Tomorrowland kicks off in Boom in eleven days, and the internet has already decided it’s the greatest thing to ever happen to a Belgian field. Two weekends, sixteen stages, five hundred names, one castle-shaped mainstage that costs more than most people’s houses. You don’t need a €500 ticket to hear the tracks that’ll actually run the place, though. Here’s the pre-game: the songs the Mainstage will lean on before Guetta pretends he built them from scratch.
1. Martin Garrix - Animals
The one that turned a Dutch teenager into a headliner. That three-note lead still detonates a crowd on contact, and the drop at 1:07 is the exact moment festival EDM stopped pretending to be subtle. Garrix has spent a decade trying to write something bigger and mostly missed, which tells you how hard this one landed.
2. David Guetta & Bebe Rexha - I’m Good (Blue)
Yes, it’s a flip of Eiffel 65. Yes, it’s everywhere. It’s also the most reliable way to make forty thousand people scream a fake-happy chorus at once, and the key change into the drop does something chemical to a festival crowd. Guetta will play it, you’ll hate that you know every word, that’s the arrangement.
3. Calvin Harris, Dua Lipa - One Kiss
Not a rave weapon, and it doesn’t need to be. It’s the track that plays at 6pm while the sun’s still up and everyone’s pretending they’re not already wrecked. The bassline is pure 2018 house nostalgia and Dua’s hook lands in about four seconds flat.
4. Fisher - Losing It
The “ohh ohh ohh” that ate the world. Fisher built a headline career out of essentially one idea, and this is the idea. The build past the two-minute mark strips down to a single acid line and a kick, and when it drops the whole field loses the plot. Stupid and effective at the same time.
5. Armin van Buuren feat. Trevor Guthrie - This Is What It Feels Like
The token trance moment before the mainstage goes back to slamming. Armin’s been headlining Tomorrowland since before some of this year’s crowd could walk, and this is his crossover: a vocal trance record with an actual song underneath. The breakdown is unashamedly emotional and it works every time the sky goes dark.
Eleven days. Charge your portable battery and lie to your boss about next Friday.