Each artist has his/her saturation point; a time comes when they’re encountered with the dilemma of “what next?”
The art of collaboration in itself is a beautiful thing, helping producers push their limits, reinventing their sound and developing new ways to expand their reach.
Although we pray daily that Batman and Robin never part ways, we know there’s no shortage of bombastic duos in the world of electronic dance music and today we’re counting down our favourite top 10 twin-turbo twosomes!
Flosstradamus
Floss-tra-dam-us, however you may pronounce their name; it’s legit to say, these guys are giving most producers a good run for their money ! Josh Young and Curt Cameruci have had our hearts since their 2014 blockbuster track with Travis Porter “Drop Top”. Their hip-hop influenced beat has only increased our appreciation of their creative growth as trap producers. Better known as the Hoodie Boyz, they’ve picked up momentum whilst dropping ‘Pillz’, a bass heavy remix of Major Lazer’s ‘Bubble Butt’ and their twerk anthem ‘ASSQUAKE!’ Amounting a huge following through their social media profiles, they’ve remained consistent in releasing the dirtiest trap music around. Vine twerkers are thankful to them as much as we EDM fanatics are!
Dada Life
Ever since these Swedish electro house troublemakers released The Rules of Dada last year, which quickly reached #1 on the iTunes Dance charts, EDM has never been the same ever since! Olle Corneer and Stefan Engblom’s live shows are highlighted with banana suit donning and partygoers that aim at ‘arriving beautiful and leaving ugly’ and covered in champagne.
The duo has been a centre of numerous controversies relating to their originals works being stolen and threatened to be uploaded on ‘Dada Death’ Facebook account, which some believe was a part of a large marketing stunt to gain attention. Multiple shows of Dada Life have been cancelled in the past ‘cause of riots forcing police to take charge.
Beyond this, they not only have successful tracks like “Kick Out The Epic Motherf*cker”, “Happy Violence”, “Unleash the F*cking Dada”, “White Noise / Red Meat” and “Feed The Dada” to their credit but also the Guinness World Record for the world’s largest pillow fight and the world’s largest gathering of people dressed as fruit!
GTA
There’s one genre-defining GTA in video games and then there’s one in the EDM world, who blend together everything from electro house and trap to hip-hop, rock, and Rn’B. Consisting of Miami based Van Toth and JWLS, the duo never shies away from an opportunity to show off their unpredictable, booty-bouncing bangers like ‘Boy Oh Boy,’ ‘The Crowd’ and other collaborations alongside acts like Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike and Major Lazer.
The members met through Soundcloud and Facebook where they decided to experiment and create a sound combining their respective individual styles and that’s when “GTA” was born. “It’s Time” is the first track they have collaborated, and through all of their efforts, they received the opportunity to release it through Afrojack’s label, Wall Recordings. Other than their productions, the versatile “Death To Genres” mix series have absolutely proven their spot on the list, receiving acclaim from heavy hitters such as Afrojack, Diplo, and Laidback Luke!
W&W
You don’t get called “The Future Of Trance” by Armin van Buuren for nothing, right? In the contemporary world, W&W is a staple name on our playlist when it comes to high energy trance tunes. Made of two DJs based in Netherlands, Willem van Hanegem Jr. and Wadt van der Harst, their debut track, Mustang became a huge success and the track received plays from big names like Tiesto, Sander van Doorn and Armin van Buuren, bringing them into mainstream EDM world. Since then they have continued to perform together and maintain a radio show, exporting the more diverse sound of the team around the world. The latest track ‘Spack Jarrow’ with MOTi is currently ruling the charts, keeping up with the expectations and enthusiasm of the people who do love hard trance!
Blasterjaxx
Dutch DJ duo Blasterjaxx comprising of Thom Jongkind and Idir Makhlaf, have worked with everyone from Hardwell and David Guetta to Tiësto in such a short span of time, creating multiple big room chart toppers as both original and remixed productions which make them worthy of the hype surrounding them. Their live sets like the ones at Ultra Music Festival, Tomorrowland, TomorrowWorld (just to name a few) make transitions from uplifting and melodic electro house music to intense and energetic progressive house.
