Prodigy, they were The Prodigy until later in their career. Aphex Twin, well, he has like 10 pseudonyms, and my files are tagged by those names but they are all in the Aphex Twin folder for easy filing.
Purist? Yes, my tags must match the CD exactly, but it's easy and it works for me, as I remember each artist's pseudonyms.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #4 – 2006-02-05 00:53:22

Quote

So... can anyone offer any suggestions for my rules? Or better still, is there some list somewhere specifying which band names have a "The" in them?
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=361936"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

My suggestion is your rules are doing you more harm than good. As mentioned by others there will be a "The" in the group name if that is what the band's name is, it really doesn't follow any sort of rule. Trying to force rules for your naming conventions is sort of wasted time I think. It would take much more time to devise the rule structure than to just skip the "the" in sorting like others have said (which Itunes does if anyone cares).

Hey, I have a disc by a band named "The Multiple Cat". I would never have seen that one coming. how would that be handled??

The "The" in band names?

Reply #5 – 2006-02-05 01:27:02

The band are called what they want to be called however here are the rules for FreeDB:

2.2. Are there any naming-rules for submitting CD's to freedb?
Yes, there are:

1. Never submit info completely in capitals or completely lower case, if there is no special reason for that.
2. For bands that have a leading "the", simply leave out the "the" (e.g. use "Rolling Stones" instead of "The Rolling Stones") (this rule does not apply to "The The" ;-)
3. Names of people should be written "first name last name" - NOT "last name, first name".
4. Use the name of the artist repeated on the "title" field if there is no title (usually seen on an artist's first major label release, such as with the B-52's)
5. When submitting a CD-Extra, name the data-track "Data" or something like that - do not leave the track-title blank.
6. When submitting a sampler or compilation, you should include the track-artist in the track-name, using the syntax "artist / track-title" and set the CD-artist to "Various"

The "The" in band names?

Reply #6 – 2006-02-05 02:19:36

Quote

my tags must match the CD exactly
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=361956"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Exactly.

I don't submit stuff to freedb.

I don't share files.

My music is for myself and I want to know where to find my music (I also know what I buy).

So I let the bands choose their name. Whatever is on the CD is what I use.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #7 – 2006-02-05 02:32:24

advanced title formatting in winamp and foobar notwithstanding, the vast majority of displays are not going to let you script out definite articles. i want my ipod display to be correct, so i always include it.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #8 – 2006-02-05 02:34:46

Quote

Quote
my tags must match the CD exactly
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=361956"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Exactly.

I don't submit stuff to freedb.

I don't share files.

My music is for myself and I want to know where to find my music (I also know what I buy).

So I let the bands choose their name. Whatever is on the CD is what I use.
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=361976"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

indeed. it's good that freedb is around and that folks are willing to upload their info (I certainly use it), but I have to match the cd to the letter. And ever since I worked at Borders years back, I have to have all my stuff in "correct" alphabetical order. I don't want my Bob Dylan coming up under Bob, It belongs in the D's!!!!!! But that's also just me being anal-retentive. But now I have the last laugh. For years people made fun of me for having my cd's separated into genre, and now they all have their little genre columns in itunes. See how helpful it can be?? ok, going off topic now

The "The" in band names?

Reply #9 – 2006-02-05 03:13:09

Well thanks for your comments; they're all appreciated. The freedb rules were of particular interest.

It actually hadn't occurred to me to just look at the albums. I do normally use my CD covers to re-name all my files (because freedb has so many errors). It just hadn't really occurred to me that the covers probably are the most official source available.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #10 – 2006-02-05 04:28:57

I also use the name as it appears on the album cover (what the band uses officially). But with an exception...

The only problem, if you want consistency, is that sometimes a band will change it's official name. For example, the "Red Hot Chili Peppers" started off as "The Red Hot Chili Peppers".

I ended up deciding to label (as in folder names, tags) old albums under their "new" (latest) name...

The "The" in band names?

Reply #11 – 2006-02-05 09:22:02

This thread springs to mind...

The "The" in band names?

Reply #12 – 2006-02-05 13:37:45

Quote

I also use the name as it appears on the album cover (what the band uses officially). But with an exception...

The only problem, if you want consistency, is that sometimes a band will change it's official name. For example, the "Red Hot Chili Peppers" started off as "The Red Hot Chili Peppers".

I ended up deciding to label (as in folder names, tags) old albums under their "new" (latest) name...

[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=362007"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I do the same, seeing the album cover. Otherwise there's the possibility of confusion: take the example of "Rasmus" (a swedish DJ) and "The Rasmus" (finnish rock-band).

The "The" in band names?

Reply #13 – 2006-02-05 17:35:41

Quote

...take the example of "Rasmus" (a swedish DJ) and "The Rasmus" (finnish rock-band).
[a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=362071"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

That's very interesting!

The "The" in band names?

