Sepang. Singapore. Los Angeles. In just 10 days, Martin Garrix has hurtled through all three at a cadence for which the Dutch DJ and producer is known. Garrix has toured internationally since he was 16. Now 30, he’s spent nearly half his life on the road or somewhere between stops.
A schedule this demanding breeds battle-tested travel and performance acumen. How to beat jet lag in its own ring. Where to securely stash the USB flash drives (containing his music library) when living out of a suitcase. How to pace a 60-minute set at one of the world’s biggest and most consequential dance music festivals.
None of that expertise renders Garrix immune to a peculiar rite of passage at 30: “I realize I don’t know shit,” he tells Rolling Stone. “And that’s a very incredible feeling. There’s so much I can still grow into, so much I can still learn.”
Some of it will unfold in the form of vocal lessons on the heels of tour dates in Mexico City, with Amsterdam on the horizon. More than a decade into his career, he’s increasingly interested in who Martin Garrix might be beyond the DJ booth. Over the past year, and especially these days, much of that curiosity is being distilled into a project years in the making: his debut album, MARTY. The 14-track LP, named after his first DJ alias, lands March 5, 2027, via Darkroom Records and his own label, STMPD RCRDS.
“Debut album” forces a pause. Sentio was marketed as such in 2022, but Garrix, who calls it a “club album,” sees no contradiction. “[MARTY] feels like the first pop album — pop-dance, basically,” he clarifies.
There’s a clear logic to positioning it as his definitive debut. Identity has a lot to do with that.
The album is both autobiographical and epochal by design. With each song representing a different chapter of his life, MARTY offers an unprecedentedly intimate look inside one of dance music’s most successful and influential minds. Its arc — from his birth on the lead single “Catharina,” written about his mother, through the afterlife and rebirth — sheds light on a question that existing context about him leaves largely unanswered: Who has the now-adult wunderkind, who broke out with “Animals” in 2013, become?
While more collaborators will be announced, the handful confirmed so far should be enough to make even the uninitiated listen for the answer: Madonna (“Bizarre”), U2 (“Fireflies”), Ed Sheeran (“Rewind Repeat It,” made more than a decade ago), and AITANA on Garrix’s first, as-yet-untitled song in Spanish. (“Bizarre” also appeared on the Queen of Pop’s Confessions II.)
Courtesy of Martin Garrix
“I got to work with some incredible, legendary artists, so it’s very surreal,” Garrix says of the features on MARTY, which also marks his first team-up with a K-pop group. “Even when Madonna released her album, I was just like, ‘How is my name on hers?’”
It doesn’t get any more nonpareil than Madonna, but Garrix is no stranger to collisions with pop, rock, and R&B’s upper echelon. There are plenty of examples: 2019’s “Summer Days” with Macklemore and Fall Out Boy’s Patrick Stump; 2017’s “Scared to Be Lonely” with Dua Lipa; 2015’s “Don’t Look Down” with Usher.
This time, Garrix is doing something he’s long left to his collaborators. He sings solo for the first time on four of the album’s songs — something few producers attempt, and even a shorter list can do well. Two have already been released: “Catharina” and “This Dream Of You.”
“To be honest, the reason I [hadn’t] done it is because I was very comfortable. I was just like, ‘Okay, I’ll just write for others if other people sing,’” he says.
At Bono’s behest, Garrix gradually began building the confidence to step behind the mic. He’s learned, “like a sponge,” from U2’s frontman, who heard early demos, coached him on vocal delivery, and contributed to some lyrics.
Singing is “very far out of my comfort zone,” Garrix confesses, adding that it felt like a creative imperative. “There are some very personal songs on the album. It’d be weird if somebody sang a song about my mom,” he explains. Vocals also serve as a powerful act of reclamation, both of authorship and identity.
Louis Van Baar*
“Catharina” was the “soft launch” of Martin Garrix as a solo vocalist — a litmus test for whether the new approach resonated “or if people were like, ‘What the fuck is he doing?’” It did, though many have misread the song to be about romantic rather than maternal love — including some of his close friends.
MARTY was never going to deal strictly in hands-in-the-air moments (but they, too, are there). I posit, has Garrix’s longstanding association with pyrotechnics and seismic drops drawn audiences who expect spectacle over substance? Or has dance music’s bad rap — as fun but vacuous and unserious — tainted the current version of the genre?
Garrix doesn’t disagree, but trusts that depth will come through when people hear MARTY front to back. “I’m definitely excited to show people a bit more than they know,” he says. “A lot of people assume DJs and producers walk up to a show and play music from a USB, but it takes a lot more work when you actually make the music that’s being played. I write everything on guitar, [I sing] demos … I’m excited to take people on this journey. It doesn’t mean I’ll lose my DNA, but I want to grow.”
