Andrea Grasselli (ATCG) – From Persistence to Global Tech House Recognition on the Virtual Sessions 9/25/25

Summary

Andrea Grasselli, better known as ATCG, joins from Milan to share how persistence and passion have shaped his career in electronic music. Starting with his unique artist name, derived from being born in 1989 at the close of the 80s, he emphasizes how identity plays a role in connecting with audiences. His path has been fueled by determination, from sending over a thousand demos to Patrick Topping before finally earning a release on Trick, to reimagining Tujamo’s hit Who into an Afro Latin remix that gained official recognition.

 

Andrea reflects on the realities of production, often creating hundreds of demos but selecting only a fraction for release. He highlights the importance of management teams like Origami, who have helped him align with the right labels at the right moments. His cover of Rihanna’s Don’t Stop the Music stands as a career milestone, reaching number one on BeatForce after initially being intended only as a VIP remix.

 

Balancing music with personal passions, Andrea speaks about late-night production sessions, staying grounded with football and motorcycling, and overcoming creative blocks by exploring other genres. He shares candid stories of hearing his music unexpectedly in restaurants, managing the highs and lows of festival performances, and decompressing from the adrenaline of live shows.

 

Andrea’s advice for upcoming artists is simple yet powerful: consistency outweighs raw talent. With residencies across Milan, Bergamo, and Cremona, and upcoming performances at ADE, he continues to carve out his place in the global tech house community while keeping his creative roots and Italian pride at the center of his journey.

 

Topics

0:06 – Origins of ATCG name and identity
3:19 – Official remix for Tujamo and recognition from Patrick Topping
6:50 – The process of producing 100 demos and refining releases
9:09 – Partnership with Origami and importance of music management
11:49 – Rihanna cover success and reaching number one on BeatForce
16:14 – Hearing his track in unexpected places with family
18:55 – Late-night production routines and balancing fitness
20:24 – Overcoming creative blocks with motorcycles and genre shifts
25:52 – Upcoming gigs, residencies, and ADE performance
36:25 – Meeting Laidback Luke and mentorship inspirations

Connect with Andrea Grasselli (ATCG)

Instagram: @andrea_grasselli_atcg_dj

[Darran]
Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the DJ Sessions Presents the Virtual Sessions. I’m your host Darran, and right now I’m sitting in the virtual studios in Seattle, Washington, and coming in all the way from Milan, Italy, we have none other than Andrea Grasselli, also known as A-T-C-G, in the studios with us today. Andrea, how’s it going today?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Hi Darran, hi everybody. Yeah, very, very well here in Milan. It’s a little bit cold these days, summer over, and it’s nice, it’s nice.

[Darran]
You know, I got to make it over to Italy, and we were talking a little bit about this pre-show that I do plan to spend a little bit more time over there in Europe next year. I definitely want to get one of those Eurail passes and kind of see everything. I do plan to be on site in Berlin a lot, but definitely making it to Amsterdam, Barcelona, and Ibiza finally, but definitely want to make it down that route.

Maybe a partnership with Origami, we’ll talk about that in the interview. But you know, you have some, jumping right into the interview here, you have some new releases, next releases that are coming out and working with Origami. Talk to our DJ Sessions fans about that, but right before that, I just remembered, I got to ask you, what does the ATCG stand for?

[Andrea Grasselli]
So, I was born on the 28th of December in 1989. So, I was searching, I was finding something that can underscore, can elevate this kind of date, you know. I was born at the end of the 80s, of the 89, so I chose this nickname that stands for 80s siege.

It’s like a siege of the 80s, because I want to take the people, I want to know that I was born at the end of the 80s, so that’s the real name.

[Darran]
Nice. You know, it’s always interesting to find out the thought behind somebody’s name when they create and put it out there. You know, I don’t know how, where the DJ Sessions came out of my mind, you know, 16 years ago.

I was like, I’m going to do this, all I had was a series called ITV Nightlife, which was a broadcast show. And then I’m like, okay, well, why don’t I have these DJs come and play and stream live? What are we going to call this?

I’m like, well, they’re coming by and it’s called a Session. And there’s DJs. And why not call it the DJ Sessions?

Okay, cool. That’s how it came about. So it’s always interesting to get the history and stuff behind that.

But you have released, you do releases, you do podcast series, and more and shows, we’re gonna talk all about that. But what’s your current release that you have that you just put out right now?

[Andrea Grasselli]
This summer for me was a very important summer for my music, because I made an official remix for Tujamo for his greatest hit, Who. I made an edit, an Afro Latin edit of his hit. First, I put the edit on SoundCloud for free download.

I put some videos on socials, like TikTok, Instagram, of me playing my edit. And a lot of people tagged Tujamo under my reels. And one day he answered me like, bro, this is awesome.

