Marlon Hoffstadt

Marlon Hoffstadt is a Berlin DJ, producer and promoter whose career has moved through several phases of European club music without settling into a single label. He began releasing music in the early 2010s, initially around house and tech house, before expanding towards trance, hard house, eurodance and melodic techno. That evolution explains his current profile better than any fixed category: his sets combine rave pianos, pronounced basslines, trance melodies and deliberately direct energy.

His discography mirrors that path. In his early years he released on labels including WellDone! Music, Stil vor Talent, Rawax and Ransom Note Records, while also working with HRRSN and Dansson. He later founded Retrograde and, in 2017, Midnight Themes, the label through which he released much of his own music and the 2020 album Planet Love. The catalogue from that period moves through house, breaks, electro and club references less obvious than the sound for which he would later become widely known.

The DJ Daddy Trance alias opened a new cycle. Hoffstadt began bringing back elements of late-1990s and early-2000s trance — highly recognisable leads, immediate vocals, fast builds and structures designed for large dancefloors — and placing them within a contemporary hard-house and rave context. Tracks such as I Got You accelerated that shift, while his connection with Club Heart Broken, developed together with MALUGI, helped consolidate a community around the sound. In recent years he has also released through Capitol Records and Columbia/Club Heart Broken, increasing the scale of his catalogue without abandoning the labels he created himself.

Alongside production, Hoffstadt has built a career as an organiser. Midnight Themes and Club Heart Broken work as extensions of his musical judgement, both on record and through parties. That dimension matters to his recent influence: his work goes beyond a run of singles and has helped reopen space for a faster, more emotional and less self-serious reading of trance and hard house within the European scene.

By 2026 the project is at its most internationally visible stage. His schedule includes festivals and large venues while he continues releasing new material under his own name and as DJ Daddy Trance. Releases such as Breathe, Party People and I Like, alongside the Das Ist Daddy project, belong to a phase where club production, electronic pop and rave aesthetics coexist with little friction.