Beyond the Beat: Matt Steffanina on Music, Movement & Moments – The DJ Sessions Virtual Sessions 8/5/25

The DJ Sessions: Virtual Sessions with Matt Steffanina

Host: Darran Bruce
Guest: Matt Steffanina
Location: Virtual Studios, Seattle WA & Miami FL
Series: The DJ Sessions – Virtual Sessions

Overview:

In this dynamic episode of The DJ Sessions Virtual Sessions, host Darran Bruce catches up with multi-talented artist Matt Steffanina, whose creative journey spans DJing, producing, and choreography. Broadcasting from Miami, Matt shares recent highlights from a whirlwind tour that included Tomorrowland, shows across Asia and Germany, and immersive performances with digital avatars.

 

The conversation dives into the contrasts between global mega-festivals like EDC and Tomorrowland, with Matt reflecting on the pure, immersive energy of music-centric crowds. He discusses the emotional roots behind his melodic house release “Love Where We Are,” and how he’s embraced a return to uplifting, vocal-driven production after a stint in tech house.

 

Throughout the chat, Matt offers genuine insights into the realities of balancing music production, choreography, and global touring. He opens up about his breakthrough moment—having Armin van Buuren unexpectedly open a set with his track—and emphasizes the value of collaborations and the power of believing in your own work.

 

From discussing the fading “no-phones-on-the-dancefloor” rave culture to creating accessible online dance instruction through DNCR.com, this episode highlights Matt’s grounded approach to artistry, brand-building, and content creation. Whether you’re an aspiring producer, dancer, or festival lover, this episode is packed with captivating, inspiring moments and firsthand wisdom.

 

Topics Covered:

Global Touring & Festival Reflections:
Matt shares his whirlwind international schedule, highlights from Tomorrowland, and contrasts the crowd energy and cultural vibes between major festivals like EDC Vegas and Tomorrowland Belgium.

Melodic House & “Love Where We Are”:
A dive into the creation and inspiration behind his latest release on Night Drive, capturing the feel-good melodic energy of early rave memories.

Phone-Free Rave Culture:
The two discuss the impact of mobile phones on dancefloor energy, European club policies, and the nostalgia of fully present, immersive music experiences.

Armin van Buuren’s Surprise Set Feature:
Matt recounts the surreal moment Armin opened his livestream with Matt’s track – a milestone affirming years of dedication to his craft.

Collaboration Over Isolation:
He reflects on post-COVID creativity, the joy of working with artists like Martin Jensen and Zach Martino, and the importance of letting go of creative control in collabs.

Choreography Roots & Dance Workshops:
From roller rinks in Germany to LA studios, Matt’s love for live dance education comes through. He shares stories of teaching both pros and first-timers, and how that passion connects to his music.

Interactive Performance & Motion-Capture Visuals:
Matt reveals how he’s experimenting with motion capture and digital avatars in live DJ sets – creating interactive and visually unique performance art.

DNCR.com & Online Education:
He talks about launching DNCR.com, an online dance platform built to teach choreography remotely and inclusively.

Mad Chill Clothing Line:
Matt introduces his athleisure brand Mad Chill, blending comfort and mindfulness, including design details like “inhale” and “exhale” stitched into sleeves.

Artist Development & Brand Advice:
From managing fan submissions to the evolving role of merch and brand-building, Matt offers real talk on what it takes to succeed as an artist today.

Content Creation Wins:
He shares how a basic dance video unexpectedly reached 80M views – a lesson in vulnerability, experimentation, and removing ego from creativity.

Balancing Burnout & Inspiration:
A raw look at work-life balance, chasing momentum, and recognizing when to pause and reset.

Special Features:

• Matt’s mocap-driven avatar experience for live sets
• Upcoming releases and collaborations with Night Drive
• Backstory behind his breakout track “I Need You”
• Reflections on DJ culture’s accessibility and authenticity
• Dream casting of Brad Pitt (from Troy) to play Matt in a biopic

Call to Action:

Follow Matt Steffanina:

• Instagram: @mattsteffanina
• Website: dncr.com
• Music & Merch: Search “Matt Steffanina” on all major platforms

Discover more episodes:
Catch exclusive interviews, live DJ sets, and immersive experiences at thedjsessions.com

Closing Thought:

“You can’t recreate magic. When the moment hits, it hits – and that’s why we keep chasing it.” – Matt Steffanina

[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 from, where are you coming in from that today? Oh no, hang on a second here.

I don’t have any audio for you right now. Somehow, there we go.

[Matt Steffanina]
Good to be back. I’m coming from Miami. I go between LA and Miami, but in Miami today.

[Darran]
Nice, nice. Miami’s always fun. Been there, actually.

The DJ Sessions, the actual conception of the DJ Sessions was born out of Winter Music Conference 2009 is when I came up with the original conception of the DJ Sessions. The rest is history from there, but hopefully the weather’s all awesome and nice out there. A little nice out here in Seattle as well, but good to see you over here.

You’ve been doing some traveling and stuff, and you’ve got some recent shows. Tell our DJ Sessions fans, what has been up to you recently?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, I just got back yesterday, actually, so I’m still a little jet lagged, but I was in Europe for about three weeks or so. Started at Tomorrowland, which I wasn’t playing, but I’ve always wanted to go. Heard amazing things.

It was my first Tomorrowland and it far, far exceeded expectations. I had an amazing time, and then I played a show in Germany. I’ve been playing a lot in Asia recently.

I played a few shows in Singapore and Dubai. Always playing in and out in LA and Miami. It’s been a good amount of DJing recently, but also a lot of traveling and a ton of producing, trying to get a lot of new music ready.

[Darran]
I can understand now what it’s like barely to be on the road and travel internationally after going to ADE twice and going to Germany last year and planning to go to Mexico for Dreamfields later this year. Going to those big festivals and those events, being on one side of the fence as a participant is much different than being on the backside of the fence and being behind the scenes and everything. If you could tell me, what was it like?

Okay, I’m going to ask you this, and I know you’re a stateside guy. If you had to choose between EDC, and I’m not trying to get you in any trouble, EDC or Tomorrowland, which one would you choose?

[Matt Steffanina]
The age old debate. Okay. I’ll give you a couple of pros and cons for each.

[Darran]
The one thing that I- Wait, before you do that, I’ve been to EDC Vegas. I have not been to Tomorrowland.

[Matt Steffanina]
So you’re selling me on this, by the way. I’ll tell you the biggest difference. I’ll tell you the biggest difference.

Because EDC is right next to Vegas, and I’ve been to EDC 10 times. It’s my favorite festival. I played it a few times.

It’s right next to Las Vegas. So you have so many different types of people. You have people that are coming to party, you have people that are hardcore ravers, celebrities, everything in between.

And that means that it’s really exciting, but it definitely is a different kind of experience. Whereas I felt like when I was at Tomorrowland, it was a hundred percent people that are there for the music. Because what I didn’t realize is it’s not in Brussels, Belgium.

It’s in a town, another 30, 40 minutes out of the way. It’s not easy to get to. So there’s not a lot of tables and access the way that there is necessarily at EDC.

So it feels a little bit more like a throwback rave. The energy is really great. Production is incredible.

But I think more than anything, what I loved about it is I just saw so many people being present and really just like no phones, just having fun dancing. The energy was absolutely incredible. Plus Swedish House Mafia played a three-hour set on a side stage, not even on the main stage.

And it was probably one of the best sets I’ve ever seen in my life. So definitely a memorable experience. I think EDC, for different reasons, has its strengths too.

And both of them now are things that I probably will go to every year for way too long past my prime.

[Darran]
Absolutely. It’s definitely an agenda of mine to add more stamps to my passport. Tomorrowland is definitely going to be one of those that I will visit next year.

Super excited. Somebody I’m working with, with Dreamfields this year in Mexico, was there on tour and played Jerry De La Villa. I hope I said his name right.