We can make it as an official remix. And I was like, wow, it’s amazing. The other one was an official one with Patrick Topping’s label, Trick.

And I made the release in August on Patrick Topping’s official label. Also, this one was for me, it’s like a very special goal for me, because I sent over like a thousand demos to him during these years, and always declined. This time I had these demos that I was not pretty sure to send this to him, because it was not 100% sound.

But I was in the studio with my friends, and they told me, man, send it over, because I think maybe sometimes he plays this kind of music. And then I sent it over to him. And the day after, I was on a plane with my wife, because I was on honeymoon.

When we arrived at the airport, I turned on my iPhone, and the first notification on the iPhone was that Patrick Topping tagged me in a post playing my tune at Haidiza. And Patrick Topping wrote me, yo, bro, your demo is a banger, it’s available, let’s make it on my label. I was like, it’s happening, oh my God.

So this summer was very, very, very important for my music and my career also.

[Darran]
Yeah, that’s an honor when somebody gets back to you and definitely picks it up. I mean, I love it all the time when people tag me in interviews, or they’ll see something, and they’ll share something, they’ll reshare something online, and it’s like, whoa, I didn’t know you read that. Or somebody chimes in and makes a comment on something like, you follow my post?

Thank you. It’s fun stuff to have happen. So congratulations on that.

Thank you. How many tracks do you actually produce a month, and how many get released?

[Andrea Grasselli]
It depends. Depends from periods. Maybe I have in two months, maybe in two months I produce like 100 tracks, and maybe the two months from 10 to 5 tracks.

It depends from periods of the year that I get inspired a lot. Maybe from some vocals I received from singers, and there are periods that maybe I’m not too much inspired. But I think that if I produce maybe I say 100 demos, maybe only 10 are released.

[Darran]
Wow. I mean, do you think that’s kind of standard? Do you think about 10% of what people create actually makes it out there?

[Andrea Grasselli]
I think so, because I heard also a lot of my friends that are producers, not only for house music or electronic music, also maybe they produce like pop, trap, that also in this world, in their world, they produce like a lot of demos, a lot of maybe tracks that they never released, because maybe they cannot find the singer, they cannot find the label. So, I think it’s a problem of a lot of producers in every single genre.

[Darran]
Yeah, absolutely. And with the barrier to entry of now music creation, music distribution being anyone can throw stuff out there. You don’t even need to really go through a label just to put stuff out there.

Obviously, you want the strength of a label to help promote, to help market, to be there. And where are you releasing most of your tracks? Where do they get released on?

Do you have your own label? Are you working with other labels when you’re pushing these 10 tracks out or so per month?

[Andrea Grasselli]
I am a lucky man in this kind of question, because I met Origami three years ago. They are working for me for this kind of problem, because the problem, I think, for us, for producers, is finding the right label at the right moment of your career and at the right moment of the career of the label. So, Origami helped me a lot, a lot finding the right label for my music.

So, I think having a music management like them is very, very important in this period of the market of the music industry.

[Darran]
Yeah, I’ve heard that before. It all has to kind of fit together at the right place at the right time to make things happen. Doing this, I’ve been doing for years.

I literally, five months ago, came off of an eight and a half month hiatus where I just didn’t do anything front-facing at all. And even in the last three, four months, there have just been more things that have fallen into place. Taking that break, even though I was doing back and stuff, but now things are just falling into place.

I mean, the outreach, the vigor, the mindset is just much more there. I’m much more dialed in and directed. Not like I wasn’t before, but I know if I was here, I know that I’m here now and I’m going in the right direction where it may have taken a long time going this way.

Now it’s like, nope, we’re going this way. Especially partnering and working with Origami and the artists and yourself. We’re super excited to be doing some stuff there, which we’ll talk about later in the interview.

Out of all the productions that you’ve done, and I don’t want to talk, if you’re making a hundred in two months, that’s a lot of productions, but the ones that have been released so far, is there one that really stands out to you the most that’s like, that was the one that always like, I love that track for some reason. I know they’re like babies. I know they’re like children.

I know you put them out in the world. And if anyone ever asked me what my favorite episode of the DJ sessions was, I’d say every single one. But is there one that really stands out to you the most and why it would stand out to you the most?

[Andrea Grasselli]
I think two years ago, I made a track, a cover track of Rihanna Don’t Stop The Music. But, you know, I started doing this as a remix, an official remix, you know. But Origami told me, man, this is a banger.

This is a banger. We have to make it official in covering the vocals. And we have to make it official because it’s a banger.

And in this period, there are no versions in this kind of genre out there. So we can make it, we have to make it as an original. And I told them, OK, but I don’t know if people, other DJs will love this production because, you know, I produce it.

I produce it as an official remix, as an edit, you know, to play it maybe in some DJ sets, like a VIP version of Don’t Stop The Music. Then we put this track out and I was like, OK, let’s see what can happen with this vocal. You know, when you cover a track, it gets more hype than an original one because maybe the vocal, you already know the vocal.

