Coverflow says Various Artist

I have seen many topics on here about Coverflow....The one things I cant seem to get past is this...I have two identical album covers one of them says the name of the group and the other cover says Various Artist.....the one with Various Artist has one song off the album....Everythign is identical in the Get Info section i.e. Album Name, Artist, Album Artist, Genre....any ideas other than deleting song and re-loading it?????

In iTunes, does that song have a name in the artist box. If there is no name in that box, the Nano automatically adds that name to it.

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Coverflow on iPod says Various Artists, not the album artist name

It looks fine on iTunes, with the proper artist name under the cover, but it changes to various artists when synced to the iPod. I set it on compilation, like I did when it worked about a month ago. I took off the compilation on Get Info and then I get the multiple covers again. Anybody else have this problem?

If they are all the SAME artist, you shouldn't need the Compilation checkmark. If they aren't the SAME artist, you would need it checked, and in Cover Flow, they will show up as "Various Artists" followed by the Album's Name.
If that doesn't help you, go to the Music section of iTunes, sort by Album Name, and select all the songs in an Album. Choose Get Info, and select pretty much EVERYTHING. If they are all the same Artist, fill it in and make sure it's checked, fill in the Album Name and check it, Genre's can be different, Volume adjustment can be different, the Year CAN be different, I believe.
Then, if the Artist is different for the songs, Compilation should be selected.
Then if you want, you can add the album artwork as well so they are all getting it from the same source at once. Then click ok, sync and try.
Then they should show up correctly.

ITunes Changing Tag Info (Compilations/Various Artists/"The")

This is driving me crazy.
Compilations
I change my tags to make sure songs do not have a check in the box marked "compilations", yet they are still moved there in their own section on my artist panel right beneath "All Artists" in it's own group called "Compilations". I cannot get them out of there despite the check box being empty.
Various Artists
Songs keep being moved back to this category over and over. I make sure that the field in the tag that says Various Artists is removed, both in the main song info section as well as in the Sorting tab of the tag. The song will go where it belongs and the next time I open iTunes, it is back in it's own section on artist panel called Various Artists. Compilation box is also unchecked.
"The"
I do not want my artist panel to ever show "The" before an artists name (The Police, The Beatles, etc.), so I change the tags both in the main and sorting tabs. I do this for songs I have imported from various MP3 collections, CD's and songs purchased straight from iTunes store. When I make the changes, they work fine...for a while, then, next thing I know I have 4 songs on my iPhone by The Police and 2 by Police in a different artist block
It really is making me nuts. Is there some setting in the menu I am missing that will make iTunes leave my tags alone? I have looked and come up empty. Any help would sure be appreciated. Thank you - Bob

Go to iTunes > Preferences > Store and turn off
Show iTunes in the Cloud purchases
Share details about your library with Apple
On any iOS device go to Settings > Music and turn off
Show All Music
Close and reopen iTunes and/or reset any device and you should see your version of the metadata for each track rather than the original store data, if not your changes should revert as you play through content.
tt2

Various Artist Don't Display

In iOS4 and previous if you set the album artist for a whole album that had various artists to one thing (such as Various Artists) then when you sort you would only see one album. Now, that doesn't seem to be the case. No matter what I try to change, sort artist, album artist, sort album artist, ad nauseum it still displays an album for each artist. the only thing I could get to work is if I selected compilation then at least when I selected one it had the whole album. Anyone else run into this?

I may have a fix, but you probably won't like it. if you purchased the music from itunes, or if itunes has the artwork, you can simply go to Advanced tab and Get Album Artwork. If not you can do one of two things. If it is from a cd that you still have, you can try reimporting it into itunes. Or, go online, like to Amazon, find your album, copy the artwork.
In itunes, go to the album that has no album art on your iphone. Select all the songs, right click, select Get Info. In the box where artwork should be, you will see an empty box. Select the check box next to it and click ok. It will delete the artwork that is there, but it really isn't there. Either the file is corrupt or it is gone. I think itunes is just displaying what was there. What is strange is, in the cases where I have a two volume album, and only one didn't show artwork on my phone, I couldn't copy the artwork from the volume that had the artwork and paste it into the one that didn't. I had do get new artwork externally.
After you have done that, you should still have all the songs selected, so just right click again and select Get Info. Right click in the artwork box, and paste the artwork you previously copied, and say ok. Your artwork should be displayed, and you can resync your phone to download it to your phone. Repeat as necessary.

