Need help sorting albums with same name

[nacho220]

I added the latest Tom Petty reissue of Long After Dark to my music. I also have the original album in my music. I’d like to keep both in there. I usually add [year] to the title as to sort it within my hard drive. However, I’d like to sort both of them under the year of the original release date of 1982 so it keeps them together when sorted by date. Whatever changes I make though, despite having the [2024] in the title, it lumps both albums together as just one album Long After Dark. Now I have two track number 1, etc…

Was hoping there was a way to do this so the reissues stick together next to the originally released album/date. Thanks in advance for any help.

[OttoKerner]

I think this only works if you set “prefer local meta tags”.
Separate versions of an album go into a separate folder, within their shared artist folder. i.e. like https://support.plex.tv/articles/200265296-adding-music-media-from-folders/
(don’t add additional versions into subfolders of the album folder)

With the above in place, you wouldn’t even need to tag the files with different album titles (although doing so is quite advisable) to keep them separated.

All of the above applies to using the modern “Plex Music” agent.

[nacho220]

Thanks for the reply and the info! I do have prefer local meta tags checked. This is how I saved the files in my folder.

Do I change the originally available date on the 2024 remaster to 1982 then? This is how I have them tagged.

[OttoKerner]

You change nothing in Plex. You edit the embedded meta tags in the files themselves.

This is how it works for me with flac files. mp3 files probably don’t support so many different tags, so you might have to pick the generic release date tag for editing.

[nacho220]

What are you using there to edit the tags? I am using FLAC files but don’t see the fields such as ORIGINALDATE or ORIGYEAR pop up under properties for me. Thanks!

[OttoKerner]

I’m using mp3tag.
You can add less commonly used tags on the “Extended Tags” dialog.

[nacho220]

I have mp3tag also. I just gave it a try. I don’t have ORIGINALDATE for whatever reason available under the extended tags section. I added ORIGYEAR as 1982 and it’s still separated in Plex.

[OttoKerner]

@nacho220

don’t have ORIGINALDATE for whatever reason available under the extended tags section

Create new tag as indicated,
then start typing ORIGINALD…

[nacho220]

I added the custom tag of ORIGINALDATE and put the release date and still on Plex it is separated.

[OttoKerner]

You need to perform the Plex Dance light afterwards.
Have you verified that “prefer local meta tags” is ON, and that the agent is “Plex Music”?

[nacho220]

I tried doing the same steps I’ve been doing again and it worked this time. I did confirm local meta tags and Plex Music agent. I have the box ticked to automatically empty trash at every scan. But I went and hit the empty trash this time, only thing I did different.

It does show the original release date in the Plex info as 1982-11-02 as opposed to its 2024 reissue date. But if I add [reissue year] to the end of the title, as I have, I guess that’ll have to do.

Thanks for the help and your patience. So I’ll plan on doing this with all reissue type releases in the future. Have a wonderful weekend.