But in two weeks, we get number one on BeatForce. Nice. And I was like, wow, they were right.

Origami was right. So I think this one, it’s like one. It’s my it’s my favorite track because it gets number one and number one for a week.

Something like I was yeah. And not how to say how to say it was it was produced like an official remix and see it on BeatForce number one. I was like, wow, it’s happening.

I was like very, very surprised. So this track for me was very, very important for my career.

[Darran]
Yeah, you know, it sounds like you and Origami have a really good relationship there and they know what’s the pulse of things. That’s why I was typing a note over here going, I got to make sure I reconnect. I’m already talking to them on the back end stuff for stuff we’ll talk about in a minute here.

But I’m like, sounds like this could be a really good connection in the future. People should be focusing on Origami, like subscribe to them, follow them, know what’s going on with everything that’s releasing. They give us a really good ear there.

Who do you work with primarily over at Origami?

[Andrea Grasselli]
With Leandro da Silva, it’s like it’s like my mentor. So because it’s not also a manager, you know, but if I send to Leandro a demo, he can tell me also what to change. Maybe the drums are not not OK in this way.

Maybe try to make the drums sound a little bit different because, you know, maybe in the American market, they can they can have a lot of impact in this way. So it’s like music management, but also producing management. So I think this kind of this double team can make our strength.

[Darran]
You know, I just did an interview with Leandro just recently, too. So super excited to have him on the show again. It’s been a while.

So awesome. It’s always good to have mentors and people kind of, you know, backing you up and supporting you in that way rather than just here’s my track and the label doesn’t give any support or guidance or like, OK, we put it up unless they just have that good working relationship. They know they just trust the artist.

Where’s the weirdest place or moment that you’ve ever heard one of your own tracks play?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Oh, my God. Yeah, I was with my with my parents in a restaurant here, not in Milan, but I was like in the south of Italy on vacation, on a holiday. We were like in the restaurant eating our pizza.

And I think it was like the cows playlist on the restaurant. And and then my song started to play and I was like, oh, my God, it’s my song. And my mom and my dad were like, oh, my God, it’s a song.

Because they were very surprised to hear my song. Not in my hometown, you know, it’s like a strange, strange, but sweet moment for my parents.

[Darran]
Is that is that, you know, do your parents frequently listen to your music? Do you send it to them and let them check it out or?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah, of course. You know, as as Italians, our mom and our dad for us, the family, the family is very it’s a very important part of our life and of our career.

[Darran]
So, of course, did you come from a musical family background or how what what gives you the inspiration to to do all of this? I just wake up one day and say, oh, I want to start making music. And or how what gives you inspiration to do all this?

Where did it come from?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Well, my family, nobody, nobody was was a musician. OK, I don’t know where does my my passion come from. My father was a football player.

And so I really don’t I really don’t know where my passion, my passion comes from. Maybe some my my grandpa or the father of my grandpa. I don’t know.

I don’t know if somebody was a musician. So I really don’t know.

[Darran]
Well, you got it somewhere. You got it from somewhere. Somebody’s going to take credit for it.

Yeah, exactly.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Exactly.

[Darran]
You know, producing music obviously is synonymous with spending a lot of time sitting down at the desk, sitting at your computer, you know, sculpting your beats, making your tracks. Where do you find free time in your life to stay fit?

[Andrea Grasselli]
You know, I think that producing. Yeah. How to say how to say I produce during the night because I don’t know why.

But after dinner, it’s the perfect time to produce because, you know, I don’t have a lot of pressure because maybe I I’ve done all of my homework, all of my stuff during the day. So after dinner, it’s the time of the day that I have a free free mind to to take my my laptop and and produce staying staying fit. Yeah, I I play football.

I go to the gym during during the day, maybe in the morning or in the afternoon. So my my time is after lunch.

[Darran]
Nice. And what happens when you hit like a creation block or do you ever get fed up with making and playing music? And what do you do to deal with that?

Do you have a mantra or something that you go to that says, OK, I’m too overwhelmed. I need to take a break. Do you have a go to kind of meditating or working out or something you go to to kind of get back into the game?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Oh, yes. I have a two two kind of of me that I am a very passionate motorcyclist. So I took I take my my motor and I I make like a hundred, two hundred kilometers so I can really focus maybe not on my on my block, you know.

Then the other one is listening to other genres of music. Maybe I’m stuck in a house in the house trying to make new beats, new music, maybe to be stuck in one genre, maybe can create a block on the artist. No.

When I have this this kind of block, I listen to maybe pop or maybe some older Italian music just to just to take my my mind in another dimension, you know.

[Darran]
Definitely. You know, it can happen. It happens.