Reply #14 – 2006-02-05 21:27:05

I, too, use the "check the CD cover" method. And even though I use iTunes, which can automatically ignore the leading "The" article when alphabetizing artist names, I still format everything as "________, The." I do this mostly out of habit, but also because the Mac OS Finder doesn't ignore "The" when alphabetizing, and so in my iTunes Music Folder I would still have a bunch of random artists clustered in the T section. It doesn't really matter, I guess, because I never really interact with my music files directly in the Finder, but it would still just kind of annoy me.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #15 – 2006-04-30 20:04:37

Quote from: Mike Giacomelli on 2006-02-04 23:44:39

I don't think there is a convention. Personally, I include the 'The' in each tag, but when I sort I parse out the 'The' and sort by the next word. IMO this allows the easiest time when you're looking for something, while still maintaining the proper band name.

Is it possible parse "The" out of band names in foobar2000 v0.9.x? How, if so? I'm referring to when using the Album List.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #16 – 2006-04-30 20:33:42

I tag artists with "The" when it's part of their official name (for which I refer to allmusic.com).

For directory names, I'll omit it from the first level if a "the.." band's name has more than two or three words. but i'll keep it in the second-level album folder.

So:

black keys\The Black Keys - 2004 - Thick Freakness\01..mp3
rolling stones\The Rolling Stones -1968 - Beggars Banquet\01..mp3
the bees\The Bees - 2004 - Starry Gazey Pie\01..mp3

The "The" in band names?

Reply #17 – 2006-04-30 21:21:53

Generally, I like to use Album covers to determine this, although for a couple of reasons that is not always practical. Many of my songs come from Entertainment Resources Group (ERG) compilations like Nu Music Traxx, and they tend to have a habit of leaving "The" off of artist names in their lists, even when it badly and obviously requires it. Sometimes I put it back in myself if it appears that convention requires it.

I have a collection of Karaoke songs as well, and for those (excepting The The, of course) I generally like to have "The" after the band name, if required. (Beatles, The). That way, in lists sorted by Artist Name, you won't have a big clump near the end of bands that start with "The" and you won't have songs that happened to get tagged as "Beatles" separated from "The Beatles".

All in all I'd say go with what's on the album cover, or if that's not consistent, homogenize it based on your personal preferences and desired application. If you typically sort your music by genre, then you might want it homogenized.

For my actual music off albums, I label the individual albums by what the CD cover says, then stick them all in one directory - if the band usually needs a "The", it goes after the name to help ensure that I don't end up with two or more directories for one band. (i.e. a directory called Smashing Pumpkins, The) and the actual song tags will say what's on the album cover for each album. (Some might say "The Smashing Pumpkins" and some might just say "Smashing Pumpkins".)

This is what works for me.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #18 – 2006-05-01 02:18:43

Right. What I'm wondering though, is if it's possible to tell foobar to ignore "The" at the beginning of, say, the Artist tag.

I mean, I suppose I could just rename all of my directories to have the "xxxx, The" formatting, but it'd be nicer if I could just tell foobar to forget "The" at the beginning of the artist field and move on. If a program like iTunes can do it, then it should logically follow that foobar should be capable of it as well.

I just want the list to be alphabetically organised, but still have "The Beatles" displayed before "Ben Harper." I suppose, then, that this would be more suited on a foobar2000 thread. I was just making reference to something Mike said earlier. I don't even know if he was referring to foobar or not.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #19 – 2006-05-01 02:32:59

Quote from: ozmosis82 on 2006-04-30 20:04:37

Is it possible parse "The" out of band names in foobar2000 v0.9.x? How, if so? I'm referring to when using the Album List.

You could try this: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?ti...2Band.2C_The.22

The "The" in band names?

Reply #20 – 2006-05-01 09:52:34

My solution:

Export my list of artists from my database (Helium) to a textfile
I made a PHP script to cache all pages from allmusic.com related to a specific artist... yes it took quite a while ;-)

Parsing the information and saving in a relations database.

Currently i'm finetuning the entire process, but i'm easily able to match the input artist name with the most-possible artist name outputted from allmusic.com, percent wise with similar_text() function.

Only thing holding me back now is that PHP won't install in any way on my webserver

The "The" in band names?

Reply #21 – 2006-05-01 12:46:15

Another recent example Here

The "The" in band names?

Reply #22 – 2006-05-01 18:56:03

i usually drop off the THE when the band sounds fine without it

"the beatles" versus "allman brothers band" is a good example

and i use the "beatles, the" convention

later

Code: [Select]

