There are several reasons why artist separation might not be working as expected, even with related artists configured. Here are the most common causes and solutions:

Check if playout policies are disabled:

Verify that your playout policies are enabled. Go to Manage > Playout Policies and ensure the Disabled checkbox is unchecked for your artist separation policies. Disabled policies won't be considered by the scheduler.

Verify related artist relationships:

Confirm your related artists are properly configured in Manage > Related Artists. Check that the artist names match exactly as they appear in your track database, including any spelling variations or punctuation differences. Also ensure the Disabled checkbox is unchecked for each related artist pair.

Review playout policy scope:

If you've checked Apply to specific track groups, ensure that all relevant tracks are included in the selected track groups. Tracks not in the specified track groups won't be subject to the separation rules.

Check multiple artist splits:

If your tracks contain featured artists (e.g., "Take That feat. Lulu"), verify your multiple artist splits are configured correctly in Manage > Multiple Artist Splits. Without proper splits, PlayIt Live might not recognise the individual artists for separation purposes.

Manual scheduling overrides:

Remember that manually scheduled tracks bypass playout policies. If you're manually adding tracks to your playout log, the system won't enforce artist separation rules for those items.

Related artists and playout policies only apply to automatically scheduled content, so ensure you're using the scheduler for the tracks where you want separation enforced.