How to locate the original release date of tracks?
June 10, 2007 5:19 PM Subscribe
iTunes Filter: Is there a simple way to determine the original release date of individual tracks by various artists?
I am cleaning up my iTunes music collection and want to set up playlists sorted by decade and genre (60's onwards to today).
The trouble is I have found that tracks purchased from iTunes do not give the correct year of release as I had originally thought they would. Logically enough if a track is on a compilation or re-release of an album, then the Year listed by iTunes is that year, not the original date of release.
I have been using Wikipedia discography for the bands concerned but as that is getting to be pretty tedious I'm hoping there is a simpler method to gather the information needed. I don't need the month, only the year.
I am cleaning up my iTunes music collection and want to set up playlists sorted by decade and genre (60's onwards to today).
The trouble is I have found that tracks purchased from iTunes do not give the correct year of release as I had originally thought they would. Logically enough if a track is on a compilation or re-release of an album, then the Year listed by iTunes is that year, not the original date of release.
I have been using Wikipedia discography for the bands concerned but as that is getting to be pretty tedious I'm hoping there is a simpler method to gather the information needed. I don't need the month, only the year.
Ya, Wikipedia is s.l.o.w.
IF most of your material is like charted hits, then I'd refer to Billboard's "Top 40 Hits", authored by Joel Whitburn.
In the back, for any (charting) song title, it's got a list of all the artists that sang it, along with the month and year it charted.
The bulk of the book is a chart-discography for most major artists. In a bookstore recently I found a used 7th edition for $2. Nice ... it's the "bible" for mainstream pop artistry. Other useful guides are Trouser Press, "Rough Guide", and Rolling Stone's Encyclopedia of Rock.
posted by Twang at 10:00 PM on June 10, 2007
IF most of your material is like charted hits, then I'd refer to Billboard's "Top 40 Hits", authored by Joel Whitburn.
In the back, for any (charting) song title, it's got a list of all the artists that sang it, along with the month and year it charted.
The bulk of the book is a chart-discography for most major artists. In a bookstore recently I found a used 7th edition for $2. Nice ... it's the "bible" for mainstream pop artistry. Other useful guides are Trouser Press, "Rough Guide", and Rolling Stone's Encyclopedia of Rock.
posted by Twang at 10:00 PM on June 10, 2007
P.S. I'm a fan of SongFacts too. Kind of hit-or-miss compared to a book ... but YMMV, & faster than Wikipedia.
posted by Twang at 10:05 PM on June 10, 2007
posted by Twang at 10:05 PM on June 10, 2007
Allmusic seems pretty good. I usually use it to fix names / dates / etc. on music acquired other than through ITMS.
posted by caution live frogs at 6:42 AM on June 11, 2007
posted by caution live frogs at 6:42 AM on June 11, 2007
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Effigy2000 at 7:37 PM on June 10, 2007