mp3/id3 tags not always populated

Audacity 2.2.1 + Ubuntu 18.04 LTS

I have captured about 20 LPs into Audacity and output as mp3. In about half of them the Artist is missing.

My procedure has been the same for all of them, Import (32 bit float), setup the Metadata file, mark the tracks cleaning up as I go along, Save project, Export Multiple as mp3 with default settings. The Title, Album, Comment, Date, Track No and Genre are there in all cases. The Artist is there in only about half. Missing Artist for instance - Abba. Populated artist for instance - Little Richard.

The same happens if I output from the same project as .wav.

However if I output as FLAC certainly Abba at least is correctly populated.

I recall I had a similar issue when I exported some Christmas songs for Xmas 2018 and that would have been Win7 but I’ve not retested on that platform.

I’m checking the ID3 with Kid3 which follows in any event what VLC displays.

I’d like to get to the bottom of this before I start processing the remaining 50 albums, then 100 cassettes. Can I get some guidance as to what to check or what to update please.

SInce my first post I have retried but under Windows and the id3 Artist metadata is populated so at first glance it seems as if this may be an Audacity/Linux issue and I have reposted under that Forum.

Ubuntu 18.04 LTS and distributed Audacity 2.2.1

I have captured about 20 LPs into Audacity and output as mp3. In about half of them the Artist is missing.

My procedure has been the same for all of them, Import (32 bit float), setup the Metadata file, mark the tracks cleaning up as I go along, Save project, Export Multiple as mp3 with default settings. The Title, Album, Comment, Date, Track No and Genre are there in all cases. The Artist is there in only about half. Missing Artist for instance - Abba. Populated artist for instance - Little Richard.

The same happens if I output from the same project as .wav.

However if I output as FLAC certainly Abba at least is correctly populated.

Kid3 confirms what VLC displays.

Doing the same output from the same source from Win10->Audacity 2.3.3 and using VLC 3.0.1 Vetinari the id3 fields look ok

I have some remaining 50 albums, then 100 cassettes to process and would prefer to be under my Linux install. Can I get some guidance as to what to check or what to update please?

I just updated Audacity 2.3.4 to audacity-win-2.4.1 on Win10. If I go into Edit->Metadata it brings up metadata from a project I did some time ago relating to a wedding.
If I open the Abba project (see my other posts on incorrect id3 data) it correctly brings up the metadata relating to the Abbal album.
When I go to File->Export->Multiple as mp3 it reverts to the earlier wedding metadata except for the track title.

I’m finding it difficult to follow your description. Perhaps it would help if you give a specific example of how to reproduce the problem, listing exactly what data you have in Audacity’s MetaData Editor, and what you are seeing in Kid3.

I appreciate that you are seeing similar problems on Windows and Linux, but to save the confusion of multiple parallel topics I’ve merged your posts into this topic. Please don’t start new topics on the same issue.

By merging my threads the two issues are conflated.

  1. The original issue is quite simply that half of the mp3 albums I produce in Linux have all metadata etc except the Artist (performing artist) is missing but is correctly populated if I export in Flac format.

I don’t know how to better describe the workflow beyond my post Sun May 24, 2020 8:05 pm

  1. I then tested to see if the issue was Linux or Windows and audacity-win-2.3.3 was fine. I then updated to the latest audacity-win-2.4.1 and he metadata displayed for the Abba project was different and incorrect. It related to a project I did some time ago and not the current Abba project. I’ve reverted to audacity-win-2.3.3 and it is fine again.

I was not asking the same question, the issues to me were different and merging seems to have succeeded in raising confusion.