Nine Inch Noize Album Review: Reznor, Ross, and Boys Noize Deliver

The surprise 2026 collaboration from Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, and Alex Ridha reviewed — Coachella moment or lasting album?

If you’re a Nine Inch Nails fan, you know Trent Reznor doesn’t do anything halfway. So when Boys Noize — Berlin-based DJ and producer Alex Ridha, the guy behind remixes for Daft Punk and Depeche Mode, co-writing Lady Gaga’s Grammy-winning “Rain on Me,” and forming the duo Dog Blood with Skrillex — started opening for NIN on the 2025/26 Peel It Back Tour, it wasn’t just a typical support slot. Every night, Ridha joined Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross on a B-stage for a four-song electronic detour deep into NIN’s catalog. It was unexpected, a little unhinged, and fans absolutely lost it.

That rapport didn’t come out of nowhere. Ridha had already been in Reznor and Ross’s orbit — contributing to Challengers, a full-length continuous dance remix of their Challengers film score, and lending production to the Tron: Ares OST and its companion remix record, Tron Ares: Divergence. By the time those B-stage sets became the highlight of the tour, the writing was on the wall. Nine Inch Noize — the collaborative project name hiding in plain sight — showed up on the Coachella 2026 lineup poster before anyone knew quite what it was. Now we have the album, released April 17, 2026, on Null Corporation/Interscope. And yes, Reznor’s wife and How to Destroy Angels vocalist Mariqueen Maandig adds talents to the project as well.

🧐 Look, we’ve all been burned by the “great live set becomes disappointing album” pipeline. So let’s get into whether Nine Inch Noize is the real deal or just a really good memory.