Lee UHF and Noise Souls have built a steady run of collaborations over a short period, balancing rough-edged jungle pressure with a more modern production finish. Their latest release, Guilty Verdict on Dirtbox Recordings, leans fully into that darker atmosphere, pulling visual cues from the 1986 Transformers film while keeping the music rooted in heavy low-end tension and direct club functionality. We sat down with both producers to talk about rebuilding confidence through collaboration, creating a recognisable visual identity, and why instinct still matters more than perfection.

When you look back at your first conversations, what made the collaboration click quickly enough to end up with more than 20 tracks together already?

Lee UHF: It was more the case of an out-of-the-blue conversation of Nic asking me, “Why don't you make music anymore?” To which I answered, “I have done. I just never finish it off.” It was then a few weeks of him trying everything he could to persuade me to show him clips. It was then a few weeks of him trying everything he could to persuade me to show him clips. Then, pushing it further by hounding me for stems to finish the tracks. I was very reluctant, as I had lost a lot of confidence in any kind of music-making process, so I thought nothing was any good.

When he showed me what he had done to the first track (Globetrotter) I was blown away and instantly sent over another ton of half-finished tracks and ideas.

Noise Souls: The first conversations were all about persistence! I have a lot of respect for him; he's a great producer, and I felt I had to give him a push to get him creating again! That's why I asked him for everything he hadn't finished, and that's how our co-producer relationship began.

There’s a clear visual identity forming across these releases now, especially with both of you appearing directly in the artwork. What led you to put your own faces and personalities into the release themes, rather than keeping things more anonymous?

Lee UHF: That would be my fault, why you have to see our faces on every release, A few years ago, I signed some music from a producer called Beskar I never knew it until his second release with me, but he made sure on every label he released with that he had a Star Wars theme in some way for his artwork.

Personally, I wanted an idea that would be very original and individual for us. Our first release, Globetrotter, was on a compilation, so we had no say in that, but our single back in December Introspective Thoughts was also set up for the DNB Essentials album. It just so happened that those singles and the album had the artist's faces on them. For me, this made the album stand out from anything else out there. A sea of AI art and similar-looking things, it just felt like a lot of ideas had gotten tired. So having our faces on them meant no one else would copy that… or so we thought (Not naming names, but we had our idea stolen recently lol)

So all in all, it's about keeping it original but also a branding exercise, so people can humanise our music. I thought it was pretty cool when you found a photo of your favourite producer when I was younger, because they’d always just be a name on a record for the most part.

Noise Souls: This was more Lee's idea, which I think is fantastic! Always keeping in mind the concept of the single or EP. If you look at an album by an artist of rock, pop, or any genre, the artist is almost always on the cover. Why shouldn't we do the same with drum and bass?

The whole “Guilty Verdict” concept pulls from the 1986 Transformers film and the Trial of Kranix scene. How deep did that inspiration go once you got into writing the tune and building the artwork around it?

Lee UHF: In all honesty the music came first and during the final stages I was thinking of a concept for it, The track name and artwork had been in my head for a while, For some reason I have never in 40 years been able to shake out that scene in the Transformers movie out my head, Its stuck with me so its been an idea for a while to try and bring that concept into my music. I had literally thought of the idea a few years before I even knew Nic. Once the track took shape, it just felt like the correct track for that concept. It's like a soundtrack to me, and the music definitely brought out some emotions aimed at fakery in the music industry. Think of Nic and me as the judges, jury and executioners.

Noise Souls: Originally, we didn't talk about the concept specifically, which is good because it shows how well we work together and how connected we are when creating.

When you’re building tracks together remotely, what does the actual process look like between you both, from the initial idea through to the final arrangement?

Lee UHF: It's literally ideas. Sometimes I'll send Nic some bits to work on. Sometimes I literally mention an idea I have with the goal of getting to the computer to work on it, and I wake up the next day, and Nic's sent me a clip of the idea I had worked out for me, haha.

It's such an easy partnership when it comes to getting the ideas out first. Nic is a machine, and I do have to reel him in as he`ll send me 5-10 concepts a week to work on. You wouldn't believe the amount of audio in our ideas folder.

Noise Souls: We complement each other so naturally, it's wonderful. He sends ideas and vice versa, then we bring them to life. We work together, prioritising each upcoming song or deciding which ones we should focus on more than others. It's a beautiful, daily flow.

You can hear the balance between older dark jungle influences and a cleaner modern production edge across this release. Were there any shared reference points or records you both kept circling back to while shaping the sound?

Lee UHF: I've become a massive fan of heavy, dark jungle-style tracks of late. I've hunted down some old Dread releases and taken a lot of inspiration from people like Varkid, VISLA and even Chase & Status. The catalyst for this tune and a few more you`ll hear soon, though, was Varkid's Bring The Fire on my Dirtbox label. It's the best track in DNB for me in the last 5 years.

Noise Souls: For my part, there's never a starting point influenced by another album or another artist. To be honest, I have old sources of inspiration, but not current ones. I'm not a guy who's very aware of what other artists are releasing, and the sound is always current and original. I focus on our productions 100% on momentary ideas without resorting to old methods, always trying not to stagnate, or push us into a single subgenre of drum and bass.

