SAMPLEDSkrillex drops 'Thistle' with Blawan, Randomer and MC Dricka as the CONTRA era opens up
A surprise UK-techno linkup arrives ahead of a 2026 festival run that runs Primavera to Bonnaroo to Head Trip — and turns Berlin's Kraftwerk into his new home base.
Skrillex has released "Thistle," a four-way linkup with Blawan, Randomer and MC Dricka — the third single from his current rolling release run, after "Duro" with Young Miko and "Smoke" with ISOxo. Subscribers to his mailing list got the track a few days early; today it's out everywhere via Atlantic.
The lineup tells you most of what you need to know about where his head is at. Blawan and Randomer are two of the heaviest names in contemporary UK techno; MC Dricka brings a São Paulo funk register that has been bleeding into global club music for a year now. Skrillex is the connective tissue — the same instinct that powered his 2023 reset Quest For Fire / Don't Get Too Close, just pushed further into the warehouse.
CONTRA, and a residency at Kraftwerk
"Thistle" landed alongside the debut of CONTRA, Skrillex's new event platform built in partnership with Berlin Atonal. The opening edition took over Kraftwerk Berlin on May 30–31, with more than 70 artists across club music, live performance and visual art — a curatorial swing that frames CONTRA less as a one-off and more as the live, year-round version of the orbit he's been recording inside.
The 2026 festival run
From Kraftwerk, the year rolls into a heavy festival summer and a Coachella-grounds October that doubles as a coronation for Head Trip, the new desert weekender he's headlining alongside Swedish House Mafia, Calvin Harris, Fisher × Chris Lake and Dom Dolla.
- Jun 3–7 — Primavera Sound 2026, Parc del Fòrum, Barcelona
- Jun 11–14 — Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival 2026, Manchester, TN
- Jun 12–14 — Lyrical Lemonade Summer Smash 2026 (three-day), SeatGeek Stadium, Bridgeview, IL
- Jun 13 — Lyrical Lemonade Summer Smash 2026 (Saturday), SeatGeek Stadium, Bridgeview, IL
- Aug 12–16 — Boomtown Fair 2026, Matterley Estate, Winchester, UK
- Oct 2–4 — Austin City Limits Music Festival, Weekend 1, Zilker Park, Austin, TX
- Oct 10–11 — Head Trip 2026, Empire Polo Club, Indio, CA
- Oct 10–12 — Head Trip 2026 (two-day pass), Empire Polo Club, Indio, CA
- Oct 11 — Head Trip 2026 (Sunday), Empire Polo Club, Indio, CA
What to listen for
If "Duro" was the pop swing and "Smoke" the West-Coast hybrid, "Thistle" is the European one: stripped, metallic, Blawan-shaped low end with Dricka's vocal cutting the grid. Read it as a thesis statement for whatever Skrillex is staging at Kraftwerk and re-staging across the Polo Club six months later.