Jerry, don’t kill me if I said your name wrong. But no, Jerry is a good fan of the show and loves what we do. And we’re super excited to be working with him and heard about, yeah, everyone was over in Europe for the last few weeks too, doing their thing.

I’ve never been to a massive like that. I mean, I went to EDC, but it was right after Pandy expired and was opening up. My friend that I went with was like, you can actually see the pavement.

Normally that’s not normal at EDC. So I was like, all right, cool. I’m kind of glad I got to walk around and move around new people there.

But you know, I was at Rave the Planet last year and they were estimated like 350,000 people. I was there with the Riverside Studios crew on their double-decker semi-bus truck and they’d never seen anything that massive before. It was just awesome.

So, you know, definitely the overwhelming experience. But I think when you go you’re a seasoned veteran with this, you kind of go, you know what to expect, you know, you know, to get to the right gates, get to the right places. I’m sure you have a little bit of awesome access, cloud, the kitchen.

[Matt Steffanina]
A lot of people can probably relate if you’re in the industry, like you get a little bit jaded in a sense when you play a lot and you also grew up, like I was going to Raves for so many years now. I feel like I’ve seen and done everything in a sense. So I’m always looking for that fresh feeling that you got when you went to your first few Raves or the first big headline festival you went to, where you were like, I can’t believe this place.

Like, you know, we’re always kind of chasing that feeling again. And I hadn’t had it in a minute. Definitely Swedish House at Tomorrowland gave me that.

They also did something really incredible called Symphony of Sound, where they have an orchestra playing top EDM hits with visuals, with a conductor. And they had John Martin, who sang Don’t You Worry Child. He sang Reload.

He had a bunch of big, massive hits. He came out and sang live with the orchestra playing. It was just incredible.

So like, feel like those kind of moments, you can never predict them. You can never recreate them. When they happen, they happen.

And so for me, the trip over to Belgium was well worth it, just for those few moments alone, but the entire festival was incredible.

[Darran]
Absolutely. And speaking of track, that gives me a great segue into, you have a recent release that just came out, Love Where We Are, released on Night Drive. Tell us the inspiration behind that.

What was, you know, what made that come to fruition?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah. You know, kind of on the tail of what I was just saying of really wanting to feel that sense of joy and inspiration that I felt in my early rave days recently. I’ve been producing a lot more melodic, electro kind of house, as opposed to, you know, I was a little more tech house for a bit over COVID and stuff, and love tech house, love deep house.

But I was really just missing melodies. I was missing uplifting chord progressions and vocals and lyrics that had that feel good kind of vibe behind them. And so going into spring and into summer, I really wanted to have a release that brought me back to that 2017 kind of nostalgic type of feel.

And Brandon, who’s the vocalist on the track, is an incredible singer. He has the exact right emotion and soul in his energy when he sings for the track. And so it was really just a perfect match.

And Night Drive has been incredible to work with. This was my first release. I did one as a collab at the beginning of the year that went really, really well.

And this is my first official one with them. So it was a great match. And the song’s been really well received so far, and people are loving it, which is amazing always to hear.

But yeah, I just wanted to get back to that feel good kind of electronic music.

[Darran]
Awesome. Yeah. When you say get back to that original feeling, I started going out at 18 years old to nightclubs.

I mean, I may not look it, I’m 50, but I was going back in the days in early 90s, when it was still underground, when it was an amazing experience, and then eventually getting on the forefront, getting to the media side of things. But I remember the first rave I went to here in Seattle, it was called Green X and Ham. And I saw my favorite DJ, he’s a Seattle kind of legend DJ, you might know him, Donald Glaude, play.

It was the first DJ I ever saw in an electronic underground music nightclub, but he was up on the decks. And the environment, the vibe was just, there was no click, there was no media, there was no social media, there were no cell phones. I mean, there weren’t cell phones, and we mentioned that earlier.

That’s why I was like, yeah, no phones on the dance floor type thing. You were there and you were into the music. And the DJ was not a central theme of the event.

I remember Donald was up in a balcony section with three, four turntables, still vinyl days, yeah, I remember those, and playing down to the crowd, and the crowd, and the dancers, the participants. I mean, you had multiple genres of people mixing that you kind of would never see come together in this electronic music environment. It was just so amazing.

Yeah, getting back to that would be awesome. I know that the whole debate is, I’ve talked with a number of people about this over the years, when you start seeing this on the dance floor, and then how do you read the crowd when people are like this? And it’s like, when I went to Germany last year, I just actually answered this a few weeks ago on a thread on Meta or something.

And in Germany, they’ll put stickers over your phone, over your cameras. If you get caught filming in the club, you’re 86. And if more nightclubs started to do that, yeah, there might be some backlash in the beginning.

But really, it’s like, hey, we didn’t… Nowadays, they used to say when you go to a concert, no professional photography, no professional, no recording devices. Well, that was back in the day when you had cameras that took film, or you had piece of crap, two megapixel cameras, who cares?

Now you got 20 megapixel cams and recording devices. And it’s like, yeah, I can go down the whole route there.

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, it’s a tough thing, because I was in Europe all summer, and a lot of people say like, oh, what city are you from? And I say LA or Miami. And so many people say like, oh, my God, what’s space Miami like?

And what’s, you know, I saw that so and so was playing, right? So like, even from the other side of the world, completely different scene, because of those social media clips, and those clips on the phones, these DJs have massive careers, the clubs have worldwide names, the festivals are at the biggest that they’ve ever been. So it’s a really tough line to toe, I think that it’s a great thing to have in moderation, I love to occasionally go to a club that’s no phones, because you can’t recreate that, that feeling, it’s just a different energy when everyone is fully present.

But you know, like a lot of DJs and producers, and I started in the dance world, too, like I wouldn’t have the career I have without people taking out their phones, in my, you know, dance workshops, and my DJ sets in the studio and filming and putting things online. So, you know, I equally understand, you know, both sides, but it is it is great when you get a fully present moment to come back to.

[Darran]
Absolutely. And I think that’s what I was trying to get back to is that original rave feeling moment, you know, I go out and I’m at a show and I’m my phone’s away. I mean, I know from a videographer standpoint, it’s gonna look like well, it’s not going to be professionally done, may not look like that, but it’s gonna sound like crap.

And I always say, well, do we? Does anyone ever watch your recording of the fireworks that you recorded for Fourth of July? No.

[Matt Steffanina]
Maybe we’ll draw recordings at the I got one video, actually, that will forever cherish. It’s Swedish at that set I was talking about. And I started like at the audience, I was up on the stage area and just panning and it was like a sea of people.

And, you know, that the guys are on stage and everyone’s just like, and I set up and everyone was commenting, you know, like, all the nostalgia, I feel like I’m there, you know, it’s a rare one. But when you do get one of those, it’s like, it’s great for people to be able to still experience it in some way that they weren’t able to be there, you know, present.

[Darran]
Yeah. And speaking of hearing a song on stage that really moves people like that, and you get that wave that that audience feedback of that, you see that happen. What’s one of the weirdest moments you’ve ever heard one of your own tracks play?

[Matt Steffanina]
Oh, man. I think that probably there was a track, this wasn’t actually live. But one of my favorite experiences of having a track played was Armin van Buren, you know, he has his State of Trance live streams and have been a fan of Armin forever and ever.

And it was maybe about five, six months ago, he was doing one, and I just happened to pull it up and be watching. And I was like, this intro sounds first song, this intro sounds kind of familiar. And he’s like, Oh, yeah, today, you know, we’ve got a new record by Matt Stefania.

And Zach Martino’s my other buddy on the track. And I was like, well, you know, didn’t necessarily nail the name pronunciation. But it’s pretty much the coolest thing ever to have Armin open up one of his streams playing your song.

So pretty surreal moment for me.

[Darran]
Absolutely. You know, I mean, that would be, I can, I would really, I could see that being like a huge honor and a huge, you know, huge, huge success in the feather in the hat, you know, people getting that recognition and like, whoa, that’s, that’s cool. You know, you have some coming some tracks that are coming up too.