It happens to me sometimes I have to have a set schedule and I, you know, I’m at I’m I’m up at seven a.m. or at the computer at the desk at seven a.m. and I stop at five. If I go further than that, it’s like overkill. I’ll just put it on my list to do tomorrow.

I have my to do list. If I don’t have my to do list, I’d be all over the place. But, you know, you got to kind of keep a regimen or something to break break the monotony of all this, especially when you hit a block.

I’ve had several times I’ve been working on a project and I might be spending three hours on doing something. And then I’m just I realize I just stop, walk away. I come back tomorrow or maybe the next day or it’s on my to do list.

A week later, I touch it and I go, I figured it out in 30 seconds. OK, move on.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah, maybe maybe what was it wasn’t the right time to do this kind of beat of music.

[Darran]
Yeah, that happens all the time. Is there something, though, that you could say to new and up and coming producers to watch out for when it comes to making their career successful, like a good piece of advice to, you know, other than staying fit or having a mental takeaway? Is there any piece of advice out there you give to an up and coming artist that you think would be good for them to know?

[Andrea Grasselli]
I think consistency, to be consistent on making music, always beat talent. In this period, in 2025, I think that if you if you if you take your time and you have to be consistent of of what you are doing, OK, you see a lot of a lot of people, big DJs with big numbers, et cetera, et cetera. But I think we are very lucky to live in this kind of period as producers because one song can change your life.

In the 90s, it was not like this. You have to make a big, long career. You have to make a lot of hits to become a big DJ.

So yeah, I think consistency is the biggest advice I can I can I can I can give.

[Darran]
Definitely. It’s one piece of advice that I give to people looking to do if they want to get into live streaming or making a podcast series is definitely being consistent. Pick your day of the week.

Pick your time so people can know your distribution patterns and know, oh, there’s a new thing coming out. Oh, there’s a new thing coming out. Don’t get momentum going and then stop.

People leave. I’ve had it happen several times before where you get something up and running and then all of a sudden you have to rebuild your audience all over again. And while you might be hot and you’re consistent, you know, you’ve got to stay on a schedule and release.

And that’s just a key. I think that’s a really great piece of advice for any artist to be consistent. You don’t have to be shoving so much content out, but just be consistent.

And if you are making so much, say at least once a week, I’m going to do something. And I think that’s also huge for the social media following nowadays as well, at least updating your socials. And you don’t have be fully active and creating viral videos and everything every day.

But at least say once a week, I’m making a social media post. Once a week, I’m talking about this. Once a week, something’s building and your fans are like, oh, okay.

Oh, okay. You know, that’s setting up PR marketing, social media strategy distributions, all the fun stuff and the business stuff that people don’t think about. It’s nice when you’re working with a company that can also help assist that.

Like you’re working with Ordami to help. Okay. I’ve said, but then they’re also pushing as well, you know, and they might have some PR or inroads with other DJs or people that can put it right in the hands to get it playing in clubs.

And then people start doing the Shazamming and going, oh, wow, that’s a project. I love that myself. So you have some gigs coming up.

Can you tell us something about the next shows that you have up and coming?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah, sure. This summer was crazy, crazy for me about gigs because I traveled a lot around Italy and also in Switzerland. I traveled a lot.

I played in some festivals. So this summer was crazy. It was really, really nice.

And in winter, I have a residency here in Milan, in Bergamo and in Cremona. There are cities around here. So I have also scheduled all the winter season from here, from September to May.

And I will be in Amsterdam also in October. So I’m very busy about gigs from here to May. So it’s going to be a great winter.

[Darran]
Yeah, we’re super excited for it. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to make ADE this year. Well, at least it’s not on the radar for this year.

I’ve been a couple of times before. Amsterdam is wonderful. I love the event.

When we go there, I always have a great time. We will be partnering with Origami this year and doing some of those secret sessions and distributing those. We’re super excited for that.

Mom, question is, is Origami, are they, forgive me, I should know this, but are they based out of Milan? Are they based out of Italy? They are based in Rome.

Rome, Rome. Okay. Well, great.

Now I’m going to have to go to Rome next year as well, which is awesome. So we’ll be seeing each other definitely probably in 2026 and super excited for that. But when you get to travel, do you get time to take in and see some of the cultures of these cities or do you just fly in, fly out?

I mean, you’re not too far away. Like me going to New York is a four and a half hour flight. I got to get there.

[Andrea Grasselli]
I got to stay.

[Darran]
Then I got to get around because I’m on the west coast. I should put this. I’m on the west coast of the United States and this is east coast of the United States, the way it looks like on TV.

But if I go over to, if I’m going to ADE or planning to go to Barcelona or Ibiza or Rome next year, or even the UK, I like to go there and take in the food, the sights, the sounds. So it’s kind of a work pleasure trip for me when I go over there. Do you get to do that as well when you’re traveling around and check out the culture and everything?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Totally. Totally. I love to visit other countries.

