Zubissou Sounds

The roomArtists › Wayne Shorter

Where to start with Wayne Shorter

Start with Capricorn — Super Nova, 1969. That is the track sitting closest to the centre of all 36 Wayne Shorter tracks in Zubissou Sounds — a listening room of 14,971 tracks placed one at a time by hand, not an algorithm.

This page is not a discography and not a ranking. It describes exactly one thing: the 36 Wayne Shorter tracks that one person put in one room, and where they sit relative to each other. The starting point above is chosen by a rule you can check — of the 36 tracks, it is the one nearest the average position on the four knobs the room runs on, and where two sit equally close the one on a named record wins. Nothing here calls any record better than any other.

It is spread thin and wide — 36 tracks across 19 different records, which is a browsing history rather than a shelf of favourites.

The energy knob swings 50 points across these tracks, the widest of the four — it is the axis this artist actually travels along in this room.

36tracks in the room
19albums
1969–1988years covered
bebopfiled under

Three ways in

The one track, if you only play one

Capricorn — Super Nova, 1969. Of the 36 Wayne Shorter tracks here, this one sits closest to the average of all of them across the four knobs the room runs on. It is the least surprising thing in the collection, which is exactly what an entry point should be.

If you want the ambient end

When You Dream — Atlantis. The lowest energy reading of any Wayne Shorter track in the room (22 out of 100). This is as far towards ambient as the collection goes.

If you want the driving end

Super Nova — Super Nova. The highest, at 72. Same artist, opposite corner — a 50-point swing from the track above.

Where Wayne Shorter sits in the room

Zubissou Sounds does not have playlists or genres you click. It has knobs. Every track carries a position on each one, set by hand when the track was added, and you find music by setting the room to a state rather than by searching for a name. These are Wayne Shorter's average coordinates and the range they cover.

KnobAverageRangeLow → high
mood5032–62melancholy → euphoric
energy5022–72ambient → driving
density5335–74sparse → wall
head · body4222–58cerebral → groove

All four run 0–100. They are placed by a person, not derived from audio analysis or from any streaming service's feature data.

What is here, record by record

AlbumYearTracks
High Life5
Alegria4
Atlantis4
Super Nova19693
Speak No Evil2
Emanon2
Adam's Apple2
Without A Net2
Footprints Live!2
Adams Apple1
Night Dreamer1
Beyond The Sound Barrier1
Joy Ryder1
Et Cetera1
Odyssey of Iska1
JuJu1
Phantom Navigator1
Schizophrenia1
Etcetera19801

Every Wayne Shorter track in the room

TrackAlbumYear
CapricornSuper Nova1969
Barracudas (General Assembly)Etcetera1980
Water BabiesSuper Nova1988
Chief Crazy HorseAdam's Apple
TeruAdam's Apple
Adams AppleAdams Apple
12th Century CarolAlegria
SacajweaAlegria
SerenataAlegria
She Moves Through The FairAlegria
AtlantisAtlantis
CriançasAtlantis
Shere Khan, the TigerAtlantis
When You DreamAtlantis
Adventures Aboard The Golden MeanBeyond The Sound Barrier
Prometheus Unbound feat. Orpheus Chamber OrchestraEmanon
The Three MariasEmanon
PenelopeEt Cetera
Atlantis (Live)​Footprints Live!
GoFootprints Live!
At The FairHigh Life
Black SwanHigh Life
High LifeHigh Life
MayaHigh Life
Midnight In Carlotta's HairHigh Life
Joy RyderJoy Ryder
DelugeJuJu
Black NileNight Dreamer
CalmOdyssey of Iska
Condition RecPhantom Navigator
Tom ThumbSchizophrenia
Dance CadaverousSpeak No Evil
Speak No EvilSpeak No Evil
Super NovaSuper Nova
Orbits (false start)Without A Net
S.S. Golden MeanWithout A Net

Near neighbours in this room

These are the artists whose average knob position sits nearest to Wayne Shorter's in this room. It is a coordinate match, not a claim that they sound alike.

What the open databases say

MusicBrainz lists Wayne Shorter as a solo artist, from the United States and born in 1933. Its contributors tag the artist crossover jazz, progressive jazz, post-bop, modal jazz and jazz. These are the open database's facts, not mine — you can check them against the MusicBrainz entry.

Questions

How many Wayne Shorter tracks are in Zubissou Sounds?

There are 36, across 19 albums. 3 of them carry a date, running from 1969 to 1988. That is the whole of what this room holds — it is one person's collection, not a discography.

Is this a best-of, or a ranking?

No. Nothing here is ranked and no track is called better than another. The starting point is picked by arithmetic — the track closest to the centre of all the others on four measured axes — and the rule is printed above so you can disagree with it.

Where do the knob numbers come from?

They are set by hand, one track at a time, by the person who added the track. They are not audio analysis and not a Spotify feature. Mood, energy, density and the head/body balance each run 0 to 100. 36 of these 36 tracks carry an individually placed coordinate rather than the room's default.

Can I listen to these here?

Not yet from this page. Zubissou Sounds is in private beta — the room itself plays through Spotify, and 36 of these 36 tracks are matched to a Spotify ID and ready to play the moment you are in. The waitlist form is at the bottom of this page.

Get on the list

The room is in private beta — 14,971 tracks by 5,585 artists, including these. Leave an address and you go in the queue in order. No newsletter, no marketing, no third parties: the address is used once, to let you in.