I have my Music Library set to use the Plex Music as the source for Musical Genre rather than embedded metadata because my Music Collection of 110,000 tracks has some messed up Genres. Furthermore there are not tag fields for Style in the standard musical tags. I’ve found I just prefer what comes down from Plex Music. However, it seems that Plexamp uses the local file metadata for Genre rather than the Plex Music the way PMS and the Plex apps for for iOS do. Is there a way to change Plexamp to use Plex Music as the source for the metadata the way PMS does rather than the local metadata in the file’s tags?
edit the music library > advanced > enable/disable the options as you see fit
note: if you use plex ‘genres’ they will show up as STYLE
if you want GENRE you must use your own tags.
you cannot have both plex STYLEs and GENRE tags. Why? I don’t know.
style/genre is only available for ARTISTS and ALBUMS, not TRACKS. Why? because plex currently doesn’t support that field for tracks.
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I have Genres set to Plex Music rather than embedded tags. So you’re telling me with that set to Plex music it will still use the embedded tags? Then why give me the option?
No, when it is set to plex music, it will use plex styles (not genre tags).
if you change this, you must refresh metadata at either (each) artist level or the music level.
music > 3 dot menu > refresh metadata
I would recommend testing 1 or more artists, before refreshing the entire music library.
with it set to Plex music though the genre’s that are in my tags will still show up but plex just won’t use them?
you cannot have both plex music styles, and genre plexamp RADIOS.
edit, actually, both genre and style may show in plex web/plexamp, but PLEXAMP RADIOS only uses style (for plex sourced style) or genre (if using tags).
for example, my library is configured to use genre tags, but I still have style info
if you want to use only plex metadata, then UNCHECK prefer local metadata in the settings pictured above, then refresh metadata.
Okay, I think I’m understanding now… the options above really only apply to Plexamp Radios?
One of my problems (not Plex related) is I edit my tags/genre’s in a separate program and save them and a day later they revert back to some crazy stuff like “17”. Anyway, at least until I get that ironed out I want to use the Plex provided metadata.
With the “prefer local metadata” unchecked and “Genres” set to “Plex Music” the genres the Plex Web shows Genres downloaded from Plex Music. I’ve tested this by setting some truly obscure and incorrect Genres, refreshing the metadata and those Genres do not show up. Yet in Plexamp there is no “Genre” under an individual artist but if I select the second screen from the bottom menu (right of home, the musical note in the box) there is an option for the Genres list which does not revert to the Plex Genres but rather the long list of goofy genres I cannot rid my music of.
I would think with the setting set as I have them, “prefer local metadata” unchecked and “Plex Music” for Genres selected this list would be what comes down from Plex Music, not what is in my library and that is not the way it works (in plexamp only. Plex web shows what plex music provides).
that, sir, is a large collection.
And that, sir, is why I need help organizing it… Particularly with the Genres…
Anyway… back to my original post…
On the home page in the iOS Plexamp app the Genre list is from the Plex Music like I selected in my library preferences:
But on the Library page the Genre list is the unorganized, crappy Genre tags in my enormously large collection that 1) I’d rather not take the time to re-organize and 2) I like those from Plex Music better:
(not to mention it’s incorrect about the number of compilations in the collection. There are hundreds…)
And these are the Genres that are found in my collection that I think are coming in from Picard…
In the Library page shouldn’t this Genre list be that from Plex Music? That’s where the Styles and Moods come from, why not the Genres if I have it selected to Plex Music in the Library settings and it’s the Plex Music on the Home Page in the iOS Plexamp app?
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Same here, I have a lot of unreliable genre when I use Plex Music, before the new agent plex music premium allowed to use Gracenote with a limited set of genre.
Any chance to bring this back or to allow in new plex agent the ability to limit genre to “classic” ones?
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Doubtful. When that happened I recall the announcement basically saying the relationship between Gracenote and Plex had ended. I assume it was for financial reasons.
That said, I still don’t see the problem I’ve addressed being answered or addressed. In the Plex web or plex app I only have 25 genres. Those are the 25 Plex Music gave my music, not the silly list of genres actually attached to my music. In Plexamp there are 257. Those are the Genres that are actually attached to my music.
In my music library’s advanced settings I have “Genres” set to “Plex Music” rather than “Embedded Tags.” So those are the Genres I get when using Plex Web, Plex for iOS or Android and so on, but Plexamp uses the Genres that are embedded in the Tags.
In advanced settings for your library, what do you have genre source set to? The things showing in stations are styles (the slightly more detailed genres Plex Music provides).
Same as above, make sure you’re sourcing your genres correctly in the library settings.
Those are the base genres.
Plexamp (for stations at least) is showing the richer Styles.
Not true! Plexamp uses what the server is reporting back.
Hi Elan, thanks for the reply.
In the advanced settings of my music library I have the Genres set to Plex Music.
My Plex for iOS and Plex web apps show the 25 base genres. Hard to get a picture of those but you can see here it goes almost half way through the alphabet in one screen shot… These I believe are the server assigned base genres you’re referring to…
Plexamp is showing the richer styles and the weird genre list. 257 Genres, 606 Styles and 283 moods…
This is what the Genre list looks like in Plexamp…
So if what I said is not true and Plexamp is not getting those 257 Genres (some of which that are numbers) from the embedded tags, where are those Genres coming from?
I would love to get this figured out…
Curious. Just wondering, is this a fairly old library? If so, maybe part of it is using the old agents and scanners. Media added after you changed to the new scanner will use that info, but older material would still use the old.
It was sometime ago, but I think I had to “Upgrade” the old metadata to the new agent when the new scanner came out.
Not sure how old “old” is. But I have more than once recently refreshed the metadata from the Music [library] >Manage Library>Refresh All Metadata and nothing changes. Is that how “Upgraded” your old metadata?
I don’t believe so.
For some unknown reason, they have placed the info for upgrading a music library in the “Features” section of the plex docs. Here’s a direct link:
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I think I figured out the difference; In Plexamp, we’re querying album genres for that page. In Plex, it’s querying artist genres. In Plex for web e.g. you can switch type to artist/album genre and see the difference.
In terms of those numbered genre, my only thought is that you have albums where somehow a) we’re reading genre from the track tags and b) somehow not translating them into their genre (IIRC MP3 had numbered genres e.g.)
I would go track down one of those albums (just dive in to a category) and:
- try refreshing the album in plex/web
- look at the genre tags for the album in plex/web
Report back.
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(ah yes, and make sure you’re on the newest library system)
First, I went to update my library to the new metadata system and the option to “Upgrade to Plex music” was not available to me. So I assume I am already on the new Plex Music system (and I am a Plex Pass Lifetime subscriber).
I’ve refreshed the metadata for the entire library. Again.
Somehow I am now down to 137 Genres in Plexamp. The numbered genres disappeared. I don’t know what I did wrong before.
I also understand now what you’re referring to re: artist vs album genres. I see that if I switch to album view in Plex for web there are more Genres than in the Artist view. I didn’t count them but it looks like the same list as in Plexamp.