Are you allowed to disclose who you’re working with? Or, or what labels you’re working with on that? I know sometimes that stuff can get hush hush and, you know, can’t say who we’re doing anything with the NDAs and all that fun stuff.

[Matt Steffanina]
But yeah, we don’t have we don’t have anything undisclosable at this time. But yeah, I have another release coming up with night drive. We actually have like three or four that we’re working on right now.

So we haven’t fully decided what’s going to be next. But there’ll be something in the next probably two months or so coming. And the last you know, I did a collab with Martin Jensen on the previous one.

I mentioned my buddy Zach Martino, that was a remix that we did together. So we’ve been doing more collabs recently and really finding a lot of joy in it. I think that, you know, the one of the best things about music is, is being able to collab.

And like I said, I mentioned, I came from the dance world initially. And I always loved even, you know, with other choreographers, other dancers creating stuff together. And I feel like during COVID, I was producing pretty much solo for three years, I was just in a studio alone by myself.

And it was great for the music project. It was great for releasing a lot of stuff. But it wasn’t necessarily the most enjoyable time at times, it got a bit, you know, lonely, or sometimes I hit a creative block, and you don’t have those people to just kind of rally behind you or Hey, you try something, I’ll pass it back, you know, and I love that energy and that flow.

And so lately, I’ve been I’ve been leaning a lot more into collabs. And when someone has an idea, and they like, I have this, I’m not sure where to take it, cool, send it over, you know, and that’s kind of how a lot of my tracks recently have been coming around, or vice versa, you know, have an idea, and I just, like, it needs something that your sound can fill, you know, and watching that come together and being able to share a project with someone in that type of way, back and forth, whether it’s in the studios even better, but you know, a lot of us work remote these days, but I love I absolutely love collaborations. And same with vocalists, too, you know, a lot of times I’ll have an idea for the story or the energy of the song, but I’ll fully trust them to just take it and run with it and tell their story in the lyrics.

And I’ve definitely learned over the years to be a little bit less controlling over things and find people that I love and I respect and I admire their work and then give them the space to do what they do.

[Darran]
And how easy is it for somebody if they did want to work on a track with you? I’m not trying to open up the floodgates or anything here, you know, but if you take unsolicited submissions, or is this, is there a vetting process or somebody, a way that people would reach out and say, hey, Matt, I got this track, you know, does it go through a screening process? The reason I ask is we were once, we’re still considering the idea of opening up a label over here at the DJ sessions and working with artists, but then I’m like, okay, now I’m opening up the gateway to everybody submitting me everything in the entire universe.

And it’s like, what do I take? What don’t I take? Who am I to judge?

What is good? What sound? What feel?

What do we want to approach? Because, I mean, if I opened up to all genres, I’d, oh my gosh. And, you know, I got a team.

[Matt Steffanina]
It’s really important to- How do you weed through who you’d want to work with on something like that? Yeah, I mean, I don’t too often just put out like an open call for submissions or anything like that. I do get people that’ll send me stuff, and I try to listen to everything.

I think most of the time it comes from either, if it’s from my side, I hear an artist that I really love their stuff, and I feel like there’s a good fit, or a vocalist, you know. And a lot of times I just literally Instagram DM singers, and I’m like, hey, I love your sound. You know, here’s a couple things that I did that I feel like fit.

Let me know if you vibe with it. And that’s how my biggest track to date was Goodbye. It was with this singer named Ciara, incredible writer, incredible singer.

And I found her stuff, my friend knew her, and I was like, yo, can you put in a good word? And, you know, a month later we had a song out. So sometimes it works really quickly in that way.

And, you know, it’s the same thing when people message me. I always ask them for some of their stuff that’s currently out. I think it’s really important that, you know, there’s a little bit of momentum, not necessarily in the sense of like, oh, you have to have big numbers or big following or whatever.

But like, they’ve been putting some things out, and they kind of understand the space, and they understand what goes into a release. Because a lot of times people reach out, and they’re like, I haven’t released anything yet. And I’m like, all right, what’s your sound cloud?

And they’re like, well, I’m holding off on that. And I’m like, all right, get the wheels in motion, you know, because it’s really good to get those reps in. And I think what I underestimated a lot, and I’m still learning this, but just is what goes into not only actually doing a real release properly, but also what goes into promoting that song after it’s out.

And it’s not just like, oh, for a few weeks up to it, we hype it up, and then we play it out at shows, and we do a couple things, and then it’s done. It’s like, you know, in my case, I’m trying to limit to maybe like four to max five or six songs a year. So you know, that’s one every two to three months.

So from four weeks previous to two months, post release, like that’s all I’m focused on really, and you know, still promote old songs and tease new ones and stuff. But like, it’s really my mindset now as opposed to two, three years ago, where I was like, I just want to release something every two weeks. Now I’m really thinking about does this make sense?

Is my audience gonna love it? Am I gonna be able to play this out? Is this something that I’m really, really excited about?

So I’m being a lot pickier now. And that way I can put more energy behind each release, which has been for me a little bit more fulfilling than just produce, release, produce, release. It was fun for a minute, but it got exhausting, honestly.

[Darran]
Yeah, you know, I mean, that’s a lot. It’s interesting that I think people are getting a little bit more sense of that, what it takes to produce a track or what it means to be an artist with the advent of social media, behind the scenes footage, in the studio footage. And it’s not just, oh, I can make a song too.

I can pick up Ableton. It’s not just that simple because you just, like you said, at the aftermath of creating something is the distribution and getting out there and promoting it and getting it in the right hands. You know, I’ve had a lot of people over the years, just had this conversation recently with somebody saying the barrier to entry to DJing is almost nil now.

You know, a six-year-old can get up and get virtual DJ or their dad, their parents can invest in some gear for them. They can get access to all the tracks. It’s no more vinyl or going to the record store.

There’s a limited press of those songs and tracks. And same with video production. I mean, you could say YouTube kind of, I was a broadcast television guy before this.

And then, you know, it was, we were FCC approved on 13 stations with eight separate television shows. And then YouTube came out. And now it’s like, everyone can be a producer, you know, and everyone’s like, whoa, okay, cool.

But are you broadcast worthy? Just because you can throw stuff up online doesn’t mean you’re there. It’s a great stepping stone, a great point to work towards.

And there’s a lot of knowledge and resources out there for people to do that. But yeah, you got to kind of come with the package deal if you want to play the game. And that takes time and money.

And a lot of people don’t see that behind the camera, blood, sweat, and tears that it takes to make stuff happen. You know, if you had to pick one of your productions, always a tough question. I know, because people ask me almost a similar question all the time, but I’m gonna ask you that.

If you had to pick one of your productions as your most favorite one, which one would that be? And is there a thought behind why it would be your most favorite?

[Matt Steffanina]
Honestly, I would say the very first one I released is a song called I Need You. I put it out in 2020, right at the start of COVID. I had been, I mentioned dance earlier, but I was a choreographer for about 10 years.

So I was always producing in the background, I DJ here and there, but I was touring with dance, I was working with artists, I never had the time to really sit down and take it seriously. And so when COVID hit, I was like, Okay, this is a sign, this is my opportunity. And I started producing, but I didn’t have the courage really to put music out.

I was kind of like, I’m a bedroom producer. And I don’t want to blast this out. And, you know, I’m just not ready for the backlash.

I’m not there, I’m not where I need to be. And so I probably made, you know, like a lot of DJ producers, you make 100 songs to find one that you’re like, this one’s okay. You know, some of those were so hard on ourselves.

And I remember sending the song I Need You, I sent it to my buddy, Justin Blau, who’s like, an incredible DJ producer, literally everything you could talk about in music, he’s A list at. And I was like, bro, I just want to get your opinion on this. And he’s like, just put it out.

And I was like, What do you mean? He’s like, it’s good. It’s done.

It’s good. Like, you know, master it a little bit like a couple cleanup things like it’s done, put it out. And I was like, Really?

