A project that has been in the making for years has finally been revealed to the hardstyle community. It’s a wild ride through Coone’s history and entire music career, as well as an insight into how the scene evolved through the eyes of a pioneer. Watch it now for free on YouTube – and be ready for a trip down memory lane and some insights on the rise of hardstyle as a whole.

Koen Bauweraerts, better known by his stage name Coone, was born on May 30, 1983, in Belgium, not the Netherlands. He grew up in a loving family but faced a few difficulties proving to them that this career path was right for him because of its risks. We all know how that turned out, so I’m sure they were happy they supported him all along.

He states in the documentary that his brother was actually DJing before him, which got him interested in how the music was actually made, not just DJing. He then began his journey with jumpstyle and rose through the ranks of the scene. There is a lot of footage of young Coone in the documentary putting things into perspective. From his humble beginnings at home with his family, all the way up to his sold-out performance at Sportpaleis in Antwerpen.

In 2002, Dirty Workz was launched as a result of Coone wanting to break away from the contract he had before. He states that back then, he saw the future in hardstyle a lot brighter than in jumpstyle since he was looking to innovate and focus on quality. Dirty Workz would become a powerhouse for hardstyle music. The label has since supported numerous artists, helping shape the genre into what it is today.

By the late 2000s, Coone had solidified himself as a major name in the hardstyle scene. His album My Dirty Workz (2008) gained significant attention, and he began performing at major festivals like Defqon.1, Tomorrowland, and Qlimax. But in many ways, this was just the beginning for Coone.

Coone pushed hardstyle into the mainstream by collaborating with big names from different genres. One of the biggest steps for him and the scene as a whole was his first Tomorrowland main stage set. He shares that his peers put a lot of pressure on him to represent the scene in a good light. And even though he felt stressed, the result was a great set that people loved. In the next few years, Coone would step down as the main man at Dirty Works in order to focus on his act – which would then lead him to festivals all around the world to play in front of tens of thousands and represent our scene worldwide.

For anyone who wants to find out about his personal views and feelings on the scene, the meaning of his tattoos, his relationship with his daughter and family as a whole, and many other quirks about the man himself, the Legends documentary about Coone is a great watch from start to finish. We cannot wait to see what Q-Dance has up next in this (hopefully) series.


Q-Dance Legends: Coone

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