[x] Aliasing solo band names

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1489

In the above thread, discussion turned to the aliasing of band names. As proposed, band name aliases would only cover "trivial" name changes. Quoting Kevin:

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Things that qualify include:
- "The" in a band name that is later dropped: The Misfits
- Punctuation that is later dropped: Ultravox!
- Spellings of the word "And": &
- Foreign band name translations: Jeaane d'Arc
- Alternative capitalization schemes that do not include all uppercase or all lowercase that are later dropped: FireHouse
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I'm not sure about the status of this system change, but I'd like to propose an expansion to the change that would cover solo artists treated in the db as "bands" under different names. Examples with BandId's:

John Gustafson (4835), Johnny Gustafson (4926)
Christine McVie (5906), Christine Perfect (5990)
Bob Marley (4631), Robert Marley (4651), Bobby Martell (4653)
Brian Eno (4399), Eno (4673)

We've already discussed the Eno and Marley cases in depth here:

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=714
[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=723

It still doesn't make much sense to me that, say, "John Gustafson" is one step away from "Johnny Gustafson" in the tree, rather than being considered one and the same entity under different names. A band-name alias system could rectify this.

For now I wouldn't want to expand this type of aliasing to anything beyond solo artists, even though in the "real world" bands such as, say, "The Stooges" and "Iggy And The Stooges" are considered one and the same. (That's a discussion for another time!)

Now that the band aliasing system is running smoothly, any interest in expanding it to include John Gustafson||Johnny Gustafson et al.?

I agree with your assessment of the situation.

Let's add Mike Park / Michael Park to the list.

And this one too:
[www.bandtoband.com] http://www.bandtoband.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1940