With the amount of collaborations already lined up across different labels this year, have you noticed your workflow speeding up naturally now that you understand each other’s strengths better?

Lee UHF: Nic makes it so easy for me. He’s brought a confidence I totally forgot about, and I owe a lot to him for helping me find that again. I know our music isn't the most technically sound, but we're just having fun making it now. We aren't setting goals to get on certain labels or goals to sound like Noisia, blah blah. We just make music, and we`ll send a very select few labels who we think could do a good job with us and the rest I just like to program myself on my labels because I know what a good job I'll do.

Noise Souls: Absolutely! I live for this, literally. And having so many projects already published, plus the ones coming up, makes everything flow naturally. We rarely disagree, and when it happens, we correct it almost instantly.

There’s a recognisable tension running through both Parasite / Shadows and Guilty Verdict. Do you consciously try to build a connected atmosphere across the releases, or does that darker character just happen naturally when you work together?

Lee UHF: This is Nic. I think he has a way of connecting the tracks like an audio story. I do all the visuals for us with the artwork and the story behind the tracks. And I love coming up with ideas for him to manipulate. The back-and-forth of stems is quite minimal as we both work our initial ideas to almost completion before the other steps in.

Noise Souls: It comes 100% naturally; I love creating dark, mysterious...cinematic atmospheres! It's our hallmark, our signature. We both share that obsession with technique.

What usually tells you both that a tune is actually finished? Is it a mixdown thing, a DJ test thing, or more of a gut feeling between you?

Lee UHF: I'm lucky to have some really high-level producers on speed dial who I confide in. Bad Ace has been great, TR Tactics also, El Hornet from Pendulum has dropped some great advice, and Andy from Canis X Sirius has gotten me out of some scrapes.

Had a super long chat with the legendary Gridlok today as well, oddly enough, and we have a chat set up soon. “Pinch me” moment that was.

Noise Souls: After having made so many songs, we have found that each song is a different story, a metric, a method, which may not be palpable if you listen to all our releases; they all have an ideal harmony to be mixed live in some set.

Outside of studio work, what sort of music, films, games, or random day-to-day stuff has been feeding into the ideas lately without necessarily ending up directly in the tracks?

Lee UHF: When I'm not making music or listening to the 50 ideas a week from Nic, I do a bit of gym, I'm a full-time dad of 2, an almost husband, hold down a full-time job, run and manage over a dozen labels and my promo company too. I do like to watch the odd show at bedtime, though, and I'll always catch up on Sunday with the UFC events and my New York Knicks.

Noise Souls: I'm a guy who watches cult movies, C-grade kind... I also read a lot of philosophy, and I'm a very curious guy. Maybe I'll read a philosophical term that catches my attention, and I'll try to translate that "philosophical idea or concept" into drum and bass.

If somebody found a folder with all 20-plus collaborations in it tomorrow and listened front to back, what do you think they’d understand most clearly about the partnership between Lee UHF and Noise Souls?

Lee UHF: Wow, that is a good question. If they heard what I have done, also solo and Nic outside of the collaborations, they would definitely see how both styles come together as they do. I'm so excited to get it all out, I'm like a kid in a candy shop.

Noise Souls: I think they would realise why we hardly ever do individual releases anymore (if we do), but we are very focused on continuing to work together.

You both seem to build these releases around strong themes and shared ideas rather than just standalone tracks. Is there a bigger world or ongoing storyline slowly forming behind these collaborations, even if listeners haven’t fully spotted it yet?

Lee UHF: For me, the themes are there in my head now. I'm just waiting for our tracks to match with them. When they don't, we`ll discuss new ones. There's no story arc, per se, but every release does have a story to it. Guilty Verdict was aimed at how we should really be putting the fakers and pretenders in the industry to right, I think it's so damaging to the craft of DJing and producing. It's literally like saying “Anyone can do it”, but they fucking can't. It's hard as fuck to make good music.

Noise Souls: Obviously! If you listen to Parasite as a concept, every sound tries to make you think about parasites...that's what we do. There's always a story. We don't make music just for the sake of it; the song titles aren't random, they're ideas poured into each song.

One slightly sideways one to finish, if you had to sentence one classic drum & bass tune in the Pit of Judgement for being “too dangerous” on a system, what record gets dragged into court?

Lee UHF: That depends on what you mean by dangerous? Dangerous as in “a fucking disaster” (lol) or something that will blow up (in a good way). If a non-positive way, I'd say any DNB you hear from influencers bastardising dnb in their music, KSI for example.

Positively dangerous?... Always for me is “Varkid - Bring The Fire”

Noise Souls: Tough question, huh!... In a bad way, there's a lot of garbage floating around that would end up there. (Without naming names) In a good way, our latest release here ;)

Guilty Verdict continues a run of collaborations that feel driven more by instinct and shared enthusiasm than calculated rollout plans. Across the conversation, both producers keep circling back to the same thing: making music they genuinely enjoy, building their own visual world around it, and letting the releases develop naturally from there. Thanks again to Lee UHF and Noise Souls for taking the time to speak with us. We can't wait to see what's coming next!

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