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Question about The Four Seasons


Farin

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This might come across as a bit ocd, but does anyone know what the correct* way to tag the "artist" of the Four Seasons' song "The Night" from the album Chameleon?

Is it "The Four Seasons"

or "Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons"

or "Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons"

or "The 4 Seasons"

or... ?

*the reason I'm asking is, because different sources tell different things and my #1 source for things like that, musicbrainz doesn't seem to know at all.

so, does anyone have any idea?

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The album cover actually says "Frankie Valli - The Four Seasons", which is the version apparently supported by discogs

The album doesn't have the "&" sign but the UK 45 single does.

See here .

The song wasn't commercially released as a single in the U.S.

Usually, the record company would use "&" or "and" if that's what the group was recording as.

In the case of the album, it seems they wanted to prominently showcase that Frankie Valli was with The Four Seasons, but by not putting the "&" in there makes me say it's an album by The Four Seasons.

They could have made it say The Four Seasons featuring Frankie Valli or Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons, but they didn't.

They just shoved his name on there to make him stand out from the rest of the band.

That's a tough call to make.

No "&" on the album, but it is on the 45.

Although I just said I think the album should be filed under The Four Seasons because the record company didn't put an "&" on it, I'd say the song should be filed under:

Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons

because the 45s have it.

I know, it sounds conflicting when the album doesn't have it and the 45 does, but if they didn't want it to be "&", they wouldn't have put it on the 45 at all.

Bell records made it easy with Tony Orlando and Dawn.

When he teamed with session singers Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent in 1970 to form Dawn, they recorded as Dawn.

They they recorded as Dawn featuring Tony Orlando and then finally as Tony Orlando & Dawn.

I think the record company should have done that with Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons and they should have been consistent with both the album and the 45.

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That's pure marketing and the fact is that the album (and the song) is actually by FV AND the FS.

This means "The Four Seasons featuring Frankie Valli" or "Frankie Valli/Four Seasons" it's the same. Valli had also a solo career at the same time.

Besides, the record companies make many mistakes when it comes to credit a song or name an artist, sometimes the lead singer wants his name on the album, then the company releases a single and change the name without asking the lead singer, etc. I know cause I've worked for record companies for many years.

Edited by Guest
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Dont'cha just hate when they do that.

Frankie Valli having a solo career at the time is prolly why they did that then, otherwise they prolly would have left his name off there.

It makes it confusing for us trivia folk who like pinpoint accuracy when compiling facts.

And the nerve of some singers and record producers who think that the singer is the highlight of the band and want top billing over the rest of the band after recording for so many years as a group with equal members.

The other guys in the band prolly feel a bit slighted.

I guess it's all about marketing, like you said, Edna, whatever they think will sell the most copies.

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To put it in perspective, the "official" name of the guys who sang "Private Eyes" and "Maneater" is Darryl Hall & John Oates, which is how it appears on their albums.

There is some kind of music illuminati somewhere that decides what artist names should really be, which is how sites like AllMusic the big lyric sites choose. The one that really screws the pooch is Pink, who remains officially P!nk.

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