I love to visit other cultures, but as an Italian, I don’t like to taste other foods. I’m going to be spoiled when I come over there. Come on.

I think Italian food is the best, man. I was in Sri Lanka for holiday. Yeah, it’s good food there, but I don’t know.

UK, the worst one. UK food, the worst one. Spanish, okay.

Okay. I can taste something. I like something.

Spanish paella, fish, okay. It’s okay. But the worst one I taste is UK food.

UK food.

[Darran]
I will say I’ll go over there. I’ll check it out. I’ll get back to you.

We’ll do another show. We’ll do a food show all about it.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah. Yeah.

[Darran]
Yeah, man. You know, when you’re going out and doing shows, do you prefer more large scale events or would you rather do more intimate nightclub events?

[Andrea Grasselli]
It depends. It depends. Here in Milan, we have a lot of small clubs, so I was born as a DJ playing in small clubs.

I know very well this kind of situation. Sometimes going to festival, it’s good for me because it’s a new stage for me. But I was born in a very small situation, about 300, 400 person in small clubs.

Also, when I started DJing, I started in small clubs, so I come from small situation, but I think playing in festival with a lot of people in front of you, it’s a very emotional moment for a DJ.

[Darran]
It can be. You know, I’ve heard about recently, I was talking with some DJs, some producers about the dopamine effect of being on stage and getting that rush of excitement and then preparing mentally for it because two hours later, after you’re done with your set, you could be in the airport or train station on your phone by yourself and you just have this huge to, okay, I got to go to my next gig. And dealing with that dopamine rush can be quite jarring or a big up and a big down, basically.

Does that happen with you when you’re going on a plane? Do you get a nice big adrenaline pump and then, okay, now I got to decompress. I used to, when I would do my shows, the first times I would do my shows, I’d be dancing next to the DJ live streamer for four hours.

And then my girlfriend at the time, she would be like, oh, let’s go out to the clubs. Everyone’s going to the clubs. I go, can I just take a break?

I did aerobics for four hours here at the live show. And I just want to take a break before we go out. So I just want to sit and chill and be like, okay, let’s go.

And now we’re out partying in the night clubs and everything. And because it is a performance. I mean, right now I’m in a performance.

It takes me even time to just come back to reality that I do this naturally. But to some people, this is a hard thing to do is get up in front of a camera, speak to somebody and do everything. And then you walk away like I was just live to thousands of people or hundreds of people online.

And now I got to go back on stage again. Do you have any performance anxiety or performance withdrawals when performing?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Anxiety, not so much, but I’m a little bit shy person. So maybe right before my performance and right after, I need to stay alone a little bit. Just to after before, just to prepare myself for the crowd, for the people and after just to decompress a little bit from the volume of the stage, the volume of the people, the lights, and everything that a club or a festival can show.

So, yes, I need to decompress a little bit after the show.

[Darran]
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, it’s nice always having a green room if you got one, you know, to chill out or hotel room you can go back to. Um, definitely even I have experienced filming events and being up on stage in front of thousands of people is still like, oh, my gosh, what if I trip and fall?

What if I bump the decks or what if something happens, you know, and you just want to be professional while you’re up there, you know, and you’re like, OK, you know, you can get over that stage, right?

[Andrea Grasselli]
But I think that the worst, the worst sensation I tried, it’s when you play maybe one of new demos, OK, and it’s not sounding like you want it to sound. So when I drop a new demo, I play a new demo and I don’t like it. And then I jump, I jump, I jump over the stage.

I’ve got the sensation like, oh, my God, I have to take a look at this demo because I have to fix it now because I played and it’s not sounding well. So I have to fix my demo. Oh, my God.

OK, this one is the worst sensation.

[Darran]
Yeah, no, I can relate a little bit to that, too. I was doing a live stream with a very prominent artist group the other day and in the chat room, somebody started heckling in the chat room, like like making fun of me. And I saw it completely took me.

You can watch the episode almost and watch when I go, OK, is this going to blow up? And I was I was listening to the art, to the interview of them responding. But I’m watching the chat room over here going, is this going to blow up and go boom?

And I was going to try and be there to go in. And that’s why you see me sometimes I’m over here on the keyboard, like I’ll look over and I’ll be typing a little bit just to monitor the chat room a little bit, because that can get out of hand and spiral and make for a bad episode. But something like that happening in the middle of a show, you’re like, and then it can take you out of your game.

And how do you come back at that? Luckily, in my instance, another fan came in and said, hey, this guy isn’t a super fan like you are. Cut him some slack.

You know, he may not know everything about him and has been following and he’s just getting to know him. He’s just interviewing him. Give him a break.

And I kind of felt a little bit. Yes. Thank you, fan, for coming in and saving the day for me.

