Solomun

From:Bosnia / Germany

DJ style:Melodic techno / house

Best known for:Pacha Ibiza +1 residency

Another year and another appearance in our Top 100 DJs list for Mladen Solomun, the multi-award-winning, endless-set-playing Bosnian-German DJ and producer. Since launching his Diynamic label back in 2005, Solomun has steadily worked his way up to the higher echelons of the DJ circuit, and had another great season with his Solomun +1 party at Pacha Ibiza, an event launched back in 2013 and which remains one of the strongest on the island. Diynamic kept up the pressure over the last 12 months with a pretty busy release schedule too, pumping out a series of high-level club tracks including Clüb De Combat’s new style-old skool ‘House Anthem’, their electro-house-ish collab with Matt Guy, ‘Party Of The Year’, sleek, stripped-back raw tech-house like Sapian’s ‘Look Ma’, and the gently twinkling melodic house of Johannes Brecht’s ‘Arp Piano’.

Solomun himself was no slouch on the production front this year either, dropping catchy underground summer jam ‘Follow The Disco Ball’ on Gerd Janson’s Running Back label, turning in a credible dark-side rework of Joe Smooth’s much-loved classic ‘Promised Land’, and remixing London Grammar’s ‘House’ into another of his infamous melodic techno-house rollers.

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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