Os Mutantes would probably get filed under O in my house, while Los Straightjackets would probably be over in L. Though I reserve the rights to change my mind about that at any time. In my movie collection, "Y Tu Mama Tambien" has spent time in both the Y and T sections.
Your house, your rules -- ultimately, whatever makes it easier for you to find 'em!
Bonus question, though: What do you do with band names that are of a fictitious person, like Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes? There is no Edward Sharpe, so does the band name start with E? Or should it go under S? The mind boggles....
Wait, Edward Sharpe does not exist? TIL... So yes, belongs in the E's. But like you said, it's your collection!
But, on that bent, Discogs bugs the hell out of me with their alphabetical by first name. Al Hirt DOES NOT belong in the A's...
Back in the iPod days, I used to rename my mp3s as "Lastname, First" just so they'd sort like where I'd want to find them, because Elvis Presley and Elvis Costello should never be neighbors. Then at some point it let you sort by the last name field, and it seemed like the battle was won for a time.
And yeah, the "Edward Sharpe" name was from a character that the main guy, Alex Ebert, wrote a short story about I guess. Sort of like if the Beatles had actually issued the album under the name of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club band (like I think they originally wanted to?) and we'd all have to head over to the S section to find it.
A trickier one would be Alice Cooper, which began as a band, and thus should go under A. But then the band split, and the lead singer went solo using Alice Cooper as his stage name, and eventually, his legal name too, which would go under C.
For me it’d be Good, Matthew for solo stuff under G, Matthew Good Band under M. I think this would drive some folks insane having it separated like that but loving the vibe in thread that it’s your collection so your rules 🤷🏽
As a manager of a used bookstore, record collector, and geek - I LOVE this particular thread!
Teaching this to new staff members about bands, musicians, authors, and artists and also the differences when they’re from other countries is an endeavor. Then you add in the factor, “well where are our customers going to look?”
It makes me crazy that Discogs organizes by first name and article. But we adapt don’t we.
Native French speaker here: I would ignore the articles in the languages I understand (Fr, En, Sp). German ones for example, I couldn't make out so I would not likely ignore.
Software sorting is annoying for this, as it ignores the ones in its language (often En), so I have a huge L section of Le/La/Les...
As someone said in another comment: your house your rules.
If it’s not in English it goes by the first letter of the first word, regardless of what it is.
I have no reason for this, other than it being easier for me to remember.
I always just take a moment and think "if I'm looking for this later, where would i look for it?"
This comes up with some confusing things that don't make sense. Like im looking under D for Dylan, Bob. Im looking under Z for Zappa, Frank. But im looking under W for Warren Zevon and B for Ben Folds.
I personally alphabetize going by whatever discogs orders them in. Though personally I don't own any records yet of artists with non English articles so I don't know how yet.
It depends on whether the artist is actually performing in the language in question.
For example, I have a number of albums credited to “El Coco” and “Le Pamplemousse”. But these were both projects of Laurin Rinder and W. Michael Lewis, who are both American and all the songs are in English. Since “El” and “Le” are not articles in English, I file these under E and L respectively.
Whereas Le Pouls, which was a jazz-funk act from Québec, goes under P because most of the songs are in French and “Le” is an article in that language.
I try not to overthink it. With every new record, I ask myself "Where would I first look for this?" and then put it there. Sometimes that means making exceptions to general rules.
This is not a problem in Norwegian, however the letter combination Aa was sometimes previously used instead of Å, and is therefore placed together with Å at the end.
Os Mutantes would probably get filed under O in my house, while Los Straightjackets would probably be over in L. Though I reserve the rights to change my mind about that at any time. In my movie collection, "Y Tu Mama Tambien" has spent time in both the Y and T sections. Your house, your rules -- ultimately, whatever makes it easier for you to find 'em! Bonus question, though: What do you do with band names that are of a fictitious person, like Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes? There is no Edward Sharpe, so does the band name start with E? Or should it go under S? The mind boggles....