Yeah. And it got better throughout the rest of the chat room. Everyone started like, this is awesome.

I love this interview. Great questions. And I was like, thank you.

That’s my feedback. You know, being on stage, being at events and doing things, you get to meet a lot of people. And sometimes you meet your idols, your people that are very famous that you’ve got to look up to.

Who’s the most important or inspiring, I say, inspiring person you’ve ever met backstage? And why that person was so such an inspiration to you?

[Andrea Grasselli]
I think Laidback Luke is a Dutch producer and DJ. Because when I when I started DJing, like 15 or maybe 20 years ago, he was the first to make like YouTube tutorials, how to scratch. And he did he make also also now a lot of tricks with the CDJs, with the mixer.

And when I met him like three or four years ago in Amsterdam, I was like, oh, my God, it’s Laidback Luke. And I am a super, super, super fan of him. Because I think, yeah, the DJ also have to choose the right music played in the right time of the night.

But also he made also a lot of crazy tricks with the vinyl, with the CDJ, with the mixer. So I think Laidback Luke was inspiring me a lot for my DJ career. Yeah.

[Darran]
Nice. Yeah, I’ve had over time, I’ve gotten a little desensitized to being a fanboy or super fan like, you know, with some artists. Yeah, there’s a couple out there that I’d be like, okay, this is really cool.

I’m like, yeah, interviewing such and such, you know, and, you know, just you got to kind of, I remember back in the day, when I first started this business, I was working on a hip hop television show. And the guy, the producer of that show was like, who would you really like to meet and see in the industry? I’m like, oh, this rapper, this rapper, this rapper.

And this is in the mid 90s, early mid 90s. You know, and I probably would have been like, oh, my God, I’m meeting Too Short. Oh, gosh, I’m meeting NWA or Dr. Dre and Eazy-E. Oh, wow, this is cool. But, you know, in the industry, you kind of, I find there’s a lot more, they’re not, they’re approachable. People are approachable.

People are nice. They don’t have, at least the bigger name artists or number of artists that I’ve met that are in the industry are very laid back and chill. You know, they’re very humble.

They’re very real people. The ego is gone. You know, they’re very, I mean, sometimes I think they get a little intimidated when I do interviews with them because I’ll be like, like before the show, we’re hanging out.

It’s like, hey, Andrea, you know, it’s going like this. And then they go, lights, camera, action. And it’s five, four, three, welcome back.

And they go, oh, gosh, I didn’t know this was going to be a serious interview. You can see them sit up in their chair and they’re almost intimidated by me. And I’m like, hey, you know, fun stuff there.

But yeah, it’s really cool meeting people behind the stages, you know, and the partnerships or friendships that can be forged. You know, it’s always great to get praise of people saying that was a great interview or that was a great set or you hear them drop your track and you’re backstage like. What?

That’s awesome.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah.

[Darran]
You know what? What? Speaking of meeting people in business backstage and being in the industry, what has been, you’d say, the best business partnership or deal that you’ve ever made that really you could say this took my career from here to here or this?

I remember making this decision that made my career go from here to here. Anything that stands out, really stands out that you could say made that from here to here?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Well, as a DJ here in my hometown, I decided three or four years ago to focus on in the tech house world, in the house tech house world, because, you know, as a resident DJ, I have, you have to play a lot of jams, a lot of jams. You have to play maybe pop, maybe trap, maybe also in commercial clubs. You have to play a lot of music.

I took this decision because I want to build a career as a DJ in this kind of music. So I love this kind of genre of music. I love this.

I love tech house. I love house music. So I decided not to play pop or trap or hip hop anymore because, OK, maybe some tracks are good.

I like some tracks from pop world, some tracks from hip hop. But the feeling that house music give me, it’s more, it’s bigger, it’s bigger emotions, you know. So I decided to focus only in this kind of music direction.

Also as a producer, maybe when I started making beats, when I was younger, I was making maybe hip hop, some hip hop, some also maybe drum and bass, dubstep. But when I decided to focus only in one direction, this step, I think, elevated my career.

[Darran]
You know, yeah, it’s definitely, I have seen some producers, some artists, and they kind of go all over the spectrum and they’re trying to find their place or, you know, they follow the charts. And I’ve talked with a lot of people over the years asking, you know, do you follow the charts and what’s hot? And they usually say, you don’t want to follow what’s hot because by the time you’re there, it’s something going to be something else.

So focus on what you want to focus on, become known for that, and get into that genre, play around and do what you want to do. But if you’re going to be known for a sound, you know, or known for something, focus on that, find the niche in that, find people in your collaborative area that are going to help you focus on that rather than, oh, I want to produce house and I want to produce techno and I want to produce trance and I want to produce dubstep and I want to produce it all because I have access to this library and and beat and nobody can decide who are you, what are you going to do? Break in first somewhere, you know, and maybe form a collective or a group or get in with a group of artists and collaborate with others and then say, okay, I got this other side project over here, you know, let’s go that route. Unless you got a bunch of money and you can do it all and publicize it.

