Boys Noize

Out Of The Black
Boysnoize Records

Boys Noize sounds like the name of a British boyband. From X Factor. With a single featuring Rihanna, and a slot at the Olympic closing ceremony. Fortunately, things are a little better than that. He’s a German producer with a pretty impressive pedigree, and Out Of The Black is a solid example of just what he can do.

This is all about the bass: big, crunchy, rumbly synths that will shake any pair of headphones to pieces. He starts off very strong on the anthemic What You Want, melding a vocoder sample with some thumping percussion, and keeps the energy levels high as the record progresses.

Good as it is, there is one real problem with Noize’s production style. It’s sparse – very few instruments, with buckets of space around them. It’s the kind of dance music that minimalist Scandinavian interior designers dig. And it gets really samey, really fast.

Fortunately, he has a collaboration with Skrillex coming up, which should certainly flesh things out a little. As it is, Out Of The Black does demonstrates what he can do, even if it shows a lot of room for improvement. www.boysnoize.com.

Rob Boffard