Some albums getting listed as Various Artist in Cover flow only

eg
Velvet Revolver - Contraband
Husker Du -Land Speed Record
The Killers - Sawdust
The above albums appear in the Correct place under the artists name in Portrait mode on the ipod but, when viewed in cover flow - the appear as being "various artists"
I have 32gb 3.5gs
Anyone know how to fix this?
I have re-type the artists name, then re-sync - still appears in the same place

I had the same problem after I updated to the most recent 3.0 firmware on my iPhone 3G.
I managed to fix the same problem you describe by:
1) Making sure the "Part of a Compilation" field is set to "No". For multiple files, you select them, "Get Info" and on the "Options" tab, you will see this setting. For one file, it will be on the "Info" page.
2) Making sure "Album Artist" is either blank or set correctly.
Number 2 only came up on 1 or 2 albums that were not displaying properly on CoverFlow (i.e., showing up under "Various Artists"). Number 1 is what fixed the rest of my albums (around 10 full albums or so).
Hope this helps other people. To save time, I would suggest using the Shift button to select the entire album and do what I recommend under #1.
Cheers.

How to get rid of "Various Artists" on iTunes?

I have a couple soundtracks from films, but all the songs are by the same artist for each soundtrack (Teddy Gieger - The Rocker, Neil Patrick Harris - Dr. Horrible's...), and I'd rather have the artists' names on my iTunes than have all my soundtracks put into one "Various Artists" catagory. I've taken off the "album artist", changed it from "Various Artists" to the name of the artist, changed the genre from "soundtrack", and unchecked "part of a compilation", but when I sync my 4S, it still shows up as "Various Artists". Is there any way to get rid of this?

I had the same problem; it was really annoying. I finally figured out how to fix it though.
Go to the artist "Various Artist" on your ipod. View all the songs and delete them all from your ipod/iphone whatever. You might want to write down which songs are under the "various artist" category so you can remember which ones to add back. Go to the Itunes library and go to the info for each song that you just deleted from your ipod and uncheck "part of a compilation" and where it says "artist album" replace "various artists" with the actual artists name.
When you're finished the various artists category should be gone and all the artists should appear individually.

Problems with "Various Artists"

Hi I have a 2 disc album that I want to list as "various artists" it's easy with first disc as there are 3 or 4 different artists on that CD that when "Compilation Album" is ticked come up as "VA" however the 2nd CD is all the same artist (Blank & Jones) so of course that will be filed under "B" I have selected all of CD 2 and ticked "part of a compilation" but this does not work, i could fudge it a bit by putting a space in one track but i'd rather not do that, so any help welcome I am using 10.6.2.35 within Win 7 U 64bit.
All1

Well i have been able to solve this and just thought i'd post back in case it helps someone else, as i say i have an album (Double CD) where the first CD is all "Blank & Jones" and the second CD is all "Blank & Jones" but 2 tracks, now marking both of them as part of a compliation did not solve my problem, you see i wanted them both to come up as Various Artists this would not work with CD 1 unless i changed the artiists name from "Blank & Jones" to "Various Artists" which of course is not right.
However just playing around the other morning i highlighted whole of CD 1, right click/get info/ of course it showed Artist as being "Blank & Jones" but i put "Various Artists" into the Album Artist section (2nd one down) and applied and it worked, it turned that album into Various Artists in my line despite all the artist being B&J.
I know i know it's old news to 99% of you but it was new to me so hope it will help others.
All1

Use Album Artists causes repeat values of Various Artists

The obvious implication of the new *Use Album Artist* feature in the Colum Browser is that only Album Artist values will be listed and further that each will be listed only once, sorted by the value of Album Artist or Sort Album Artist. It may be that the previous build (where the feature was introduced) did just this but I have noticed that the current build with Group Compilations turned off will, for example, list the value Various Artists at multiple locations in the Artist column in the browser.
For example, say we have a playlist with albums by Alice, Charlie, Eric & Grace together with a compilation featuring artists Bob, Dave & Fiona with an album artist value of "Various Arists".
With *Use Album Artists* turned on and *Group Compilations* turned off I would expect I would expect the artist panel in the column browser to read:
Alice
Charlie
Eric
Grace
Various Artists
but what we actualy get is:
Alice
Various Artists
Charlie
Various Artists
Eric
Various Artists
Grace
In other words each different value used for Album Artist with compilations, Various Artist, Original Cast, etc. may be listed multiple times at multiple locations within the Artist column instead of just once as expected.
So, is it just me? Anybody still on 9.1.0.79 or a Mac build care to confirm if they see the same?
tt2

Compilations need a value for album artist to keep them connected on an iPhone as I've noted elsewhere. However exploring the problem further it isn't even about compilations & various artists, it was just working with them that brought it to my attention. A more accurate description of the problem is:
With the new *Use Album Artists* feature turned on the artist pane fails to re-sort when you change the value of Album Artist or Sort Album Artist and does not update until you close and re-open iTunes.
E.g. Change "Albert King" to "King, Albert" in either Album Artist, Sort Album Artist or both and the entry in the Artists pane will stay put under A. Close iTunes and re-open and it will have moved to K.
I have already sent feedback with a link to this thread. Again it would be useful if any Mac or Win 9.1.0.79 users could confirm if they see the same behaviour.
tt2

How do I keep imported albums featuring various artists in one list?