Build it your own, do your own label and push your own stuff out there. But yeah, definitely, folks, I was talking to somebody, a group team yesterday, Science, and they said, you know, one of the things that they rank on Spotify playlists for music is their old stuff that isn’t even stuff they produce anymore, but it’s still highly tracking and puts them in the algorithms in Spotify. And they’re like, we can’t get our new stuff.

It’s there, but it’s not what people are finding this on Spotify. So they listen to us and they go, huh? Or they’re at a concert and they’re playing and people say, let’s go see Science and they go, well, let’s listen to them.

And the first thing that pops up is their older works. And they’re like, well, what do we do? Do we remove that?

Because it’s gotten us millions of downloads or, you know, online or in Spotify. Do we remove that from Spotify and go with this? But now we’re taking ourselves out of that algorithm.

People might not be able to find it. So it’s very interesting at that standpoint, especially when you want to change genres as an artist, you know, and, you know, it’s very interesting. I’m doing that.

So yeah, sticking in and finding your lane that you want to stay in is a good, good, good growing point there. Now you also do a podcast series as well. What’s the name of the podcast series and what’s it all about?

[Andrea Grasselli]
The name of the podcast is Tune Talks. And I made this podcast with my best friend that also he works with me in some clubs as an emcee. He’s an emcee, a presenter.

He has a very strong personality on the stage. But every single weekend on Sunday, we go out. We usually go out to have maybe a dinner with our friends.

And on this dinner, we only talk about what happened in the weekend. What kind of music we played. Oh, this club did this, this DJ did this.

And we thought we have to make a podcast talking about what we played, what we felt playing this kind of music, what happened in the club scene in our hometown, in Italy. And it all started as a like a game, you know, we were having fun with this podcast saying live this kind of experiences we have on the weekend. So it started as a game.

But I don’t know how, I don’t know why. A lot, a lot of people here in Italy started watching us. And a lot of our content on TikTok and Reels went viral, completely viral in Italy.

So it started as a game. But now it’s like one of the most followed podcasts of the club scene in Italy.

[Darran]
Nice. Congratulations on that. You know, now I would take it that this whole podcast is done in Italian, correct?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yeah, yeah.

[Darran]
Do you translate it anywhere for anything? Or is it just all… Not yet.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Not yet. Only in Italian because our audience right now is the club, Italian club scene. So we make it all Italian.

[Darran]
Well, we’ll have to talk about that off show. Yeah, I definitely want to talk with you about that more in the background, see what we can do. Maybe partnering together and doing something together.

Outside of your series, your podcast, and of course, the DJ sessions, what is some a show that you really like watching, say on YouTube or a podcast? Do you subscribe to them? Do you watch other people’s shows?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Yes, but it’s not a show or a podcast about music. What is it? I’m a huge fan of an Italian streamer called SaviUltras, and he streams and plays Call of Duty as a professional player.

I love… I don’t know why, but I love watching this guy kill everyone in this game, Call of Duty. And he’s a very, very, very, very famous player in Italy.

And also in Europe, he won a lot of titles here in Italy and Europe as a Call of Duty player. And I don’t know, maybe it’s some relaxing time for me watching this guy play Call of Duty, and I’m a huge, huge fan.

[Darran]
Yeah, I mean, video game sports, I mean, I can see it’s already happening that there’s, I guarantee you, there’s going to be something as big, not necessarily as the Olympics, where they build a stadium for it, maybe, okay, 20 years in the future. But it’s definitely taking that route where you’re going to have the video game Olympics. I can see that, and they’re going to have multiple things going on, different competitions, the countries coming in.

It’s already happening with the different games setting up, but I don’t think there’s one huge conglomerate. I mean, in our own backyard, we had an exposition or a convention called PAX, Penny Arcade Exchange. It started here in Seattle because we had Microsoft with Xbox, we have Nintendo in our backyard.

Literally, I can almost see their headquarters from where I live. But it started here in Seattle. It became really big.

They did PAX East in Boston. Now they have PAX U, PAX Australia. And this is where all the video games get released.

There’s more stuff that happens there. But a lot of that stuff surrounds PAX, and it’s just very awesome seeing the video game world. Me being a video game kid growing up, I don’t have much time to play them anymore.

I’m more of a strategy type game player. First-person shooters are great. But yeah, it’s really awesome seeing that take off.

And yeah, a lot of people, some people don’t get it. Some people don’t get watching. I got a friend of mine who’s in his late 50s, mid-late 50s.

He’s like, my husband watches this, and I don’t get it. I don’t get why. I wouldn’t want to watch video games all day long.

