Novaix Onyx brings a sharp collision of UK garage, bassline, house and Korean-pop attitude to Close, a six-track EP built around words that carry more than one meaning. Across the project, Onyx explores control, attraction, refusal and vulnerability, gradually revealing how a confident exterior can conceal something much more complicated underneath. As a disclosed AI artist, Onyx’s songwriting, lyrics, arrangement and creative direction are human-led, while the performance and visuals are generated.
“Handle” opens with gritty, glitchy textures that seem to rise and pulse around rumbling beats. Onyx’s high voice cuts through the production with a grave, smug delivery, rapping rapidly and snappishly. There is a deliberately confrontational quality to the performance, immediately establishing the EP’s attitude and its fascination with control.
“LOADED” pushes the energy further. A fast, pulsating electronic swirl spins around hard, thumping beats as Onyx attacks the verses with a quick, confident flow. The song plays with the idea of irresistible attraction, portraying someone who wants something so badly that they are already “locked and loaded” before they can think twice. The production matches that sense of momentum, constantly driving forward.
The title track, “CLOSE,” brings the EP’s central wordplay into focus. Skippy two-step drums and off-grid snares bounce against a steady four-on-the-floor kick, while stabbing organ bass and rolling sub give the track a muscular garage-house groove. A recurring 90s-flavoured vocal riff runs through the arrangement, connecting its different sections. Onyx shifts from smooth, low sing-talk into a hard, rapid-fire rap passage, creating the track’s biggest burst of energy without relying on a conventional drop.
But “close” means both being near and being shut out, and that contradiction gives the song its bite. Everyone reaches the same point with her, yet nobody gets beyond it. Then the perspective flips: she is not necessarily the one closing the door—she is inside, hearing it shut.
That idea gives Close an intriguing arc. What begins as control and bravado gradually becomes a question of whether control was ever entirely hers. With its swaggering rap, restless rhythms and futuristic garage-house pulse, Close turns a compact dance EP into a study of attraction, boundaries and the masks people wear when they claim to be in control.
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Review by: Naomi Joan