Split The Atom - Noisia

2010 proved to be a key year in shaping the modern electronic landscape, and Noisia spearheaded the charge with their debut album "Split The Atom" — the album that not only put Noisia slap bang in the middle of everyone's radar, but also one that was so far ahead of its time that you can hear its influences in modern tracks to this day.

Packaged with all sorts of bass music that populated the scene, Noisia manifest their neuro-infused take on the most mainstream EDM genres: everything from aggressive complextro to clubby french house. The truth is, "Split The Atom" is exactly that — an atom-splittingly precise exploration of what electronic music could be, a scientific pushing of its boundaries at a molecular level, a project that experiments with Newtonian gravitas under the immense pressure of heavy basslines, keeping it grounded and breaking apart its nuclear structure all at once. Noisia's sound design is magnificent in its exactness, meticulousness, rigour — controlled and withdrawn in its atmospheres, yet unleashed upon the soundscape to do the Dutch trio's vicious bidding upon command, whether it's plucky, stabby, motoring, or anything else Noisia can get their hands dirty with. Arguably what makes "Split The Atom" such a monumental project, however, is its ability to combine pristine production with brash experimentalism. No two tracks sound the same, no track run lacks any diversity, no mood lingers long enough to bore; Noisia rip through styles like a trained swordsman in the midst of battle — always with a poise and gracefulness in their execution, always with a bloodlust to consume EDM whole and spit out the remnants for everyone else to deal with. From the thoughtful liquid DnB "Thursday", to the bold complextro "Alpha Centauri", and even to the club destroyer french house "Red Heat" — not to mention the slew of neurofunk tracks that take some measure of precedence, and yet each stick out in their own right — no genre is safe from Noisia's blade of synth-gilded steel, and whatever escapes is placed into a giant incubator to fully develop it into pure heat. It's clear, to me, why "Split The Atom" received such a revered spot in the mythos of the electronic scene. And yet, even after all that, I can't deny some key flaws — primarily, the influx of painstakingly short, typically around a minute of runtime, tracks. Some of the ideas in these shorter tracks brim with potential that the shrunk length fails to fulfil, to the point where they can sometimes feel like filler despite being nonetheless well-produced.

Aside from that, a couple of the tracks can feel a little dated, whether that be in the mixdown or the production ideas, but for the most part, "Split The Atom" is still rather ahead of its time. And it's just so, so hard to deny Noisia's incredible prowess on show here, and, in turn, to deny the cultural impact "Split The Atom" kickstarted. Whilst it's not my favourite album from their catalogue — that would go to this project's bigger, more mature brother "Outer Edges" — this is a strong showing, a strong showing indeed.