Noisia Just Reunited, and They're Doing It Differently

On September 17, 2019, Nik Roos, Thijs de Vlieger and Martijn van Sonderen announced that Noisia was ending. On September 17, 2026, seven years to the day later, they announced it wasn't. The Groningen trio confirmed their reunion via social media, and with it a comeback show at Melkweg in Amsterdam on December 4, 2026, according to WeRaveYou and the Melkweg's own event listing. Presale tickets go live today, September 23, with general sale following on September 25.

Noisia spent two decades pulling drum & bass sideways into sound design, film scoring and studio technicality most producers in the genre never bothered to touch. Their split in 2019 was framed at the time as a full stop, not a pause, which makes the specificity of this reunion, the exact anniversary date, the deliberate return to the room-sized scale of a club show rather than a festival headline slot, worth taking seriously rather than filing as a routine nostalgia cash-in. What the three members are saying about how they plan to make new music, tested live before it ever touches a release schedule, is arguably the more interesting story than the reunion itself.

Why Did Noisia Split in 2019?

Noisia announced their split on September 17, 2019, though the pandemic then stretched what was meant to be a farewell tour out over several additional years before the group played its last scheduled dates. The band gave no single explanation loud enough to become the defining headline, the way, say, a members-only lawsuit or a public falling-out might have. What's clear from the language all three are using now is that the ending was treated as final at the time it was made. Roos, Van Sonderen and De Vlieger walked away from one of drum & bass's most technically influential acts by design, not by drift, and stayed away long enough that reuniting on the exact seven-year anniversary of that original announcement reads as a considered gesture rather than a coincidence.

What Have Nik Roos, Thijs de Vlieger and Martijn van Sonderen Been Doing Since?

None of the three sat still. Nik Roos developed Sleepnet, launched the Ring Noord project alongside an artist called Former, and worked on Body Ocean, splitting his time between production, scoring and audio technology work rather than staying inside a single studio alias. Thijs de Vlieger expanded his solo alias Thys, collaborated with Amon Tobin, composed for film and contemporary dance, contributed to designer Iris van Herpen's Paris Haute Couture show, and worked with a collective called VIER. Martijn van Sonderen kept building his Zonderling alias while also producing under the name NSR, moving across house, melodic techno, pop and hip hop rather than staying anchored to drum & bass.

That spread matters for what comes next. All three members effectively used the hiatus as a genre residency, absorbing production language from house, techno, composition and sound design for stage and screen work, the kind of range that made Noisia's own productions stand out from the rest of drum & bass in the first place. A reunited Noisia isn't three producers returning to exactly where they left off. It's three producers who each spent seven years somewhere else, converging back on a shared project.

What Happens at the Melkweg Show on December 4?

The comeback performance is scheduled for Melkweg in Amsterdam on December 4, 2026, a considerably more intimate setting than the festival stages Noisia closed out during their farewell run. Presale tickets opened September 23, 2026, the same day as the reunion news itself, with general sale following two days later on September 25, per the Melkweg listing. Choosing a club show over a festival slot for the first performance back is its own kind of statement: this is a return to the room where the music actually gets tested, not a comeback engineered for the biggest possible stage.

Why Are Noisia Testing New Material Live Before Releasing It?

Rather than rushing toward a finished album or a streaming drop, the trio say they plan to test new ideas and works-in-progress live first, building a feedback loop between the crowd and the studio before finalizing anything for release. Van Sonderen described the process in blunt, practical terms: "Getting a rough idea from the guys and letting my own ideas loose on it. That already feels exciting again." Roos put the reunion itself more simply: "Noisia is in motion again. We don't know where it'll lead." De Vlieger, for his part, called the reunited group "an unknown future prospect again," language that treats Noisia's second act as genuinely open-ended rather than a nostalgia lap with a predetermined finish line.

That live-first approach also lines up with a wider shift in how independent artists are choosing to control their own release timing rather than defaulting to a label's calendar, a dynamic that's shaped how independent labels have grown their US market share in 2026. Testing a track on a Melkweg crowd before it exists as a finished master is the extreme version of that independence: no streaming release date locks the music in until the trio themselves decide a track is done. Individual solo projects, Sleepnet, Thys, Zonderling and the rest, continue running alongside the reunion rather than being folded back into it, which keeps the reunion itself lower-stakes than a full-time comeback would be.

What Does Noisia's Reunion Say About Drum & Bass Right Now?

Drum & bass's commercial momentum has been building for a while, part of a broader jump in US electronic and dance streaming that saw the genre post the largest streaming-share gain of any format tracked in the first half of 2026. That's a different, faster-moving story than hard techno's parallel climb in the US market, but both point to the same underlying shift: underground dance music built without major-label infrastructure is finding real audiences on the platforms that measure listening now, years after the scenes themselves did the actual work. Noisia's return lands into a moment where drum & bass doesn't need to prove its commercial relevance the way it might have needed to in 2019. That gives the trio room to reunite on their own terms, at club scale, without a label push or a festival system demanding a finished product on a fixed timeline.

Frequently Asked Questions

When did Noisia announce their reunion?

Noisia announced their reunion on September 17, 2026, exactly seven years after announcing their split on the same date in 2019. The announcement came via the trio's social media channels.

When and where is Noisia's comeback show?

Noisia's first performance since reuniting is scheduled for Melkweg in Amsterdam on December 4, 2026. Presale tickets opened September 23, 2026, with general sale following on September 25, 2026.

Why did Noisia split up in 2019?

Noisia announced their split on September 17, 2019, though the pandemic delayed and extended what was meant to be their farewell tour by several years. The group has not attached a single defining reason to the split beyond treating it, at the time, as a genuine ending rather than a pause.

What have the members of Noisia been doing since the split?

Nik Roos worked on Sleepnet, Ring Noord (with Former) and Body Ocean, alongside production, scoring and audio technology work. Thijs de Vlieger expanded his Thys alias, collaborated with Amon Tobin, scored film and contemporary dance work, contributed to Iris van Herpen's Paris Haute Couture show and worked with the VIER collective. Martijn van Sonderen continued as Zonderling and produced under the name NSR across house, melodic techno, pop and hip hop.

Is Noisia releasing a new album?

Not yet, and not on a fixed timeline. The trio have said they plan to test new ideas and works-in-progress live first, using shows like the Melkweg date to build a feedback loop between the crowd and the studio before finalizing anything for a formal release.