diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index a5b5129c5..b8ab9cd62 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -33,6 +33,7 @@
   to the @listen decorator (Thanks again, Lugoues!)
 * In path formats, $albumartist now falls back to $artist (as well as
   the other way around).
+* When autotagging, "and" is considered equal to "&".
 * Fix some crashes when deleting files that don't exist.
 * Fix adding individual tracks in BPD.
 * Fix crash when ~/.beetsconfig does not exist.
diff --git a/beets/autotag/__init__.py b/beets/autotag/__init__.py
index 6a8705d62..14b827244 100644
--- a/beets/autotag/__init__.py
+++ b/beets/autotag/__init__.py
@@ -74,6 +74,10 @@ SD_PATTERNS = [
     (r'\[.*?\]', 0.3),
     (r'(, )?(pt\.|part) .+', 0.2),
 ]
+# Replacements to use before testing distance.
+SD_REPLACE = [
+    (r'&', 'and'),
+]
 
 # Artist signals that indicate "various artists".
 VA_ARTISTS = (u'', u'various artists', u'va', u'unknown')
@@ -134,6 +138,11 @@ def string_dist(str1, str2):
             str1 = '%s %s' % (word, str1[:-len(word)-2])
         if str2.endswith(', %s' % word):
             str2 = '%s %s' % (word, str2[:-len(word)-2])
+
+    # Perform a couple of basic normalizing substitutions.
+    for pat, repl in SD_REPLACE:
+        str1 = re.sub(pat, repl, str1)
+        str2 = re.sub(pat, repl, str2)
     
     # Change the weight for certain string portions matched by a set
     # of regular expressions. We gradually change the strings and build
diff --git a/test/test_autotag.py b/test/test_autotag.py
index 5072337a0..1645af433 100644
--- a/test/test_autotag.py
+++ b/test/test_autotag.py
@@ -403,10 +403,14 @@ class ApplyCompilationTest(unittest.TestCase):
 
     def test_mb_albumartistid_applied(self):
         autotag.apply_metadata(self.items, self.info)
-        self.assertEqual(self.items[0].mb_albumartistid, '89ad4ac3-39f7-470e-963a-56509c546377')
-        self.assertEqual(self.items[1].mb_albumartistid, '89ad4ac3-39f7-470e-963a-56509c546377')
-        self.assertEqual(self.items[0].mb_artistid, 'a05686fc-9db2-4c23-b99e-77f5db3e5282')
-        self.assertEqual(self.items[1].mb_artistid, '80b3cf5e-18fe-4c59-98c7-e5bb87210710')
+        self.assertEqual(self.items[0].mb_albumartistid,
+                         '89ad4ac3-39f7-470e-963a-56509c546377')
+        self.assertEqual(self.items[1].mb_albumartistid,
+                         '89ad4ac3-39f7-470e-963a-56509c546377')
+        self.assertEqual(self.items[0].mb_artistid,
+                         'a05686fc-9db2-4c23-b99e-77f5db3e5282')
+        self.assertEqual(self.items[1].mb_artistid,
+                         '80b3cf5e-18fe-4c59-98c7-e5bb87210710')
 
     def test_va_flag_cleared_does_not_set_comp(self):
         autotag.apply_metadata(self.items, self.info)
@@ -487,6 +491,10 @@ class StringDistanceTest(unittest.TestCase):
         dist = autotag.string_dist('Untitled', '[Untitled]')
         self.assertEqual(dist, 0.0)
 
+    def test_ampersand_expansion(self):
+        dist = autotag.string_dist('And', '&')
+        self.assertEqual(dist, 0.0)
+
 def suite():
     return unittest.TestLoader().loadTestsFromName(__name__)