acdc
adderley, cannonball
aerosmith
air
alice in chains
allman brothers band
anastasio, trey
anthrax
aphex twin
arcade fire
at the drive in
audioslave
average white band
bacharach, burt
bad brains
bad company
band, the
barrett, syd
beach boys
beastie boys
beatles, the
beck, jeff
beta band
betts, dickey
black crowes, the
black flag
blakey, art
blind faith
blind melon
bloc party
blondie
blood brothers, the
bloomfield, mike
blues brothers, the
blues project, the
bluesbreakers, the
boston
bowie, david
breeders, the
brown, james
buckethead
buckley, jeff
buffalo springfield
burning spear
butterfield, paul
butthole surfers
byrds, the
cake
camel
captain beefheart
cars, the
cash, johnny
chappelle, dave
chicago transit authority
clapton, eric
clash, the
cocker, joe
cohen, leonard
collins, bootsy
coltrane, john
cooper, alice
corea, chick
cream
creedence clearwater revival
crosby, stills, nash and young
cult, the
cure, the
cursive
davis, miles
dead kennedys
dead milkmen
decemberists
deep purple
devo
distillers
dixon, willie
dj logic
doors, the
drake, nick
dylan, bob
elfman, danny
ellington, duke
elmer, lake and palmer
eminem
everclear
fabulous thunderbirds, the
faces, the
fagen, donald
faith no more
fantomas
firehose
firm, the
flaming lips
fleck, bela
fleetwood mac
foo fighters
ford, marc
frampton, peter
francis, black
franklin, aretha
free
fripp, robert
frisell, bill
fugazi
gabriel, peter
galactic
garcia, jerry
gaye, marvin
geils, j. band
gilmour, david
gong
gov't mule
grand funk railroad
green river
green, al
grisman, david
guns n' roses
hancock, herbie
harper, ben
harrison, george
haynes, warren
helmet
hendrix, jimi
hooker, john lee
hot hot heat
howlin' wolf
husker du
james gang
jane's addiction
jesus lizard, the
jethro tull
johnson, jack
jones, norah
joplin, janis
joy division
judas priest
kaukonen trio, jorma
keane
king, albert
king, b.b.
king, freddie
kinison, sam
kinks, the
kossoff, paul
kraftwerk
lanegan, mark
lang, johnny
leadbelly
led zeppelin
lennon, john
lightning hopkins
lincoln park
live
living colour
lovage
love
lynyrd skynyrd
mad season
mahavishnu orchestra
marley, bob
maroon5
mars volta, the
material
mathews, dave
mayer, john
mayfield, curtis
meat puppets
medeski, martin and wood
melvins, the
metallica
metheny, pat
mingus, charles
minutemen, the
mitchell, joni
modest mouse
molly hatchet
morrison, van
moss, ian
mother love bone
mountain
mr bungle
muse
new order
nine inch nails
nirvana
no doubt
nofx
oasis
outkast
outlaws
page, jimmy
parliament funkadelic
pastorius, jaco
patton, mike
pearl jam
perfect circle, a
petty, tom
phish
pink floyd
pixies, the
plant, robert
police, the
pop, iggy
primus
prince
public enemy
public image limited
queen
quicksilver messenger service
radiohead
rage against the machine
rainbow
ramones
red hot chili peppers
redding, otis
reed, lou
rem
replacements, the
rodgers, paul
rolling stones
roots, the
run dmc
rush
rush, otis
santana, carlos
scaggs, boz
screaming trees
seinfeld, jerry
sepultura
sex pistols, the
shakti
sheppard, kenny wayne
silverchair
simmonds, kim
simon & garfunkel
sinatra, frank
sly & the family stone
smashing pumpkins
sonic youth
soul coughing
soundgarden
specials, the
spinal tap
split enz
squeeze
steely dan
steppenwolf
stewart, rod
sting
stone temple pilots
stone, joss
string cheese incident
strokes, the
sublime
summers, andy
sun ra
system of a down
talking heads
taylor, cecil
taylor, mick
television
tenacious d
thin lizzy
thorogood, george
thrice
toad the wet sprocket
tomahawk
tool
tosh, peter
townshend, pete
traffic
tragically hip, the
trainwreck
transplants
traveling wilburys
trevor dunn's trio convulsant
trower, robin
trucks, derek
turner, tina
u2
ultravox
umphrey's mcgee
van halen
vaughan, stevie ray
vedder, eddie
velvet revolver
velvet underground
waits, tom
waters, muddy
waters, roger
watt, mike
weather report
weezer
westerberg, paul
white stripes
white, snowy
who, the
winter, johnny
worrell, bernie
wright, richard
wu-tang clan
x2
xtc
yardbirds, the
yeah yeah yeah's
yohimbe brothers
young, neil
zappa, frank
zorn, john
zz top

The "The" in band names?

Reply #23 – 2006-05-01 22:40:06

Quote from: LordFrieza on 2006-05-01 02:32:59

You could try this: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?ti...2Band.2C_The.22

Thanks so much. That's what I was looking for. I figured it wouldn't be possible to have the Album List actually display "The Beatles" as opposed to "Beatles, The" and still have everything in alphabetical order.

The "The" in band names?

Reply #24 – 2006-05-01 23:01:24

Well, personally I don't like the writing of "Beatles, The". I think this feature should be included in foobar. Someone posted a feature request?
Btw, MediaMonkey already has this feature and you can define the pronouns like The or Die (in german) by yourself.

Big_Berny

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