Alternatives to ZERONOISE
Other ways to find music that a feed has not already chosen for you, and when each one suits you better.
ZERONOISE maps what DJs and radio hosts played next to what: 1,439,859 songs on a wheel, one sector per Discogs style, and two songs linked when people played them one or two places apart in the same mix. Nothing is personalised, and it does not read your listening on other services. It has limits. A link does not mean two songs sound alike, and most of what is on it is electronic music and recent releases (see what the sets are made of). For folk, classical or jazz, another tool will serve you better.
Tools for finding music differ less in how they look than in what they are made of. That decides which question each one can answer, and who chose the neighbours of a song: a listener, a model, an editor or a DJ. This page sorts them that way and says when each suits you better than ZERONOISE. Sites change and some stop, so check each one’s own page for its current state.
Built from genres: Every Noise at Once
Every Noise at Once organises music by genre: a map of genre names and a list, each genre with its own page. It answers “what does this genre sound like, and what sits near it?” Choose it when you want to hear what a genre is. It does not tell you what was played after a given record.
Built as a map of music: zig~zag
zig~zag.fm is a music map too. Its launch post describes it as organised by genre, place, era and label, and its own page said “early access” when this was written. Choose it when you want to move across place and label as well as genre. See zig-zag.fm for what it does now.
Built from similar artists: Music-Map, TasteDive
These start from an artist you name and return artists that other people, or a model, consider close. Choose them when you already have a name and want more like it. They return the neighbours of what you already like, which keeps you near it.
Built from your listening: Last.fm and streaming services
Last.fm and the large streaming services recommend from what you and other listeners have played. Choose them when you want recommendations that fit your taste closely. They predict it better the more you use them, which is also how a filter bubble tightens.
Built from tags and labels: Bandcamp
Bandcamp lets you browse by tag, label and place, and see who else bought a record. Choose it to dig one scene or one label, or to buy from the artist. It does not show what a DJ or a radio host played next to a record.
Which one to use
- You want to hear what a genre sounds like
- Every Noise at Once.
- You have an artist and want similar ones
- A similar-artist tool such as Music-Map or TasteDive.
- You want to dig one scene or one label
- Bandcamp.
- You want to leave your own taste and follow what DJs and radio hosts played next
- ZERONOISE. Open the map.
More: questions and answers, how the map is built.
Every Noise at Once, zig~zag, Music-Map, TasteDive, Last.fm and Bandcamp are the names of their owners, used here to describe them. ZERONOISE is not affiliated with any of them.