Slannesh: Kum on Feel the Noize
There's a really good video on Youtube about Games Workshop's foray into the world of music production. I was completely unaware of this going down when I saw my first pewter noise marine in a blister pack display at J&B Cards in Excelsior, Minnesota. Or it could very well have been the Hobbytown USA in the 7-HI mall in Minnetonka. One of those places.
This was in the mid 1990's.
I immediately liked a ton of stuff about this noise marine. First the mohawk. Then the guitar gun. But lastly the stat line, which in 2nd Warhammer represented a rare piece of long-range ballistic competence in an army that primarily was expected to do a lot of running towards the enemy.
But lets go back even further than 40k 2nd edition.
Back in the 1970's, a British rock band called Slade came out with a song called Cum on Feel the Noize.
A song title featuring several deliberate mispellings.
Slade was an early "glam" band and I have to think, as the original Games Workshop designers were sitting on their couches enjoying early adolescence, feeling the "Noize", they were building a strong mental image that would be suitably useful when it came time to design a chaos space marine that was ready to rock.
Let's go even further back, to the 1950's, when the first "Kum & Go" gas stations opened. You didn't go to Kum & Go to feel the Noize, you went there to put gas in your car.
One second thought, hat's probably too far back.
The Noise Marines of 10th Edition
You've probably seen the new 10th edition Noise Marine kits released in last year (2025). They came out right as I was finally getting back into the hobby. They look pretty cool. They're noticeably bigger that a standard Chaos Space Marine, more akin to a Havoc (heavy weapon) Marine.
Despite the new guys' unassailable awesomeness, I have a whole ton of these Slade-inspired rockers and I'm sorry to say they will continue being my noise marines.
I just repainted them bright magenta. The brightest magenta I could find.
And I painted some suitable old-school rhinos for their conveyance throughout the battlefield. In a very dark purple (probably close to Emperor's Children Horus Heresy-era colors) so that the bright magenta looks even brighter in comparison.
Look out world, here they come.
