iTunes incorrently splitting the songs in an album. Metadata problem?

Question

I have these albums and songs in my iTunes Library. They should appear grouped, but for some reason, iTunes splits them up and shows them as separate albums with the same name and details:

I check the metadata and everything seems to be in order. Here are screen shots of the first two songs:

Why is iTunes doing this? Thanks for your help!

Answer 1

I've only ever seen this happen when the metadata absolutely differs in some way between tracks. There are two ideas that come to mind:

1. Highlight each individual character and make sure 3 dots ( ... ) haven't been transformed into a single character elipses ( … ). Highlight each of the dots above and you should understand the difference.

2. Check the 'Sorting' section too and make sure all of that data is identical, notably in the 'Grouping' fields.

Answer 2

I would suggest selecting all four songs and doing the following:

1. Delete metadata from the tracks: at least Grouping, Album, Artist, Sort Album, and Sort Artist, but more wouldn't hurt.
2. Save the absence of the data by selecting "Done."
3. While they continue to be selected, Get Info again and fill in the relevant information.

I've found that no matter how much some fields may look identical, resetting them to be identical together often solves the problem.

Answer 3

For all the tracks, selecting "Part of a Compilation" - "Yes" solved this one for me (though it was not part of a compilation, it was the only way I could get it to cooperate).

Answer 4

I've had the same problem before, even with identical info, artwork, etc. What helped me was that I right clicked one of the songs of the identical albums and clicked "Create AAC Version." This created a double of that one song, and automatically grouped the two identical albums, and then I just deleted the AAC version.