I'm new to iTunes and have not figured out how to create a single library listing when importing CD's that feature various artists. iTunes always creates separate library listings for each artist, spreading them across the library in alphabetical order. I can make a single playlist from all of the library listings, but I'd rather that the album just lists as a single listing in the library. (the song order gets messed up)
Has anyone figured out how to accomplish this? Many thanks in advance.

As Zevoneer pointed out, first thing to do is select all the tracks in the compilation album, do a Get Info and make sure they are checked off as "Part of a Compilation".
Next all you have to do is click on the "Album" heading and it will change to Album By Artist, then clicking again Album By Year and one more time brings you back to Album.
As it turns out, both the Album by Artist and Album by Year sort by artist first in the list then either by album name (Album By Artist) or the Year (Album by Year).
Finally, go into Preference and in the main (General) tab there is a check box for "Group Compilation while browsing". Check this box.
Now if you sort by the other two "Album" sorts (by artist or by year), your main library will be listed by artist alphabetically. Then within each artist the albums but alphabetical or by year. And finally, if you scroll down to the bottom your list, you will find your compilation albums grouped nicely together by album rather than scattered all over the library.
Cheers,
Patrick

TS1468 If all tracks on an album are written by one artist, but have other supporting artists, can I group them all as one album under the original artist without having to group them as a compilation and being called "Various Artists"?

I'm pretty sure I've tried all the suggestions I've found, but I can't seem to find a satisfactory option.
I'll use a CD I just bought as an example. I just bought "The Best of Sergio Mendes", all songs are written by Sergio Mendes, but some include Brasil '66. iTunes thinks this album is a compilation, but I really just want to group it all as Sergio Mendes rather than Various Artists, but I still want to have the information about which songs include Brasil '66. For some reason the tab "Sorting" does absolutely nothing, but it seems like the idea behind it would be really useful if it actually worked... Is there a way of doing this or will I have to settle with a more confusing or less informative option? I feel like this must be possible, or else it's a pretty big flaw for me as I have a fair few albums this would apply to.
Thanks in advance for any help.

Indeed, generally all you need to do is fill in an appropriate Album Artist. For more details see my article on Grouping Tracks Into Albums, in particular the topic One album, too many covers.
Don't try to use sort fields to merge different things together as it quickly goes wrong. These should be used consistently to make all things with one value sort as if they had a different one, e.g. Bowie, David to make David Bowie sort under B.
tt2

Albums with various artists down load as 13 separate items. How do I rejoin them as an album?

When I import some compilation albums into my Itunes it seperates them out into seperate "albums" how can I "re-join".

Make sure "artist" and "album artist" are the same.
You only need make sure they all have an identical "album artist" to get them to group together. This can be anything as long as it is the same -- even "various artists" for a true compilation. This is designed so you can keep different artists in the artist field but still have tracks group together. In fact if you do make the artist fields identical, the album would group together in the first place and you don't need to touch album artist. However, there may be cases where you do not want to put the identical artist in the artist field, then you need to either flag them as compilation (as indicated in another post) or give them all a single album artist.

Having downloaded update 10.5, the artists section of my iPod no longer recognises artists who feature on compilation albums. Instead it groups them under the album artist, ie various artists. Any suggestions?

Having downloaded iTunes update 10.5, my iPod no longer recognises in the artists section those artists who feature on various artists' compilation albums. Instead the iPod groups them under various artists, and, if you are looking for a particular artist,who only features on a compilation, you have to remember or search to see which various artist album they feature on - all very frustrating, especially as it worked OK before the update. So far I've not updated any more - so I've not taken 10.5.1 or 10.5.2 because 10.5 caused me so many problems, but I'm wondering if the solution could be in those updates
I've tried amending the iTunes library artist and album artist, and it is possible to get the iPod to recognise the artists, but the downside is that the library then removes the artist from the album, and you then have to play those tracks individually
Has anyone suffered the same problem and, if so, has a solution been found?

