Music - Albums Showing Re-release dates, not original release dates

Plex Media Server
1

I recently noticed that all of my music albums switched to re-release date (for those that had a re-release) instead of the original date. I looked at the properties of the files themselves, they showed (or have been clanged to) the original date. The release date within plex for the album (if you edit the album and select the originally available date) is also the original date for the release.

However, when you look at the date displayed and sorted by within plex, it shows the re-release date not the originally available date.

Anyone know how to correct this?

Server Version#: 1.29.0.6244

2

any suggestions on correcting this?

3

Edit your music library.
Go to the Advanced tab
Please read whatā€™s been selected for Agent.
Do also look for a checkbox named ā€œPrefer local metatagsā€. Is it ticked?

4

Hello, the agent is currently set to Plex Music, i also tried setting it to personal media artists with no change.
Prefer Local Metatags is currently checked, should it be unchecked?

5

Leave everything as is for now.
Can you show me an overview over all embedded meta tags of your files?
Particularly interesting is if you have several date-related tags populated. There can be ā€œYearā€, ā€œDateā€, and ā€œOriginal Dateā€.

Also important is to know the folder organization.
Each album should have a separate folder for its tracks.
Each album folder in turn should be stored inside a folder which is named after the Album Artist of that album. (Important: ā€œAlbum Artistā€ is not ā€œ[Track] Artistā€)
Plex usually stores only one release date for the whole album, so it is also important whether all tracks of an album have identical meta tags.

If you have switched the agent of the library back and forth, it is possible that your library cannot be repaired.
Iā€™d create a completely new folder and copy just a few albums into it.
Then create a new music library and point it to that new folder.
See if the result is different from how these albums appear in the old library.

mp3tag_multidisc_album
mp3tag_multidisc_album1717Ɨ741 54.1 KB

grafik
grafik1202Ɨ416 88.9 KB

6

I tested this, but a little differently then you requested:

First, I have an example from the existing library which shows the incorrect (or more specifically re-release) date:
Megadeht current library incorrect date
There are a number of albums with the remaster/re-release date showing in this library.

Next i created a new library and directed it to the specific sub-folder for this artist, there are probably 20 (give or take) albums. In the new folder the re-release albums show the orginal date of the release:
Megadeth Test -correct date
I didnt move, copy or change anything at this point. The other albums that show with the incorrect date in the current library also show the correct original release date in this test library.

Here is a screen shot of from mp3tags:
megadeth metadata

I know at one point i ran into this issue (a year or more ago), but the dates in plex were showing for the originally available date as the re-release date. I went and modified those to the correct year and everything was fine for a while.
orginally available
(Screen shot for reference of where i am referring, as it currently shows the correct date).
Then one day recently i noticed it was changed (it likely/possible it was after being prompted for a plex update and applying it - but i cant pinpoint an exact time/version).

I did for testing try modifying the year and retail date shown in mps3tag and re-scanned the (original) library to see if that made any difference, but it did not.

Next i tried moving the album above from the folder it was into a folder not monitored by the (original) library, emptied the trash in plex, and once it was gone moved the folder back to the artist folder, re-scanned the library and it now shows the correct date.

To further test this out, in the (original) library, i took an album with an incorrect date, move it a folder not monitored by the (original) library, emptied the trash and then again moved it back to the artist folder which is monitored. This too resulted in the album showing the correct date. So it seems like something happened (again thinking an update but canā€™t say for sure) that triggered the date changes and that the library is capable of reflecting the correct date, but at of the moment requiring the removal and re-add of album to do so.

The problem is it would be kind of a pain to do this with all the albums and i also donā€™t want older albums showing up under the recently added if i can avoid it.

Let me know if what you think and if there are any suggestions on fix it it.

7

Unfortunately this makes the test pointless, because the artist folder has now become the library root.
Please perform the test as instructed.

8

I dont think i would agree its pointless. For one, follow up i did the test as outlined which is to create a new folder with the artist folders underneath that folder and point the new test library to the root of the new folder (example x:\media\music2\plex2\megadeth and pointed the library to x:\media\music2\plex2\ which mirrors the current library setup) . It yielded identical results to what i did.
newtest

With that, removing an album and re-adding it to the existing library and having the date being properly reflected seems relevant to me, almost like the database is holding a date that got incorrectly updated and is now not able to be changed.

Regardless the test outlined yielded the same results which is the correct original release date is shown and not the re-release date.

9

Iā€™d check the state of the primary database file. If itā€™s damaged, it can prevent parts of the library from getting updated.

  1. activate debug logging (not ā€˜verboseā€™!)
  2. quit Plex Server
  3. wait 1 minute
  4. start Plex Server
  5. wait 5 minutes
  6. fetch log files and attach them here

Or inspect them yourself. Take a look at the Plex Media Server.log file and seek for messages about database corrupt or malformed.
If you find these, you may have to repair your database.
https://support.plex.tv/articles/repair-a-corrupted-database/

10

I had debugging on already, i took a look at (and searched for both malformed and corrupt) in the various existing Plex Media Server #.log files. None have malformed or corrupt listed that i could see.

I stopped Plex and restarted and attached the most recent log after 5 minutes (which also doesnt appear to have malformed or corrupt listed)
Plex Media Server.log (427.3 KB)

11

Any suggestions since there doesnā€™t appear to be corruption in the db?

12

I guess weā€™re not looking any further into this then?

13

Pretty lame to support a company and have their support just give up.

2 Likes
14

This topic was automatically closed 90 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.