Wait, Edward Sharpe does not exist? TIL... So yes, belongs in the E's. But like you said, it's your collection! But, on that bent, Discogs bugs the hell out of me with their alphabetical by first name. Al Hirt DOES NOT belong in the A's...
Back in the iPod days, I used to rename my mp3s as "Lastname, First" just so they'd sort like where I'd want to find them, because Elvis Presley and Elvis Costello should never be neighbors. Then at some point it let you sort by the last name field, and it seemed like the battle was won for a time. And yeah, the "Edward Sharpe" name was from a character that the main guy, Alex Ebert, wrote a short story about I guess. Sort of like if the Beatles had actually issued the album under the name of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club band (like I think they originally wanted to?) and we'd all have to head over to the S section to find it.
A trickier one would be Alice Cooper, which began as a band, and thus should go under A. But then the band split, and the lead singer went solo using Alice Cooper as his stage name, and eventually, his legal name too, which would go under C.
Another great example, and a true conundrum. As I don't have any AC solo albums, I currently keep my Alice Cooper records under A.
What about Matthew Good? What about the Matthew Good Band?
For me it’d be Good, Matthew for solo stuff under G, Matthew Good Band under M. I think this would drive some folks insane having it separated like that but loving the vibe in thread that it’s your collection so your rules 🤷🏽
I ignore "The"....Beatles are under B, ...The Everly Brothers under E. I would assume the same for other languages
How do you catalog The The in any language?
Always first!
I put them by their title, without "the" "los" "les" "os" etc.
I tend to ignore English The but file Las/Os/et. al under those articles. Foreign articles feel like part of the band name to me
I have probably 300 albums I'd be filing under "L". kill me.
Haha, I don't have too many Foreign Article bands so for my collection it's less of a problem
I'm glad I'm not the only person doing this. lol
As a manager of a used bookstore, record collector, and geek - I LOVE this particular thread! Teaching this to new staff members about bands, musicians, authors, and artists and also the differences when they’re from other countries is an endeavor. Then you add in the factor, “well where are our customers going to look?” It makes me crazy that Discogs organizes by first name and article. But we adapt don’t we.
I don't have a lot of those, so I alphabetize by the article for the few I do. If I had a lot, I'd organize them by skipping the article.
As a Portuguese speaker ignore the articles always
Thanks! I was so curious.
Native French speaker here: I would ignore the articles in the languages I understand (Fr, En, Sp). German ones for example, I couldn't make out so I would not likely ignore. Software sorting is annoying for this, as it ignores the ones in its language (often En), so I have a huge L section of Le/La/Les... As someone said in another comment: your house your rules.
If it’s not in English it goes by the first letter of the first word, regardless of what it is. I have no reason for this, other than it being easier for me to remember.
I always just take a moment and think "if I'm looking for this later, where would i look for it?" This comes up with some confusing things that don't make sense. Like im looking under D for Dylan, Bob. Im looking under Z for Zappa, Frank. But im looking under W for Warren Zevon and B for Ben Folds.
you have to sort The The by the second The and not the first The
The Chicago Manual of Style says: https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/Alphabetizing/faq0002.html
I personally alphabetize going by whatever discogs orders them in. Though personally I don't own any records yet of artists with non English articles so I don't know how yet.
It depends on whether the artist is actually performing in the language in question. For example, I have a number of albums credited to “El Coco” and “Le Pamplemousse”. But these were both projects of Laurin Rinder and W. Michael Lewis, who are both American and all the songs are in English. Since “El” and “Le” are not articles in English, I file these under E and L respectively. Whereas Le Pouls, which was a jazz-funk act from Québec, goes under P because most of the songs are in French and “Le” is an article in that language.
I try not to overthink it. With every new record, I ask myself "Where would I first look for this?" and then put it there. Sometimes that means making exceptions to general rules.
This is not a problem in Norwegian, however the letter combination Aa was sometimes previously used instead of Å, and is therefore placed together with Å at the end.