Need help understanding masks

[The Gremlin]

Hello, I've done a bunch of searching but can't figure out how to solve my problem

I Use the following for my Main Library:

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\music\$if(<Album Artist><>The The, $RemovePrefix(<Album Artist>),<Album Artist>)\<Album>\$if(<Disc#>>1,<Disc#>)<Track#:2> <Title>

This works just like I would like , makes directories for the artists without a prefix, except for the artist "The The" which comes As The The instead of "The"

But for my media keys that I use in the cars I like to index using the Group mask so I have directories ABC, DEF, etc...

If I do this it works great:

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$Assign(A,$RemovePrefix(<Album Artist>))$Group($Use(A),3)\$Use(A)\<Album>

I get: ABC\Beatles\Abbey Road

however if I try and get alittle tricker and do this

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$Assign(A,$If(<Album Artist>==the the,<Album Artist>, $RemovePrefix(<Album Artist>)))$Group($Use(A),3)\$Use(A)\<Album>

I get \0-9\Beatles\Abbey Road

as my path, which I don't understand, clearly the 'A' variable has the correct value in it as it's the second section of my path, and clearly the $Group correctly process the $Use as it works in the first case. For some reason though when the variable for the $Use was loaded by the $if it completely fails.

anyone have any ideas here?

thank you!