Like, okay, well, if he says it, you know, I’m gonna, I’m gonna trust him. And I put it out. Yeah, I did a little music video for it on YouTube and a couple couple things and expected nothing and ended up getting picked up by some playlist.

I think it’s like a couple million streams or something with no label, no nothing, you know, me just putting it out. And I think that the reason that that one really stands out is because that was the turning point in my mind where I wasn’t able to see it myself, but I went to like, I realized like, okay, I, you know, I have put in the work I’ve been producing for years I’ve been, I went to icon and learned how to produce properly went to the school, I really did everything I wanted to really understand it. But I was just being hard on myself.

And that that one small gesture from Justin gave me that the vote of confidence, like, okay, I was I was there. And then after that, every release from there, I made a song, if I felt it, I just I put it out. I really took his advice to heart.

And I think that’s one of the most important things as a creative is that belief in yourself. And sometimes having someone else give you a little pat on the back is, is what can help you get over the edge. You know,

[Darran]
I’ll give a shout out to Jack and the team over there that did arrange this interview, you know, it’s always, I kind of took an eight and a half month hiatus from last year off, but coming back into the mix of everything, you know, having that support you just mentioned, of people just even saying, it’s good, you’re back, oh, my gosh, we got so much for you is kind of that motivation that can definitely help pump you and go, okay, I’m back in the swing of things.

So I want to give a shout out to Jack and the crew for arranging this interview. But I can definitely tell you know, you get that inspiration. And it’s just that one pebble that turns into a landslide that goes down.

It’s like, whoa, you know, it gives you that confidence to keep going. So congratulations on that. And definitely having a support team in the background that supports you and motivate you to keep doing things.

You know, you did talk about the producing the tracks, you did mention a hint. And I always love it when guests do this on my show, because I never send the questions in advance. You don’t know what’s coming up.

I like it like that. But you spoke about dance. And you know, I know music obviously is a part of your career now.

But it’s also a central theme to your dancing and choreographing career. I saw a really awesome video recently, your workshop series that you do. I believe it was a video from was it New York you were in recently, and did something there or one from Germany if it was it was a few days ago, could have been it was just a few days ago.

Yeah, it popped up. I thought it was New York. But maybe it was Germany.

I think you’re right. It was Germany. That’s what caught my attention.

Can you tell us a little bit about your workshop series and what you do? Because that looks awesome. I might be a little bit out of shape to kind of get involved with those, but I’d love to go see it in person at least, you know, all that.

[Matt Steffanina]
Dance, live dance workshops are one of the most incredible events you could ever go to. And I think if for anyone that loves festivals and the energy that you feel at a show or a rave, it’s very similar in a dance workshop, you know, and I taught recently in Cologne, Germany, that was last week, and had about 300 350 dancers in a roller skating rink, we took over a roller skating rink and turn it into a dance studio, essentially. And, you know, when I do these, I always make sure to do both a beginner class and an advanced class.

Because while a lot of my stuff online is, you know, more advanced, and it’s for professional dancers, I love absolutely love people coming up and saying, this was my first dance class ever, or I was terrified to come into this room. Or I never thought I could dance, I saw one of your videos. And I was like, you know what, I’m going to try this.

You know, I love helping people get out of their shell out of their comfort zone. That was why I originally started dancing when I was a teenager was just to help my confidence and pick up a hobby and meet people. And, and then I fell in love with the art form.

But I think that dance, the energy that you share with people when you’re in a room, learning how to dance dancing together, it’s just absolutely incredible, you know, and we do a meet and greet after each workshop. And I get to hear people’s stories of how they started or how far they’ve come. And it’s it’s one of my favorite things that I get to do in my career is is teach dance, you know, to, to especially to beginners and, and hear their stories.

And it pairs really well with music, I wouldn’t have ended up doing what I’m doing now. If it wasn’t for my career in music, I actually started choreographing for Steve Aoki, I worked with Tiesto, Joyride, Slander, Nightmare, like a lot of the acts that are big in the electronic space, I brought I came on as a choreographer first. And while I’m working with them, they’re, you know, talking about music, they’re showing me stuff, they’re telling me they went to this school, or they did this thing, or this really helped them in their career.

And it was such a source of inspiration, you know, and still to this day, I’m friends with all those guys. And they’ve just been such amazing mentors in the sense of like, no ego, just, you know, I’m just a choreographer, whatever, asking them questions about their productions. And, you know, they’ll take time out of their day every time to, to help me out.

And it’s really incredible. I feel very, very blessed to have that. And, you know, bringing dance and music together and being able to dance to my own tracks, or when I’m DJing, get people out there dancing or come out in front of the deck sometimes, and I’ll dance a bit just to get everyone on the dance floor.

It’s it’s really a perfect match. And so kind of at this, this this point in my career now where I’m finding new ways to combine them. One more thing, but the recent show I did in Thailand, I motion captured myself like a guy in a mocap suit.

And I made digital characters of me dancing, but I made like one was a giant gladiator guy. And then I made like a kpop girl and all these different characters. And then during the show, I would have them on the screens dancing, but it would be me that was actually doing the dancing.

And sometimes I come out and match them. And people were freaking out because they couldn’t figure out how it was working and what was going on. And so I’ve done that show a few times now.

And the reception has been really, really amazing. So goal is sometime in the next few years to get that onto a big stage with some screens and blow people’s minds a little bit.

[Darran]
It’d be awesome to get the get some of your avatars made and then put them into our VR nightclub. Have a VR nightclub? We do have a VR nightclub.

It’s called beta nightclub in VR chat. Actually, this interview is streaming live in there right now. Oh, sick.

Yeah. So we got a lot of stuff going in our VR nightclub. We call it beta because it’s our first version.

There’s a lot of ideas that I want to do. But unfortunately, it can get quite expensive when you want dreams to be built even in VR. But yeah, it’s really sick.

And we have avatars in there that do kind of like kind of robotic dances. We haven’t gotten anything as technical as bringing in somebody who’s motion done what you’ve done, but it’d be kind of cool. Yeah.

And we plan to do a lot with our VR nightclubs. Because when you said that, I’m like, I wonder if you saw my finger go up going, I wonder if we could do something like that in our VR nightclub. That’d be pretty.

You know, and you spoke about the dance. My friend, good friend of mine is a dancer. It’s been a dance for years.

And she goes just to the local studios and does different forms of dancing. They’ll put on a song, they’ll teach it. I know she would love to take one of your classes.

I don’t know if she’d fly all the way to Germany. But if you ever do him stateside, you know, we’ll get a hook up. I don’t know if you’re ever on the West Coast.

I think you said you fly back and forth between LA and Miami.

[Matt Steffanina]
LA is sort of the dance capital of the world, at least for hip hop right now. So I go to LA about once a month or so. And I teach still there.

So yeah, if anyone wants to come jump in a dance class, keep an eye out on Instagram.

[Darran]
I’m going down to LA for my birthday on the 23rd. This month, you’re going to be there.

[Matt Steffanina]
23rd. Well, I leave for Burning Man on the 24th.

[Darran]
So we’re just doing a quick pop in, pop out for my 51st to go to Magic Mountain and the water park there. I love that theme park. And so just bouncing in for that really quick.

But hey, we’re on the West Coast. It’s a hop, skip and a jump down there. I’m sure, you know, you let us know.

We’ll probably plan a trip and come on down and I’ll go to Magic Mountain. She goes to do I’ll probably go to the dance class, do an interview with you. That sounds awesome.

You know, something else that got me while you were talking about working for those big names, Aoki, Tiesto, you know, being on stage and doing the choreography for them, that how humble those artists are and how much wisdom they can pass on you. And you know, in my years of doing this, I’ve also found that to be kind of a truism with these bigger artists. They’re actually really approachable, really cool people and really down to earth.

You know, that ego is, I’ve never met somebody, I don’t think I’ve ever had anyone on my show that’s ever come off overly conceited or rude or, you know, they’re more than welcome to tell and share their experiences of the industry with people who don’t know them, two people that do know them, three up and coming people. And that wisdom, you know, that inkling of wisdom that could come out of something. You never know who you’re inspiring the next day.

