Richard D James == "Aphex Twin" || "AFX" || "Caustic Window" || "Bradley Strider" || "GAK" || "user48736353001" || "Polygon Window" || "Universal Indicator" || "The Tuss" || "Powerpill" || "Mike & Rich"

(for me, 'artist' is the alias, 'album artist' is 'Richard D James'...)

Yup. ARTIST_ID does not have a 1:1 relationship with ARTIST_NAME over time.

Another example... from 1976 to present day: Johnny Cougar → John Cougar → John Cougar Mellencamp → John Mellencamp.

Close enough for library software to store/recall them all as "John Mellencamp"? Maybe. But perhaps not to fans or historian or artist liking.

Imagine documenting something like this https://www.discogs.com/artist/661099-Filipe-Santos (check out the edit history) where the artist actively sabotages the documentation effort and makes their music unavailable on a whim.