EDM Global Producers

Shock shock, the king is again.

Hardwell didn’t simply briefly pop up at Bayfront Park and go away a mountain of uncertainty in his wake; the Revealed Recordings boss laid down the brand new music hammer throughout his not-so-unexpected return that doubled as each the conclusion to Extremely’s comeback and the jumpstart to his. For those who determined to randomly examine social media at any level within the midst of his ID onslaught, you’ll’ve discovered your self mind-numbingly looking at a tour poster and coinciding announcement for Hardwell’s long-awaited United We Are follow-up, Rebels By no means Die. Though there’s no date publicly set in stone for his 14-track sophomore LP, Hardwell’s 23-stop album run—which formally ignited at Extremely and in addition consists of Tomorrowland—will proceed all through the remainder of 2022, with its first pair of choices already arriving simply 5 days faraway from his statement-making resurgence in downtown Miami.

Earlier than March 27, the four-year mark had been nearing since an indefinite, well-deserved sabbatical was imposed as a approach for him to easily expertise life as Robbert van de Corput, not Hardwell. And in hindsight, that pause on Hardwell’s profession couldn’t have come at a greater time, with COVID-19 getting into the door a 12 months and a half after his Metropole Orkest-assisted finale present to slam the brakes on life as we knew it, giving him much more runway time to reset with out even the slightest little bit of expectations surrounding a potential comeback.

Throughout a podcast sitdown with longtime buddy Domeno again in February 2020, Hardwell had made it clear that he had zero intention of shattering that inventive hiatus till the music he was creating gave him “butterflies” when daydreaming about taking part in it dwell. Whereas some might have anticipated Hardwell’s quintessential bigroom sound to be the one to present him that feeling, there was nonetheless that stage of cheap expectation that his music was resulting from evolve to some extent every time that day did come, identical to with Swedish Home Mafia’s music on their incoming LP. And after a surprise appearance during Revealed’s annual ADE event this previous October and KAAZE’s teaser that “he’s coming,” the writing was on the wall for Extremely’s looming Bayfront Park reunion and Hardwell’s comeback to be intertwined.

And until you’ve been dwelling below a rock since Sunday, you’d know that’s precisely what occurred. Hardwell’s first look into Rebels By no means Die aptly comes within the type of the 2 tracks that he used to reintroduce himself at Bayfront Park to the dance music world. The album’s opening lower—”Damaged Mirror”—speaks for itself, coming as a well-thought-out monologue the place Hardwell explains that he doesn’t really feel outlined by others’ opinions of him and that he’s “gonna present you who [he] really [is.]” Who’s he actually? Within the subsequent couple of minutes of his set, all of us discovered what that was precisely referring to, with “Into The Unknown” grandly welcoming in Hardwell’s bigroom-infused-techno stylistic development. A sound that genuinely shouldn’t come as any shock contemplating Hardwell’s late-2000s-to-early-2010s releases had already planted the seeds for it, with tracks like “Smoke” and “Voyage“—as KURA had pointed out—being prime examples. And earlier than this goes any additional, it’s time to drop the madness that’s the “bigroom is now useless” dialog. Hardwell stated it finest via his Blasterjaxx pairing, and bigroom is available in so many alternative kinds—with an abundance of producers nonetheless preserving its mid-2010s home state wholly intact—as he helps the style at giant take a needed leap ahead. That union between bigroom and techno—a route Maddix has additionally been toying with—was solely additional explored via 13 different never-before-heard productions throughout Hardwell’s Extremely set—together with 12 remaining album cuts like its title number, the “Pac Man ID,” and the “Laser Gentle ID”—in addition to a 10-year anniversary reimagining of “Spaceman,” which is one thing that Hardwell says he’ll continue to do extra of for his old-school releases. In a 12 months that’s already proven promise of with the ability to spark one other dance music golden age, Rebels By no means Die—via “Damaged Mirror,” “Into The Unknown,” and the remaining Extremely ID—is shortly doing its half to push that narrative alongside.

Stream the primary two Rebels By no means Die singles beneath and relive Hardwell’s whole comeback at Extremely 2022.

Featured picture: Alive Protection

Tags: Hardwell, Rebels By no means Die, revealed recordings

Classes: Music