It’s pretty awesome. And you mentioned, you know, a note that you sent over was that you’re honing in on your DJ skills. I mentioned earlier in the show that, you know, the barrier to entry of DJing is now you can go out and get a controller.

I just literally posted about this on Facebook today, somebody coming to the negotiating table saying, I’m a DJ. And I’m like, okay, great. That’s your negotiating skills that you’re a DJ.

What else do you bring to the table? Because if that’s all you have and you have X, Y, Z, you know, there’s other acts out there that can bring more to the table than you can. So that really isn’t a bargaining chip nowadays to say I’m a DJ when it’s so accessible.

And so, you know, you’ve been honing in on your DJing skills. What has that been like? How have you found the experience?

Has it been easy for you to jump into having a musical background? Everyone always says I should be a DJ. I’m like, no, I produce a show.

I’m not a DJ. I just play one on TV. But, you know, how has that been going for you so far as honing in on your DJ skills?

Are you looking to take it past the mixing of tracks and get a little bit more creative with that and anything in the works of mixing choreography and DJing into the mix, you know, to build a show?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that’s really where my focus is that now is kind of what can I do to level it up and what’s unique about my music, my DJ set, all of those things that I can give someone a different experience, something to go home and talk about or get excited for the next show when they come to see me. I started DJing, actually, the way that I started DJing is really random.

But I was when I was like 17, I was working for this company and they did, you know, when you have like a birthday party or a bar mitzvah or something and they hire the DJ and then they hire the dancers, the party motivators. Sometimes I think they would call us and we would get people out to like do the Macarena and just like get people on the floor. And so I was doing that.

And the guy that owned the company was like, you know, you’re really good at getting people on the dance floor and we love your energy, but we don’t have enough DJs. We have more bookings than we can handle. So I’ll make you a deal.

If you learn how to DJ, I’ll bump you up and you’ll make way more money DJing than you do doing the dance stuff. And I was done. I bought a controller.

This is, you know, 15 years ago or something. And next day I was in there. I learned and that was the start of it.

And so I started playing corporate parties, weddings, all this stuff. And then that translated into clubs. And then when dance really took off for me, I kind of put DJing and producing on the back burner for a bit.

And it wasn’t until COVID that I came back to it. And, you know, I noticed very quickly exactly what you’re saying that the barrier to entry, I can teach one of my friends to DJ well enough to go play a set in literally a couple hours. If they have some cue points and they, you know, there’s cheat codes to make it so you can literally play with zero experience.

But obviously the art of reading a crowd in complex transitions is a whole nother level. But for me, you know, I’m never going to compete with the guys that are doing four decks, insane transitions. That’s not necessarily my strength.

Like I can mix really, really fast. I can beat match fast. I’ve been doing it forever.

That’s great. That’s enough for me on the technical side for the most part. You know, you can always learn more, but what I really want to do is find a way to make my DJ set interactive in the sense of, yes, you’re also watching visuals and maybe there’s some dance elements and some things, but I want to get people to enjoy the set.

And I want them to participate in the set, whether that means putting their phones down and actually dancing, whether that means me doing some type of emceeing or dancing, whatever it is that brings them out of that space of I’m watching a show to I’m participating and I’m part of the show. And that’s really my goal as a dancer that’s sort of transitioning now back into music the last six years. That’s where my mind always goes to is how do I make people feel the joy that I feel when I’m in a dance workshop or on stage dancing?

How do I make them feel that in the crowd and how do I connect with them from behind the deck so that we’re all sort of in this together? And I have seen some glimmers of it. I definitely saw it with the dance concepts and some different emcee things that I’m playing around with.

So that’s kind of where my focus is as far as leveling up on the… I wouldn’t say just DJ side. It’s sort of like the full package of what the show and the experience is like.

[Darran]
And when you go to other shows, and I know this is probably a no-brainer and it probably activates with you. I know it activates with me. My friend who’s a lighting designer, it activates with him.

When you’re sitting there watching a show and you’re watching the dancers on stage, you’re like, I know who did that. I know who choreographed that. Or I know that move.

Are you analyzing the performance? Are you actually able to disassociate that and watch as a participant and take that business out of your head for a second? I do it when I watch video production.

I’m like, there’s a bad edit. There’s a focus shot. Oh, there’s the boom mic.

Okay. I can see all this crap that probably people don’t see. It’s like the DJ that sits there and listens and goes, that was a train wreck.

I heard that. I wasn’t on. Do you see that or are you able to turn that off?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah. If it’s really well executed, I would say if it’s at a really high level, I’m able to fully turn off and just enjoy it and be… I’m still a fan of dance at the end of the day, even though I did it for so long.

Like anyone that works in a field for long enough, you have pet peeves and things like you were mentioning where I’m like, guys, you should have just swapped it. That person should be over there. If there’s obvious ones.

But part of the thing that was great about leaving the professional dance industry the last five years and going to music is I really fell in love with it again, back the way that I had when I was first starting. Sometimes when you do anything professional, it becomes your income. And also just from a competitive standpoint, I was the most followed dancer and then I had the highest grossing dance tour of all time.

And I had these statistics that were stacking up, which I never set out to do any of that. But then when you do it, people are like, well, can you do a bigger one? Can you create more?

Can you bring this? Can you do that? And you’re like, well, I have this opportunity.

Now I got to really take it and run with it. And then sometimes over a five or 10 year span of doing that, you can look back and be like, oh, my God, I haven’t taken a vacation in eight years. And so I started to, resent isn’t quite the right word, but I started to fall out of love a bit with dance because I just sort of saw it as work towards the end.

And then COVID, a couple years of break, and now when I go teach workshops and stuff, I’m just so happy to be there. I remember every bit why I started it, why I fell in love with it. And I think that the students and the viewers whether it’s on YouTube or wherever, they can feel that too.

And so even though I don’t post as much dance content these days, my pages are growing as fast as they ever have. I think that that energy resonates through the screen.

[Darran]
Absolutely. How do you, you mentioned something in there, eight years going, I haven’t taken a vacation. I can relate with that.

35 years in the industry, 16 years on this show, when do you take a time? When does the break ever happen for the mind? How do you balance your career with your other obligations in life?

I’m up at 6.30 in the morning, check the emails and the socials and everything at seven. And I’m not off the clock. I try to pace myself.

I’m done at six o’clock at night. Then it’s making dinner time and doing all my stuff. And I keep my weekends open either for activities or trying to keep a mental balance there.

How do you balance that? Is there a systematic regime that you have that says, this is on the clock hours, this is off the clock hours, or anyone that you work with that plans your schedule for you, you use an AI or something in the back end?

[Matt Steffanina]
Man, it’s a good question. It’s a tough question. I’m not very systematic.

I wish sometimes that I could be like, I started this time, I ended this time. But the truth is, there are times I feel like where you get a little spark of momentum, you get an opportunity, things are moving, something happens. And that window does not last forever.

And so when I feel that energy, and I’m like, this is working, I will still work 100 hours in a week and not sleep and not go on vacation. I’ll do whatever it takes. But I read the four hour workweek.

And I’ve read it about probably six or seven times now, because I forget it. And I’m like, okay, I need to remind myself. And the sort of the 8020 rule, right?

Where like, the idea is 80% of the things that you get the achievements, the success, the growth is due to just 20% of your actions. And the other 80% of your actions are kind of fluff, like they’re helping, but they’re not necessary. They’re not really moving the needle.

And I really like especially the last few years, once everything reopened, and I started to travel again, and tour again, and all this stuff, I always have kept that in mind. And so, you know, I’ll do these sort of assessments where I’ll look back at the last month, three months, six months and be like, what is the one thing that caused the most growth, you know, and maybe it’s one series that I did where I was storytelling, right? It’s a type of song that I remixed that I made that went viral.

And okay, let’s do five more of those. And let’s scrap all the other stuff that isn’t working, you know. And by doing that over and over and over and I think that’s why, like I mentioned, you know, my growth is still really good on the dance side, even though I post a lot less, it’s because I’m only doing the things that work.

And I’m only doing the things that I want to do. And that that makes sense. And if someone’s like, hey, can you fly here and do this and that, and I’m not 100% bought into it, then I’m like, no, sorry, I can’t, you know, whereas earlier, my career would have been like, it’s another opportunity, I would have just stacked them and stacked them.

So I wouldn’t say I’m perfect at it. But I do think that a lot of times I see people and they’ll get that one moment, that video that’ll pop off that song that’ll hit that opportunity. And they’ll just kind of keep going as they were going.

And I’m like, No, that’s the time that you throw balance in life and everything out the window and you just fully lock in, you know, and that’s how everything that’s happened for me in my career that I would say is like, on a on a big scale was due to that. And the rest of the times where I was still working at the same rate, but the the moment wasn’t there. It was me trying to force it.

And that’s the time where I would have been better to be like, Alright, let’s breathe for a second. Let’s get back on the meditation practice. Let’s go take a weekend off.

Like we’re not missing anything. Get your mind right. And then when that opportunity strikes again, like that’s when you go, you know.

But yeah, I say it. And then sometimes I still just, you know, don’t sleep for a few days.

[Darran]
No, I can I can completely relate to that. You know, I’m kind of a I run an organization, but I have a team of people I work with, just added it up the other day, I think I have like 14 different people that do different aspects for everything. But I’m the idea generator.

And I usually don’t task somebody with with something to do unless I can do it myself. You know, I mean, I’m not going to start coding websites, I don’t do that. I hire somebody to do that.

But I come with the idea of it, and then work with them to make it happen. That’s just stuff. But you know, there’s times when I will literally hit like a writer’s block or a wall with something.

And I know that when I hit that, I have to say, stop, let it go, walk away. And I find I come back a day to usually not more than a day or two later. And I’m obviously doing other tasks.

But I sit down, I go to accomplish that task. And in 1530 seconds, I’m like, why wasn’t this off my mind then? Because I’m just trying to pressure it and force it through and make it happen.

And really, if I just took a step back, took a breath, went, Oh, oh, oh my gosh, it’s working. Why didn’t I think about that when I was in the mix? You know, and those kind of things are just taking that step back from things.

But you’re right, going with it in the moment, you don’t want to lose that momentum and lose that forward momentum, or what I call positive mental influence. Or, oh, there’s another word, I use the term positive mental influence or PMI, you know, always be always be keeping it positive in your mind of what’s going to happen. But yeah, a fluent model to like, I’m the type of guy, I don’t like stopping at a red, at a walk sign when I’m walking down the street.

If this one turns red, and this one turns white, and I know I got to get to my destination over there. I’m not going to stop and wait for this to go and go, I’m going to go across the white one, because then I get over there, the lights ended, this one turns white, and I’m continuing, but I’m constantly moving. I’m not just standing there waiting for something to happen.

You know, and sometimes I’ll jaywalk, okay, you know, only when it’s safe. Not endorsing that to the kids out there. You know, what has been one of the best business decisions in favor of your artist career that you could say, if there’s one, two, three, four, five, millions, is there one that stands out above all else that you could say, this was one of the best decisions I ever made?

And I’m really proud that I made that decision? What would that be?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, I mean, 100% it’s creating content. And removing my ego around creating content. I think that, you know, one of the gifts and the curse, curses of being an artist is that we care so much about what we create and and what it means to us.

And I’ll give a really, really tangible example. I was coming up as a choreographer, was very excited about being taken seriously. Finally, in the industry is getting some opportunities.

I was starting to be like, I’m really doing it. Wow. You know, and so I was putting a lot of dance videos online.

But it was always like my proudest choreography, right? It’s my hardest pieces. It was like professional dancers dancing professional stuff, and lights, and everything was filmed.

Well, right, like kind of you were talking about earlier, the broadcast side, like professional. And one day, someone was like, you know, I have so much fun in your beginner classes, like, why don’t you ever post those online? And I was like, I’m, why would I post beginner choreography online?

Like, it’s easy, who’s gonna care? Like, I don’t know, it’s just really fun. Like, I always have fun in your class, maybe people would like to watch it.

And I was like, Huh, okay, sure. Why not? What’s there to lose?

So I put it on YouTube. And that video got 80 million views, and ended up being the biggest YouTube video that I ever posted in my whole career. And it is the most basic piece.

I think I was teaching it to like 10 year olds at some studio in like Boston, it was a random class filmed on like a crappy camera, iPhone 15. I don’t even remember before iPhones were good. And all the comments were like, I wish I was in this class.

Can we get this guy to come teach here? Like, who’s this choreographer? He’s great, you know, and it was just such a mind, I don’t know, recurse on the show, but F to me, because I couldn’t believe that I had been that off.

Like in my mind, I’m like, people want this. And that’s what I’m giving them. And I thought that I was there.

And, and I humbled myself after that moment to be like, okay, I’m, I’m just me. I’m not the norm. I’m not that I don’t know.

So from this point on, if I have an idea, or someone has an idea, and I can’t say that there’s a really bad reason to avoid it, then I’m just gonna do it. I’m gonna try it. Someone wants me to talk about something, do a tutorial, this or that easy choreo, bad choreography, heart like, I’m down, I’ll try it.

And that is the number one thing that that helped me in my career is just being willing to try things before I judge them. And then if I do it, and it flops, you know, three times in a row, then I’m like, I that that maybe isn’t the idea. Fair enough.

But I’m always willing to take shots if it seems like there’s potential there.

[Darran]
Awesome. You know, you said something to me about that, that beginner video getting 80 million views online. Have you toyed with obviously you do classes, have you toyed with the idea of doing anything online with like a class seminar or a subscription based type of thing?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, I mean, it sounds like I paid you to ask me that question. But I do have a I have a company called dncr.com, which is literally learn how to dance online. All online tutorials and everything.

Exactly what you’re talking about for people that can’t, you know, can’t get to the studio can’t get to LA. It’s, it’s great. We have a free week trial on there for anyone wants to jump on and learn how to dance a bit.

[Darran]
No, the reason why I ask is because I know you did not pay me to say that that was not a paid promo plug in any way, shape or form. I’m glad you brought it up, though. My friend that I mentioned earlier is the dancer that does the dance classes.

She’s also a Pilates and personal trainer. And she’s using the software that’s really kind of cool. And I’m not getting paid endorsement for this either.

But I’m not going to name who they are. But it’s really cool. She can go in now and do virtual sessions with people, they perform their workout, and then she goes back.

And instead of being with them in the workout itself, can go back and give notes on the workout routine that they did. And and rather than spending an hour with the client, they can you spend 510 minutes to give the feedback to the client. And it was really cool.

This I’m actually one of our first beta persons that try it. She didn’t design it. It’s the company that designed it.

The gym she works for is using it. But I didn’t know if you had something like that also that could almost be a one on one session. Or if you have a team people you work with as well that could do that.

It just sounded really cool how advanced training virtual training can can get. And I you know, I’m glad you were you do have that I should have. Yeah, got that in my research.

It’s kind of in my research out there.

[Matt Steffanina]
Because I don’t necessarily do. I don’t necessarily do a lot of one on one stuff, just because I’m always sort of maximize time. But yeah, I think that, you know, it’s it’s really amazing to be able to learn stuff online.

I’ve learned literally almost everything I do now online, I think a lot of us have. And I think, you know, back to that example, for a lot of us, for a lot of people listening, obviously, are more on the music side, whether it’s production, DJ engineering, whatever it is, it really, it doesn’t really matter if it’s dance or music or cooking, right? It’s it’s really the the idea.

