Organized Noize will not be a name everyone will recognize immediately. But if you are familiar with the early work of Outkast, Goodie Mob or the songs “Waterfalls” by TLC or “Do not Let Go (Love)” by En Vogue, you will know their work. It is the production team behind the music that put Atlanta on the map as a music city. This documentary, which can be found on Netflix, shows their history and how they managed to reach the top, but also how they eventually lost that position.
The trio of Sleepy Brown, Rico Wade and Ray Murray met in Atlanta. They started making music together and got to know various artists. They all stayed in one house (which was renamed The Dungeon), in which they were constantly busy making music. Artists slept on the ground regularly, hoping to eventually achieve success together. And that success finally came. Not only these three men talk about that time, but also various artists such as members of Outkast, Goodie Mob and producers like Sean Combs and L.A. Reid. But it was precisely the success that eventually became too much for them. With a signed contract for millions at a young age they were giving wild parties and slowly lost their focus on what made them so good. The groups for which they made music learned a lot in The Dungeon and developed their own sound without them.
And although there is access to a lot of archival material and artists, this documentary feels messy. Some stories add little to the whole and at the same time you get the feeling that this documentary is an advertisement for the production team. A kind of “remember us?” project. For hip hop fans interesting to watch, but not focussed enough to be a music film that will appeal to everyone.