I’m like, okay, yeah, there’s content. Especially if the player’s good. Sometimes you can watch some of these players, and you might be watching for two hours, and nothing’s happening.

And so you got to understand if you’re performing, it’s just like a regular show. You got to be doing some cool stuff or be good and great. And when they are, they get picked up.

And yeah, he’s on YouTube or on Twitch, probably making a nice little paycheck too if he’s having thousands of people watch. I just did some numbers recently, just as a performing artist. If they had so many bits being given to them per show, if they had so many subscribers per month at just the $5 level or the $25 level, how much they could be making per year.

And on just rough numbers that I could calculate on one stream, or maybe about half a million a year without breaking a sweat. Depending on what their cuts are with Twitch, because they take a little bit.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Of course, American streamers, maybe it’s different from only Italian streamer. American streamer, I think they are being watched by a lot of people around the world. So it’s completely different income.

Yeah.

[Darran]
Yeah. It’s very interesting that realm. And I mean, I was doing live streaming DJ shows 10 years before it became the hit.

Obviously, we had this thing called the pandemic that put everyone online. And people thought I was crazy because they’d come and say, who would want to watch a DJ live streaming? And I would say, well, have you ever listened to a radio show before?

You listen to a DJ playing, you don’t have to sit there and look at the screen the whole time. But you’re putting it on, you can interact with them, you can be in a chat room, you can see them, they can give shout outs, you know, there’s that interactivity that you can do that I thought was so much more than just a podcast series or a broadcast television show, where you couldn’t interact with the show. You know, you couldn’t interact with the viewer, you could say something later on in the chat room, but it wasn’t live when the show was going.

I mean, I guess you could, we set up some chips and tricks back in the day to do that. But now live streaming is such a phenomenon. I think it’s here to stay.

I’m always usually 10 years ahead of the game. We can’t wait to see what’s going to happen in the virtual reality world or the augmented reality world, you know, things coming out. It’s not there yet, but we have a VR nightclub, we’re ready for it.

And when AR comes out, I’m already looking at setting up augmented reality nightclub environments out and go to a park. You have a whole nightclub, like put on your glasses and you’re transformed. Yeah.

I think that’s going to be something that’s really awesome as the technology gets better, probably about five years. I don’t think it’ll be 10 years out, but cool stuff there. So after all this, Andrea, when you’re done taking a break from all of this stuff, podcasting, traveling, shows, music production, what do you enjoy doing the most outside of all this?

[Andrea Grasselli]
As I told you, I’m really a passionate motorcyclist. I have my BMW. I’m very proud of my little baby motorcycle.

And I really love, love to take my motorcycle and make long trips with my wife or with my friends. But when I have also maybe one hour of free time, I take my motorcycle and go around.

[Darran]
That’s the one. Yeah. I bet you, I mean, I haven’t been to Milan before, but I can just imagine it’d be a city that you definitely have a great time driving and riding around in.

Yeah. Maybe I have to do the whole moped thing when I get over there. I won’t have a motorcycle, but at least a moped to get around and check it out.

That’d be really cool. Is there anything else you want to let our DJ Sessions fans know before we let you go?

[Andrea Grasselli]
Well, a lot of music are coming out. In October, I will make a release of an official remix of Leandro Da Silva’s hit, Gimme Mami. It will be out on the 25th of October.

And I will write my next gigs on my Instagram. So if anyone is interested to see my shows, where I’m going to play, or if somebody wants to listen to my music, they can take a look on my Instagram, or my SoundCloud, or my Spotify.

[Darran]
Definitely. And that’s it right there. The Andrea Grasselli, underscore A-T-C-G-D-J.

Exactly. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show today.

I know we’re going to be following up with you and what’s going on, especially looking forward to getting that mix from you from ADE, if you’re playing that secret show with Origami, and getting some of your tracks up on our site here in the near future. Andrea, thank you so much for coming on the DJ Sessions today.

[Andrea Grasselli]
Thank you. Thank you, Darran. Thank you.

Thank you, guys.

[Darran]
You’re welcome. On that note, don’t forget to go to our website, thedjsessions.com. Check us out there.

Over 700 news stories published every month. Over 2,700 plus past episodes. Live interviews just like this one you’re watching right now.

Exclusive mixes. Our VR nightclub, check it out. We got our new mobile app, version 2.0, coming out. Our new music section here. We have a radio station in the works, in the launch, in the back end. There’s going to be so much more, and that, and our social, so you can help follow along with us, and help get us bumped up out there, and discover new artists like ATCG, Andrea Grasselli, on the DJ Sessions, and all and more at thedjsessions.com.

I’m your host, Darran, coming to you from the virtual studios in Seattle, Washington. That’s Andrea Grasselli, ATCG, coming in from Milan, Italy, for the DJ Sessions. And remember, on the DJ Sessions, the music never stops.