Re: 1 -- very cool. Exactly what I was looking for. Don't know how I missed it.

Re: 2 - I already use the subgenre field... in the past I used the "notes" section of an album, but it doesn't quite give the desired results.

Another use of suggestion #2 would be for artists that have had releases with slightly different spellings of their names (like Del, who's released under "Del the Funky Homosapien," "Del tha Funky Homosapien," and "Del the Funkee Homosapien").