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Interview: Noisia

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Nik Roos, Martijn van Sonderen and Thijs de Vlieger, better known as Noisia are at the forefront of the bass music revolution.

Since their inception in early 2003, Noisia have grown to become one of electronic music’s most loved acts and the Dutch trio don’t show any signs of slowing things down. Their high octane sets and heavy bass productions have impressed fans across the globe for many years and this September, Noisia will be kicking off their 8-date Australian & New Zealand tour.

We had the pleasure of speaking with Noisia to discuss production, the tour, collaborations and more!

First of all, how are you guys and what is new in the world of Noisia?

Good! We had a pretty heavy summer up here, lots of touring, did our own festival for the first time, and just released the Dead Limit EP with The Upbeats. Getting used to normal studio life again, but not for long, as we’re about to embark on our Australia/New Zealand tour quite soon!

Your Incessant and Dead Limit EPs had a lot of positive feedback from our fans on social media, tell us a little about them.

Incessant EP was part of the 10 years of Vision compilation project celebrating our label’s 10 year anniversary. On the compilation there were a bunch of new tracks that we wanted to release separately, also because we still press vinyl for every release on Vision!

Dead Limit EP is 4 collaborations with our DNB BFF’s The Upbeats. Some of the tracks had been started a while back, we had three collabs basically laying around, so we thought let’s finish this as a nice package! Then when we started thinking about artwork, we came up with the idea to use our nicknames and make them into videogame / action movie characters. It worked quite nicely, we think.

You guys are known for your intricate production process, from sound design to crafting out your drums to perfection. Can you give us an insight into a general day in the studio with Noisia?

Wake up, etc etc, go to studio, start making something, feel unhappy about it, change it, feel unhappy about yourself, change it some more, give up for the day. Next day: same, hear what you’ve done yesterday – feel even shittier. Start something new which sucks too. Go back home. Next day: hear back what you started 2 days ago, find something in it that’s actually quite useful, elaborate on that. Feel very enthusiastic about potential, king of the world. Next day: hear back what you tried to do but you went way too far. Try to fix it, fail. Feel shitty again. Next day: fix it and leave it simmering for a while. Self-imposed deadline comes around a while later: finish it in a frenzy. Much stress, but much relief.

Hehe this is not how it always goes, it’s different every time. But it does happen a lot!

How did you first get into the bass music scene?

When we started producing music we had no idea about a scene, about partying and taking drugs to go with super loud music. We were just making music for the joy of making music, and drum and bass was one of our favourite sounds so we focused on that quite a bit. This was in ‘98 / ‘99. Then as the internet grew, internet communities started forming, and we got involved in a couple of dnb forums (SLR, DSCI4, DOA) and those were our first steps in a “scene”.

Do you ever write music on the road, or is it all mostly composed in the studio?

Certainly!

After this tour, what’s next on the Noisia calendar?

In October we’ve got our Noisia Invites show in Amsterdam during Amsterdam Dance Event with a lineup we’re quite excited about: we’re pushing a new sound of beats/trap/hiphop influenced bass music with guests such as Gaslamp Killer, Alix Perez & Eprom and ourselves doing a hybrid beats & dnb set. We’re also doing Invites shows in Paris and Rome, so it’ll be quite a month! After that we’ve got a period with less gigs and a lot of studio time. Looking forward to that too 🙂

You guys are also well known for teaming up with Foreign Beggars on the I Am Legion project. Are there any plans for a follow-up release in the future?

Yes, we’ve even got a couple of rough tunes. But we have no plans whatsoever yet.

If Noisia were to collaborate with any artist, who would it be?

We would love to do a tune with The Prodigy.

Who are three rising acts to watch out for?

Ivy Lab, Disprove, and Mefjus

Where do you see the electronic dance music scene in 2020?

The future is uncertain, but actually things will probably be pretty much the same. The music will sound a little different, but we’ll still be going to nightclubs and festivals to enjoy loud music.

Thank you for your time guys and smash these Australian shows!

Thank you.

NOISIA + The Upbeats Australia/New Zealand Tour

FRI 25 SEPT – HQ COMPLEX, ADELAIDE – TICKETS
SAT 26 SEPT – GREENWOOD HOTEL, SYDNEY – TICKETS
SAT 26 SEPT – MAX WATT’S, MELBOURNE – TICKETS
SUN 27TH SEPT – METRO CITY, PERTH – TICKETS
THURS 1ST OCT – BODEGA, WELLINGTON – TICKETS
FRI 2ND OCT – THE STUDIO, AUCKLAND – TICKETS
SAT 3RD OCT – THE BEDFORD, CHRISTCHURCH – TICKETS