Benny Benassi on Satisfaction, Skrillex, and Feel the Bass

Transcript

Twenty Five Years of Miami Music Week

Benny: I remember when the owner of the record company told me about Skrillex. I said, "Skrillex? Who is Skrillex?" I'd never met him. He sent us the song, and I listened to it and said, "Wow, what is this voice?" He said, "It's Chris." I said, "Chris who?" Chris Brown had come by the studio. I said, "Wow, come on, this is crazy." One night when we were going home from the club, he said to me, "At the end of the story, the people in the club are happy with one good kick and one good bassline." I said, "This is the key, this is the point."

Bobby: Cheers.

Benny: Cheers, my friend.

Bobby: Cheers, cheers. Welcome to Music Week.

Benny: Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Bobby: How many Miami Music Weeks have you been to?

Benny: I think the first one was in 2001.

Bobby: Wow.

Benny: My first Winter Music Conference. I was just a young DJ, not Benny Benassi, I was Marco Benassi, and I came to Miami for the first time to listen to music, to see what was happening at the conference. That was 2001, the first one. It was crazy.

From Reggio Emilia to Ibiza

Bobby: Was that one of your first trips? Where are you from, by the way, Italy?

Benny: I'm from Italy, yeah, a little town in the north called Reggio Emilia.

Bobby: Reggio Emilia.

Benny: It's a small town, but when I was young it was really interesting at night, there was a lot of clubs, and the club scene, to be honest, was incredible. I grew up in this city with this situation.

Bobby: How old were you when you started going to clubs?

Benny: The first time, I was fourteen. At that time the club was open also on Sunday afternoon, it wasn't an after hour, because now if a club opens on Sunday it's usually an after hour, but in the eighties the club was open Sunday afternoon so you could go. It was really nice, because they made music for the young kids, no alcohol, or a little bit of alcohol, but it was crazy.

Bobby: What kind of music were they mainly playing?

Benny: At that time it was a lot of club music and Italo disco, the music people all around the world now call Italo disco. It was like a synthesizer sound, very, now it's very cool.

Bobby: Is that what influenced you to start making music?

Benny: I started by listening to this music and buying vinyl. My school was the club and vinyl.

Bobby: That makes sense. