Oliver Heldens

From:The Netherlands

Best known for:Hits like ‘Gecko’ and his HI-LO alias

Oliver Heldens has spent the past 12 months putting his spin on classic tracks, bringing them up to date for the festival stages of 2024. In January, he and Ian Asher injected some samba heat into the winter months with a chuggy house track sampling Sérgio Mendes & Brasil ’66’s classic cover of ‘Mas Que Nada’. (Mendes sadly died in September, and Heldens paid tribute to the bossa nova legend online.) The following month, he teamed up with Spain’s Danny Avila to re-imagine Coolio’s ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’ as an epic trance-techno hybrid. In fact, he’s been turning out HI-LO stompers like crazy all year, dropping the acid-licked ‘My Fantasy’ with Maddix, the ravey ‘Gimme The Word’ with Alan Fitzpatrick, and the grinding ‘Afraid To Live’ with ZHU via his HILOMATIK label. As Heldens proper he also joined forces with David Guetta for the floaty ‘Chills (Feel My Love)’, put out the intensive ‘PHYSICAL’ via his Heldeep label, and recently released disco-tinged effort ‘SHINE’ with Bajan singer RoRo.

He brought all these tunes and more to aforementioned festival stages himself, with shows in both guises at events like Veld, Airbeat One, Tomorrowland, Parookaville, and even going back-to-back with himself playing as Oliver Heldens & HI-LO at Mysteryland.

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Faustix

From:Denmark

DJ style: “Big techno.”

Best known for: “Collaboration with Diplo, Faustix, Imanos and Kai called ‘Revolution’.”

Everything about 2024 was big and bold for Faustix. The Danish dance music lifer found a new sound over the course of the past year, where ropey and dramatic arpeggios dart in and out of brash techno kicks and every drop feels like barreling down a dopamine rollercoaster. Each release seemed to push the envelope further and further — from the soaring emotions of ‘Lead Me To Love You’ with vocalist Mougleta to ‘All My Friends Are Hot’, whose cheeky vocal flip (“All my friends are hot and only listen to techno”) was the perfect summer festival anthem. Add to that a teased remix of Belgian Stromae ‘Alors on danse’ and it’s clear that 2024 was, without a doubt, the year Faustix found a whole new groove.

While he’s certainly been busy in the studio, Faustix has also played everywhere — from 13,000 person raves in the middle of Copenhagen to gigs on the Faroe Islands. Faustix, in other words, hasn’t taken his foot off the gas for even a second. And, with each gig and release, he is testament to how much people still love pumping, hard-edged techno.

Fave tune of 2024?

“Dash Berlin ‘Till The Sky Falls Down’, it’s an all-time classic and still gets me