And, you know, one of my songs that did really well, I use that same concept of I was like, Okay, I’ve been making these really complex songs with, you know, 100 layers and all these stacks and, you know, million different things and putting all this time into them. Let me just do a series where I just take vocals that I love. And I remix them and I give myself, you know, a couple hours to do it.

And then I put it up on SoundCloud. And a few of my biggest remixes that went went viral were from that series of just trying stuff. So, you know, for anyone that’s out there that’s, you know, really doing top notch stuff, take a take a day to mess around.

And, you know, what’s the worst that happens is it doesn’t hit or it doesn’t resonate with the audience. But you know, I found that not only has it been really productive in the sense of it’s performed well, but creatively, it’s really freeing to to be like, I’m going to give myself the chance to just mess around and have fun. And this isn’t going to be a I’m not I’m not putting this out there as like, look at my work and how amazing it is.

Like, I’m literally just being like, Hey, guys, did this beginner thing. It was super fun. Check it out, you know, and and watch what happens what people respond.

Sometimes it’ll surprise you.

[Darran]
Yeah, it is. It’s, it’s, it’s, I’m always open to doing like our show started as it came born out of a show that I was doing another broadcast television series, and I had eight, nine separate television shows. And I tried to do a smorgasbord idea of putting them all on live streaming.

This is my early days in 2009. And out of that whole instance, I found the easiest segment was to produce was when the DJ was playing in between swapping out what the show for it. So like, we have a live with tons of stuff going on.

But DJ sessions, or the DJ part was the easiest one to form. And I was like, Alright, cool. And now underneath the DJ sessions umbrella, we have the virtual sessions, we have the mobile sessions, we have the rooftop sessions, we have these different genres.

Underneath the umbrella, it’s like a project that the silent disco sessions, the state of the industry sessions, I’m actually launching a new series that I just brought on a pretty well known singer, that’s going to be doing vocalists, that’s going to be doing interviews for us, that’s going to still got to determine the name for that sessions. But I got the beats and eat sessions, you know, all this crazy stuff, you know, you throw at the wall and see what’s gonna stick and people like watching a cooking show while talking to people about music. I mean, I’d be cooking with you here in your kitchen.

I’m here cooking in my kitchen. And we’re both making the same meal. And like, how’d that taste at the end of the day?

You know, it’s like the beats and eats and we’re just still having the same interview format. But I’m crazy. Like I’ll come weird stuff, you know, probably maybe it’s already been done.

But if it has been done, you heard it here first, you know, I created it. But speaking of here’s something I want to switch to, because I think that’s what prompted me, which was awesome. Again, I don’t send questions in advance.

But I’m gonna ask you, how important is it for an artist to have merchandise available? And I know you have your merch shop, I went through it a little bit. And I was like, Oh, that’s dope.

You got your own online store, your own thing. Do you think more artists should look at having some type of merch, at least a logo, we know that that’s kind of a standard, have a logo, have your name, you know, just don’t have an aerial font. This is my name.

You know, you can go to Fiverr nowadays, I will promote them not getting paid, but have somebody make you a logo for 50 bucks. Heck, you probably have AI make you a logo for less than that. You know, but how important do you think it is for you to have merch or an artist to have merch on their sites?

The benefits of having that? Is that a must?

[Matt Steffanina]
I don’t think it’s a must. I think if it speaks to you, then it’s a great vehicle to, you know, deepen the connection with your fans. I think that’s really the main purpose behind merch.

Obviously, it can be a really amazing part of your business too, if it if it takes off, but I always try like with anything that I put out on the merch side to have it have some type of meaning, whether it’s a tour shirt, and it has all the cities and people are going to wear it, you know, for years to come and remember the experience they had there. You know, right now, I launched a clothing brand, it’s actually separate from sort of me, it’s called Mad Chill. And it’s athleisure, we do a lot of stuff around mental health.

And so like, for instance, the hoodies on the inside of the sleeve on the wrist, it says inhale, and the other one says exhale. And it’s a reminder to just take a deep breath, throughout your day, stay calm, kind of stay centered, stay present. And so that particular set, hoodie and sweats is really based around that concept.

And so I think if you have a concept or, you know, a tour, some reason to do it that you’re really passionate about, absolutely, it’s an incredible idea. But, you know, if you’re starting out, and you’re like, it’s a lot of work, and do I want to just slap my logo on a t shirt, I personally would wait until sort of inspiration strikes, or until your fans are asking for it. You know, if you have a cult fan base, it’s just like, we want merch, like, give the people what they want, you know.

But I don’t think it’s necessarily mandatory, especially when you’re in the earlier to mid mid stages of your career, if it’s not speaking to you.

[Darran]
Are you working with a designer to make custom pieces? Or the reason I’m asking this is we’re getting ready to revamp our merch store. We have some products there.

I wanted the product line, I wanted to put something out there so people could support the logo help support the that stuff. But we’re really in the marketplace. We’re looking for designers that want to come in and put their stuff with our brand and even their brand in our stores and also incorporate our stores for guest artists that come on the series saying, Hey, would you like to cross and put your stuff into our online store?

That’s a whole nother ball of wax to deal with just like making a music store. I don’t want to make a music store, but we’re launching a new music section on the site royalties payouts. That’s a whole nother ballgame.

But yeah, do you work with specific designers? And if somebody had a design, or a line that they wanted to say, Hey, could we get this merch, this design in your store? And you use that?

Do you? Are you open to that?

[Matt Steffanina]
I basically, there’s a lot of ways to do it. You know, over the years when I was doing more, just like my merch, and I was doing one off drops and stuff. There’s so many sites, like like Printful, and there’s a million of them where you can just design something literally on the site, upload your logo, toss it in, it’s print on demand, or you order 100 of them, and they make it so easy.

So you know, if you’re if you’re brand new to it out there, like that’s probably the best way to go to just start out and do it really low risk. Right? Once you get to where you’re talking about where you’re involving a designer manufacturer, maybe making some custom cuts or sizings or whatever it might be like designs, then it gets a lot more complicated.

We’re sort of in the middle. Our designs are obviously all original. I have a designer on the team that I work with to sort of get everything right and ready to send out I come up with the ideas.

But as far as the you know, making fully custom garments, I’m mostly getting samples in from different manufacturers and trying them on and being like, Okay, I like these sweats, but it needs to be more like this. Can you guys do it a little bit wider? You know, I’m not necessarily there with a sketchpad drawing, drawing things out not talented enough for that one.

But you know, for me right now, the most important thing is the fit and the quality. And so with with mad show in particular, we’re thinking of it much less of like, a brand t shirt. And it really is its own clothing line, like think of, you know, essentials, fear God and what they’ve come to be known for this like high quality athleisure wear.

So I love their stuff, but I have a slightly different take on it. It’s it’s that kind of a vibe like a premium athleisure item, but it’s it’s a lot of work. I’m not gonna lie.

If you want to do a t shirt with a logo, that’s pretty easy. But as soon as you get into like, quality and different fabrics and sizings and sweats, and then you know, if you can’t print on demand, and you have to bulk buy, and then you’re dealing with inventory. And there’s a lot of things that go into it, which is why I say, when you’re starting out, if you’re just like, looking to do something for some shows or whatever, print on demand is great.

[Darran]
Keep it keep it Oh, no, we broke up. Oh, no, we lost transmission there for a second. That’s why you know, this is live, not pre recorded.

That’s okay. We’ll wait till Matt comes back online. There we go.

Looks like it’s slowly coming back online right now. But I totally hear what you’re saying there, Matt. You know, the work that we’re going to getting up there and getting merch up there basically is pretty easy to do.

You know, I grew up with my father being a print shop, he owned a print shop, screen printing shop, well, actually a print shop and a screen printing shop as a kid growing up. So I remember getting all those samples in the house. And all those things that got to see different types of clothing, different types of wear and didn’t know you had the opportunity to suggest to suggest clothing to people.

There we go. Matt’s back. All right, cool.

That was weird.

[Matt Steffanina]
I could still see and hear you.

[Darran]
But that’s okay. It happens. That’s what happens during the live interview.