Having downloaded iTunes update 10.5, my iPod no longer recognises in the artists section those artists who feature on various artists' compilation albums. Instead the iPod groups them under various artists, and, if you are looking for a particular artist,who only features on a compilation, you have to remember or search to see which various artist album they feature on - all very frustrating, especially as it worked OK before the update. So far I've not updated any more - so I've not taken 10.5.1 or 10.5.2 because 10.5 caused me so many problems, but I'm wondering if the solution could be in those updates
I've tried amending the iTunes library artist and album artist, and it is possible to get the iPod to recognise the artists, but the downside is that the library then removes the artist from the album, and you then have to play those tracks individually
Has anyone suffered the same problem and, if so, has a solution been found?

How do I get itunes to comile various artists cds?

I am new to the posting, so please fogive me if this has already been answered. My kids and I put a lot of compilation albums on our itunes like the Now that's what I call music-where the album is the same name, but the artists are all different. On my older version of itunes, as long as I had clicked on the album info that it was part of a compilation, it would put all of the tracks together. Now on the updated version it will seperate the tracks by artists even though the album info lists it as a compilation. How do I change this?

Hi,
The post I referred you to earlier tries to deal with quite a large number of potential causes for "split" albums. I've tried to keep it brief while giving sufficient detail to explain each problem and the suggested workarounds.
*One album, too many covers*
For true compilations, where each track is by a different artist, the answer is to set the compilation flag to true and enable the iTunes preference to *Group compilations when browsing.*
Expanding this rather brief statement to address your specific problem first confirm that the "Group compilations when browsing" feature is turned on. Use the menu item *Edit > Preferences* to open the Preferences dialog, select the Advanced tab and ensure there is a tick against "Group compilations when browsing" (3rd option up from the bottom). If you've added the tick, click OK to confirm the change, otherwise you can cancel.
Next confirm that you are using an "Album-friendly" view to look at your tracks. Select *View > List* to switch to the list view. If you don't have a section showing Genres, Artists & Albums use *View > Show Browser* to turn this on. Right-click on the track column headings to reveal a list of attributes that can be displayed. Click on any of the following that are not already ticked to turn them on; *Album, Album Artist, Artist, Disk Number, Track Number*. Repeat until all of these fields are shown. Click on the heading of the Album column one or more times until it reads *Album by Artist*.
For each compilation album, select it's name in the top-right browser window, then click on one of the tracks to move the focus to the Tracks pane. You can now select all the tracks of the album with CTRL-A, then open the "Get Info" dialog with CTRL-I. On the Info tab change/set the *Album Artist* to *Various Artists*. On the Options tab, set the *Part of a compilation* value to Yes. Click OK.
For the *Now That's What I Call Music Series* or other albums containing multiple discs that are displaying as multiple covers (e.g. Now That's... 61, Disc 1, Now That's... 61 Disc 2), select the tracks of each disc in turn and make sure that the correct *Disc X of Y* values are set. Then select all the tracks of all of the discs of the album and type in the overall album title to merge the albums together. Incidentally, for this series I find it much easier to use the shortened "Now ##" title as with the full title you can't tell one from another in the album section of the browser.
You should find that albums are now properly kept together in other "Album-friendly" views whether list, grid or cover flow based. Just don't expect them to stay together if you sort on columns such as Track Name, Artist, Disc No. Date Added, etc.
tt2

Itunes renaming songs and tracks to the incorrect ones, e.g. renaming all Various Artists to be Gym Class Heroes when played on my ipod, and incorrectly renaming tracks at random.

Also some songs are imported twice and named different things? I dont know why itunes has done this, and its on purchased products mainly.
I have switched back all the various artists defaults once, and it has just switched it back when synced with my ipod. How can i solve this issue?

There may be some inconsistency in the capitalizations, or some of the tracks may be marked as Disc 1 of 1 while others are Disc <Blank> of <Blank> See Grouping tracks into albums for more details.
tt2

Imported CD artists not listed individually, I found them under "various artists". How can I change the way rs? thanksthey import and edit the current erro

Imported CDs are being labeled as "various artists" not by the actual artists name. Why is this happening and how do I fix it? Thank you, J

Highlight a track and press command ( or ⌘ key) and the letter "i" at the same time to enter the editor window.
Use shift+click to select a range of trakcs, or command+click to select multiple individual tracks.
Various artists is often used where an album has several artist on it (read links below). If you don't group them some way then you will find multiple albums listed in iTunes with each one being an artist on the main album. The individual artists should still appear in the artist window but it is possible the database used to label your CD was incorrect. CDs do not have the information on them, they get it from an Internet database. Anybody can submit track names so you don't always get good ones.
Why aren't songs with the same album art grouped together? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ts1468
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4559720 - discussion of using compilation vs. album artist to group tracks

Coverflow says Various Artist

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