If life feels like a blur right now for Yes Boone, there’s good reason.
The stage was all set for a triumphant home win when the DJ and producer was shortlisted for breakthrough artist of the year at the 2026 AIR Awards in Adelaide.
It wasn’t to be as Folk Bitch Trio scooped the category, part of a hattrick of wins on the night.
Yes Boone didn’t shed any tears; he has other important matters on his mind. That coveted indie newcomer is now a major label artist with a debut album in the works, thanks to a new record deal struck with Warner Music and Warner Records US.
Now based in Sydney, the electronic music creator’s first release through the partnership is “Nosebleeds,” a hard thump in the chest that he wrote during a stint in London and Paris. Its theme, the infatuation and uncertainty of a relationship’s honeymoon period, its title a discrete nod to his hometown heroes, Hilltop Hoods, the South Australian hip-hop trio that enjoyed a domestic smash with the 2003 song “The Nosebleed Section.”
The rising artist premiered the track last month at WMA’s annual Listen Up Showcase, as he spun a surprise set at the wheels of steel.
On the night, Dan Rosen, president, Warner Music Australasia and Southeast Asia, enthusiastically told the industry gathering that the music company’s latest signing, “we’re going to take him to the world.”
Yes please.
Like so many of his compatriots, Yes Boone isn’t afraid of a long haul.
The Aussie took notes, and inspiration, from a recent, first trip to Europe where he worked with several electronic music producers. “I was a little awestruck at first,” he said of a writing trip in France, an experience that gave him the direction for his first artist album. The work-in-progress captures elements of French house, British post-punk energy and a “timeless sound,” he tells Billboard over Zoom.
Yes Boone is coming off the release of his debut 2025 EP Best I’ve Found and the club weapon “All I Really Want,” which crashed ARIA’s Top 20 Australian Singles Chart and entered the top 10 on AIR’s Independent Singles Chart (peaking at No. 9).
A major label deal isn’t the only big change in his life. “Nosebleeds” features Yes Boone’s own vocals. Expect to hear more from where that came from on his debut LP, which doesn’t yet have a release date. “I’m definitely becoming more comfortable with it,” he says of his singing voice. “It took a little while to find my voice, to sing on my own tracks, and to put my own words to the music for the first time.” He also edited the official video, which was shot and directed by Have You Stopped Growing? and can be seen below.
The Australia festival circuit beckons, and the world awaits. Yes Boone is booked for the Yours & Owls Festival in Wollongong on Oct. 4, then travels with the Split Milk festival for shows in Canberra (Dec. 12), Gold Coast (Dec. 13), Geelong (Dec. 19) and Perth (Dec. 20).
He runs with a world-class Australian electronic and dance music community, a scene that counts Dom Dolla, Confidence Man, VASSY, Ninajirachi, Alison Wonderland, FISHER and labelmates RÜFÜS DU SOL within its ranks.
Looking ahead, building a bridge to the United States is on his wishlist. An invite to a writing camp in the United States in the following months could pave the way for many future trips to the world’s biggest music market. “Next year I hope to get out there and start playing some shows,” he enthuses. “It’s quite exciting.”