Their latest collaborations “Ghost in the Machine” with MOTi and “Bowser” with W&W bring out a fresh new blend of big room and Dirty Dutch that fans go crazy for. The boys even have their own radio/podcast channel ‘Maxximize On Air.’
Knife Party
Rob Swire and Gareth McGrillen, part of the Drum&Bass band Pendulum formed Knife Party as a side project, having released four EPs and one studio album till now. Their extra-ordinary production skills are well illustrated in works like ‘Centipede,’ ‘Power Glove,’ ‘Internet Friends’ and the mammoth collaboration with legendary trio Swedish House Mafia in the form of ‘Antidote.’ They have toured around the world reaching festivals including Ultra Music Festival, HARD Day Of The Dead, Spring Awakening, EDC Las Vegas and even Breaking Bad! Recognized for dramatic intros, heavy synths and massive bass they definitely have made a frontrunner position for themselves in the already crowded industry!
Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike
Do these guys really need an introduction? If so, come out from under your rock and spend some time on the internet!
Currently #2 in the world, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike have been exceptional performers with several festival-anthems like ‘Wakanda,’ ‘Madness,’ ‘Mammoth,’ their remix of Fatboy Slim’s classic hit ‘Eat Sleep Rave Repeat’ and latest smasher ‘The Hum,’ these brothers have been upping the ante for big room house since their 1999 debut. Now they’re permanent Tomorrowland residents, touring around world and hitting #1 on Beatport with every new track of theirs!
Between destroying club crowds and throwing a party at every major festival stage they manage their record label ‘Smash The House’ and radio/podcast channel by the same name, and everywhere in between, the trapped out duo shells out time to make friends like Bollywood superstars Salman Khan and Sonakshi Sinha! All about that, DVLM have proved EDM’s reach is more than just “bass hungry” sound systems.
Jack Ü
If you didn’t already know, Jack Ü is the collaboration project involving Mad Decent’s founder Diplo and OWSLA’s head Skrillex. After making their world debut at Ultra Music Festival in Miami with the entire “Jack Ü crew,” they immediately began working together on their album ‘Skrillex and Diplo Present Jack Ü,’ which upon on its release topped nearly every possible musical chart in the world! This ubiquitous duo has quickly proven that “All the world’s a Stage,” throwing continuous music festivals and surprise appearances across the world, never letting the party stop. We’re assuming that’s what Shakespeare originally meant! Their live sets blend together all different genres of bass-heavy music and they are known to drop nearly every fan-favourite classic to date.
Axwell /\ Ingrosso
Two thirds of Swedish House Mafia joined forces to become a new electronic duo carrying a self descriptive name, Axwell /\ Ingrosso, who signed to Def Jam Records and are coming up with their debut album later this year. Both members deleted their respective Facebook pages and created a single page under their alias announcing their partnership. The Swedes toured India, as part of Sunburn Arena where they performed already hit tracks “We Come We Rave We Love” and “Can’t Hold Us Down” along with some unannounced projects.
Their single “Something New” was used for a Beats Solo2 advertisement, following it with the anthemic “On My Way” featuring vocals from Salem Al Fakir. On 12 June 2015, they released a new song “Sun Is Shining” which collected 3 million views in one month on YouTube.
With more music on the way and they look to continue their dominance of house music no holds barred!
Daft Punk
With the combined efforts of Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter, Daft Punk has become the definition of dance music, despite the fact that they’ve been known to only release limited amount of music at long stretches of time and make rare public appearances. Honestly it’s hard not to put Daft Punk at the “Number One Spot,” after what they’ve achieved in twenty-two years only on the basis of their “music”! There are a myriad of reasons the French belong here, be it their Grammy winning discography, the ability to have the music world up in arms with a 15 second clip, or the sheer reason that they’ve ditched their race of robots to spend some time with us.
Honourable mentions (in particular order):
Infected Mushroom
Adventure Club
The Chemical Brothers
Pegboard Nerds
DVBBS
Camo & Krooked
The Crystal Method
Disclosure
Duck Sauce
Firebeatz
Sultan & Shepard
Bingo Players
Showtek
Super8 & Tab
Tritonal (band)
Zeds Dead
DubVision
The Chainsmokers
By any chance, did we miss your favourite EDM-Duo? If yes, let us know in the comments section and we’ll make sure it is on the list!
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