[x] Weird situation

A couple of years ago, Tracii Guns left his own band, L.A. Guns because he thought Bride Of Destruction was going to rule the universe. L.A. Guns continued touring with a revolving cast of guitar players until settling with Stacey Blades. They recorded two albums with him so far.

In the meantime (after Brides Of Destruction failed big time), Tracii started touring as The Tracii Guns Band, with two former band mates from L.A. Guns when they weren't signed yet. "The Tracii Guns Band" didn't draw enough people to their shows so he decided they were L.A. Guns. Legally, he owns 50% percent of the band name (Steve Riley owns the other 50%) so he can use the name.

While this hasn't been settled legally, I think the logical thing to do, is to call the band that continued to record albums "L.A. Guns (US 1)" and the band now led by Tracii "L.A. Guns (US 2)".

Now, in the late 90's, L.A. Guns (1) released an album with Jizzy Pearl on vocals: Shrinking Violet. In the meantime, L.A. Guns (2) has gone through a couple of lineup changes and now has Jizzy Pearl on vocals. To make things worse, they got signed and decided to re-release Shrinking Violet with added bonus tracks, recorded live with the new lineup of L.A. Guns (2).

So, what we have, is an album originally recorded by (1) released by (2) with added tracks recorded by (2).
And now for the final question: how do we record this in the database?
Is the re-release of this album an album by (2) with previously recorded material by (1); or is this an album by (1) with added material by (2)?
And does everyone agree to call Phil Lewis' band (US 1) and Tracii Guns' band (US 2)?

Actually, I would support having this all listed as the same band.

Why is that? There are two different bands touring and recording as "L.A. Guns". They're obviously not the same band.

They both came from the same band. It's not like there are two completely different bands that happen to have the same name.

To me it is the same band, with different lineups. It just happens that the different lineups are releasing records at the same time.

The whole thing is making my head spin, but I'm finding myself agreeing with Scott. This isn't like the Tigertailz situation in which one lineup was authorized and one was not. Here we have two bands that have the right to perform as L.A. Guns.

i'm think i'm with Python - there's two bands here. i think the album is a rerelease by (1) with bonus tracks by (2). i don't think the reissue would be mentioned at all on our page for (1) - there isn't any unreleased material with a new lineup. but the reissue could be mentioned on our page for band (2) and it's a 'released by...' situation.
LA Guns (US 2) - Shrinking Violet (released by LA Guns [US 1])

i could be persuaded however but this makes sense to me in as far as this weird situation could make sense.

Does it really matter if one band is legally authorized to use the name or not? The fact remains that there are physically two separate bands. Is the fact that they both come from the same band even relevant?

I think it is relevant if one or both are legally allowed to be the band. If both officially are the band, then we have two simultaneous mutually-exclusive lineups of the same single band. For example, I think the Trans Siberian Orchestra has different east coast and west lineups.

If only one is legally authorized to be the band, then they are two distinct bands.

The TSO example is different. In the studio, it's the same band. It's just that they have two live versions of the band. It's one band that makes new music and performs that new (and old) music in two separate live instances.

There are two bands called L.A. Guns. Both play songs live that come from a catalogue they have in common. However, neither band has new music in common. Phil's band doesn't play Tracii's new songs and neither does Tracii play new songs that were released by Phil's band.

Also, I fail to see the logic in allowing a separate entry for a band that is legally not allowed to use that name (Tiger Tailz (UK 2)).

For argument's sake, let's assume that at the time Tracii left L.A. Guns, the remaining members adopted a new band name: Phil's L.A. Guns. Let's assume that Tracii started a new band which he called Tracii's L.A. Guns. Would you still consider those two the same band? The only difference with the actual situation is that both bands are just called L.A. Guns. So why is this any different as far as db-entries is concerned?

I'm with Python.

Both being legally able to use the name does not mean they are the same band. In fact, the opposite, it seems that they are determined to be two different versions of the same-named band.

I think we treat Tigertailz (UK 2) as best we can. It was released by a band calling itself Tigertailz. At the time, the court case about disputed names had not been heard - therefore we can't dismiss it as a boot. And we can't retrospectively deem it a boot because it's not a frivolous infringement of the name (i.e. it was a previous member laying claim to the name - not just me calling myself 'The Beatles'). It's not the real Tigertailz (because the court decided so). Having ruled out disregarding it and assigning it to Tigertailz (UK 1) - where else to put it?

Here are the facts:

* There are two groups of musicians
* performing under the same name
* while legally entitled to perform under that name.

That sounds like two lineups of the same band to me. We have plenty of examples of mutually exclusive lineups of the same band, just usually not operating at the same time. I don't think our handling of things should change just because of the timing.

In the Tigertailz example, only one band was the "real" lineup. The other was a different band with a same name.

I think Python's view and the implementation suggested by shakinghell is reasonable too though.

This calls into question how we handled these:

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&BandId=967 (lineups E and F)

[bandtoband.com] http://bandtoband.com/index.php?Page=Search&BandId=5761

I think we handled The Guess Who just fine. The band split up in '75 and a bunch of former band members started up the band again two years later. Eventually, some members that were in the final line-up before the first break-up, re-joined the band. This is a different situation than L.A. Guns because that band never split up.

If each group is working/touring/recording independently of one another with no input from the other, I'd say two different bands.

Got the album today - entered in the DB.

So Be Bop Deluxe release a single "Kiss Of Light" with a track on the B-side called "Shine", recorded by an incomplete version of the band, quirkily-named "Funky Phaser And His Unearthly Merchandise" (which may or may not have been portrayed correctly on the cover). This is tantamountly a split release.

However, under our rules for splits, this means the entity should go in as "Funky Phaser and ..." by Be Bop Deluxe and its counterpart as "Be Bop Deluxe" by "FPAHUM".

It naturally feels to me like it ought to be "Kiss Of Light" by BBD and "Shine" by FPAHUM.

We've had other situations where a band release a single with a B-side under a joke band name. It just feels wrong to do it as a split.

In fact the whole way we do splits is suboptimal to me. Why not just enter it as the song by the one band, the song by the other band and then connect them in the DB in the same manner as a collab, or a compilation, or whatever?