NOISY like to call themselves ‘your new favourite band that sound nothing like a band.’ With a maximalist sound that blends alternative rock with electronica and falls in line with the canon of Justice, The Chemical Brothers and even The Streets, NOISY bring an adrenaline rush to their music that is hard to match.
Kicking off 2023 with single RUDEBOY, the band started the year by leaning into their more instrumental instincts. ‘We went to a place called Braintree in Essex, to just basically seclude ourselves away for a week,’ says singer Cody Matthews. ‘We wanted to explore even more of the electronic side of NOISY and the more instrumental vibe of it. Originally, it didn’t have the verse and stuff that are on it. We were like, “Let’s just leave it. Let the instrumental and the beat drive the tune.”’
When they brought the lyrics back in, the rest of the song grew out of the phrase ‘I put my shades on’. It was unusual for a band who tend to get excited about a beat first. ‘A song rarely comes from a lyric first. It’s usually a sound, or a drum lead with a bit of bass,’ says Cody. But when it came to the lyrics for RUDEBOY, Cody says, ‘we’ve all had a few beers by this point. We were bopping about to the music, chatting, and came up with the ‘I put my shades on’ thing and we’re imagining a video of robots or something, and it just got us really excited. That was the first hook that was in there, that was like, “that’s going to sound sick at a festival.”’
‘Also, we were all wearing our sunglasses inside,’ laughs synth player and guitarist Connor Cheetham.
Like most everything else they’ve released so far, RUDEBOY has been a live hit for Noisy. When paired with another recent single, ALLIGATOR, it was like ‘an overdose of new music,’ says Cody.
‘Everyone was loving it and when we started getting people to put their sunglasses on it felt like a really special experience,’ he adds. ‘We did our Fast Forward to Friday club night and got 3D glasses, and looking at everyone wearing these 3D glasses felt like a proper moment.’
The club nights and the community around them are a huge part of NOISY's identity as a band. They launched the nights to build a new scene in Brighton, one where their music would fit comfortably and where fans could find a great party.
‘I feel like we’ve never been part of a scene in Brighton – or anywhere, really – because we’re so cross-genre,’ says Cody. ‘We’ve built our own thing up based on bands that were big back in the day, so there’s no new bands coming up. So we wanted to start inviting our favourite artists down, start doing collabs with them and hopefully in the years to come build a scene.’
'It felt like a natural progression to always keep it to ourselves with NOISY and it feels more wholesome when it does work out. Like, we did this, we did everything, and we’re really proud of it.’
They have control over the whole process, from writing and producing their songs to the club night and the band’s aesthetic. ‘We’ve always done it this way,’ says Spencer Tobias-Williams, Noisy’s guitarist and producer. ‘We’ve been hands-on in bands since we were 13, it’s in us to do everything. It felt like a natural progression to always keep it to ourselves with NOISY and it feels more wholesome when it does work out. Like, we did this, we did everything, and we’re really proud of it.’
Having a hand in so many elements of the band’s image and success can come with its own pressures. The highs are more fulfilling, but the stresses also multiply. In April, the band released DESIRE, a single they’d had in the bank for years. Written when NOISY had just begun, the song is a fan favourite live and is something of a musical calling card. They’d been holding off on releasing it as a single, wondering when the right time was. This year, Cody says, they decided to put their best foot forward ‘and release what we feel is the best tune.’
‘When a song is unreleased, it’s your little baby and you don’t want to get rid of it.'
It’s intimidating, to release something you’ve held back for so long. If you have a song in the bank, you always know you have it up your sleeve. There’s no fear that you’ve released it at the wrong time, because the right time could always be right around the corner. Of course, if the right time is always potentially around the corner, then the right time never comes.
‘When a song is unreleased, it’s your little baby and you don’t want to get rid of it,’ says Cody. ‘But then as soon as it’s out in the world, it’s almost not your property anymore. It’s the world’s. That’s why there’s a bit of nervousness, or an anxiety around these songs.’
But NOISY are done holding back. With DESIRE, they’ve entered the era of releasing all their best work as it comes. ‘Recently, we’ve just been kind of like, “let’s see”. Let’s put it out and see what it does. If it doesn’t do what we want it to do, that’s fine, just keep going, because we’ve got songs for days in the bank.’