And I pick up the ball and roll with it. No, I was just talking about how my father, I don’t know if you heard it or not, but he’s on a screen printing business. And, you know, getting all those samples in and seeing all the different materials.

And, you know, I remember when American Apparel came on the market, it was like the hottest, you know, thing. And it’s like, Oh, where’d you get that shirt? Where’d you get this?

And it’s like, I never get boxes of samples sent to the house. And I’m wearing gear that’s not even like in the stores yet and stuff. It was kind of cool.

But totally know how that is. And but, you know, definitely something there. It’s there.

I like to have it. Like I said, we’re getting into the process of revamping our store and then expanding it to other endeavors as well. You know, if there was one non famous person that you would like to put into the spotlight, and other than your direct family or friends, who would that be?

And why? For any anything, some purpose? Yeah, like we could say, you know, this person really would love to see them go here.

Not family or friends. Oh, man. Somebody that’s hot.

That’s that should be like next year’s.

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, I’m trying to get you in trouble. I just have so many, honestly, people that are really incredible and doing amazing stuff. I mean, I definitely would would have to throw my buddy Zach Martino in there.

I mentioned him earlier, we did a collab. That was the one that the Arman played out. And he’s he’s been in the game for a while.

He’s he’s been releasing for probably almost a decade at this point. And, you know, a lot of people know his name. They’ve seen his work.

He’s, you know, everyone has played his music out at some point. But I feel like he hasn’t quite got the recognition he deserves for how good his music is. So just give a give a shout out to my boy Zach.

And if you guys haven’t checked out his music yet, Zach Martino, he’s incredible.

[Darran]
Zach Martino, shout out. Awesome. Is there something you’d like to say to new and up and coming producers to watch out for when it comes to making their careers successful?

A bit of advice you could say, you know, hey, don’t go open that merch store yet. Because something you could give a piece of the wisdom tree there.

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I guess I wouldn’t wouldn’t rush to open up the merch store out the gate. I think that the the number one thing, you know, I really would go back to what I what I was saying earlier about my biggest mistake of thinking that people didn’t want to hear, or in my case, see a certain type of video.

You know, a lot of people will have opinions on how you should do the industry, how you should be a producer, how you should do how, how, how, how, how, how. But if you do what they recommend, that’s what’s already been done. Everyone always recommends the path that they saw works the best, A, B, C, D, right.

And it’s not that it can’t work. There’s a lot of great advice out there. But, you know, I think it’s just as important to also take shots in new directions.

And if you have a weird idea or something crazy, try it, like send it there’s there’s never a better time to try all your crazy, stupid ideas than when you’re starting out, because there’s no risk. Once you have a label and a manager and tours and shows and people are relying on you and you have a sound and all those things are there. Now you have pressure.

Now you have, you know, some some guidelines that you’re not able to get outside of as much you don’t have as much freedom. So when you’re early and you’re starting off and you’re like, man, I don’t have all those things like the upside of you don’t have all those things is you can do whatever the hell you want and nobody’s going to tell you anything. So if you want to drop a tech house song and then drop a dubstep song and then mash them up into like, do whatever, just go for it, you know, and maybe you’ll find something that’ll work that nobody’s done before.

And at the very least, you you have the great advice that you got from everyone else of ABC to always fall back on. And I kind of do both. At the same time, I’m sort of building the traditional sense and trying to do the smart things.

And when I have an idea, I’m just like, all right, let’s take a break and do this real quick. You know, that’s that’s the number one thing I would say for anyone start now.

[Darran]
Well, something I like to use there, the ABCD, the pathway does not always go ABCD either. You know, somebody’s B, it may have been your Z or somebody’s, you know, Q might have been your A, you know, once you culminate on then you start going into the numbers. Like I think what you said, I think the pressure starts to happen when you get all those ABCDs down to Z.

And then it goes, now I got responsibility, like you said, to maintain those numbers, because now there’s expectations, you know, and those numbers mean anything from viral views to dollar signs, to gigs, to wherever it is. And those numbers are time constraint numbers. You know, how much time do you have in the day to do everything?

But you’re right, it’s just never, you know, you never know what your path is. And I just had a post today on Meta and socials that said, hey, you know, somebody’s trying to come to me and tell me how to run my company, when a lot of people haven’t really done. Yes, they’ve done online streaming, they’ve done online shows, but they’ve never done something that I’m trying to accomplish.

So you can’t come up off the table and tell me you should do this. When first of all, you’ve never done it, you’re not in the industry I’m in, and you’re giving me a suggestion. I’m like, no, dude, I have, this is why, and I’ve talked to industry professionals.

Why don’t you work with us, see if it works for you, and then say, no, it doesn’t work, rather than just criticize and say, change your format, change it. And it’s like, oh, I know what I’m doing, and I’m laying out new foundations here for something that, there is no model for what I’m going off, there’s no playbook, there’s no four-hour workweek book that I’m reading going, oh, this is it, this is my to-do list, this is how it’s been all done and accomplished, you know, having said, but yeah, it’s definitely a process, and you go through no one finite, clear way, path of doing it. Question for you, I always love this one is, we’re wrapping up here really quickly though, if Hollywood made a movie about your life, who would you pick as the main actor?

[Matt Steffanina]
Oh, man. Currently, or can we say time doesn’t matter? Time doesn’t matter.

You know, on the flight back from, where was I yesterday? Budapest. It’s just a flight from Budapest the other day.

I was like, I know I was somewhere else yesterday. I watched a few movies, and one of them was Troy, the throwback, and Brad Pitt in Troy is such a gangster. Man.

Can I get, I mean, I don’t quite have like the, you know, the jawline and the hair exactly, but like, can I get a Brad Pitt from Troy to play me just for the clout?

[Darran]
That would be a good one, Brad Pitt from Troy though.

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because he was big. He was taking his protein for that one.

[Darran]
You sure there was no CGI in that, like 300?

[Matt Steffanina]
Yeah, there was no CGI back then. Shout out, creatine.

[Darran]
Awesome, Sass. No worries there. Awesome.

Well, is there anything else you’d like to let our DJ Sessions fans know before we let you go?

[Matt Steffanina]
No, man. I really appreciate the time, the interview, and yeah, hopefully I see you guys either at a show or maybe a dance class somewhere around the world.

[Darran]
Absolutely, absolutely. Where’s the best place people can go to find out more information about you and what you got going on?

[Matt Steffanina]
Uh, all my social media is just at Matt Stefanina. So probably Instagram is the one that I update the most with shows and that professional stuff right here. And probably probably Instagram is the best.

Yeah, at Matt Stefanina. And yeah, especially if anyone comes out to a show or whatever, and takes a video, I always always try to be really active on there and reposting people love seeing you guys engage and enjoy the shows and everything. So yeah, I would love to connect more.

[Darran]
Awesome, Matt. Well, definitely want to try to hook up with you in person here somewhere around the world. I know you’re a busy guy.

And thank you for coming on the DJ Sessions today. We always like to follow up with our artists. We’ll probably hit you up in a few months.

I know you’ve got something going on that we’re gonna want to talk and let our fans know about. But again, thank you so much for coming on the DJ Sessions today. Yeah, amazing, man.

Thanks so much for having me. You’re welcome. On that note, don’t forget to go to our website, thedjsessions.com.

Find us on that’s the wrong QR code. I want that QR code. Find us online at thedjsessions.com.

All our socials are there. We got over 700 news stories a month, live interviews, exclusive mixes. We’re launching a new music section where you’re gonna find artists tracks and more at the DJ Sessions syndicated shows coming in.

There’s just a bunch of stuff you’re gonna come there in the morning, come there in the afternoon, come there in the evening. It’s gonna be something different for you at thedjsessions.com. I’m your host, Darran, coming to you from the virtual studios in Seattle, Washington, and coming in from Miami.

It’s Matt Stepnina. It is. I got it right.

Awesome. For the DJ Sessions. And remember, on the DJ Sessions, the music never stops.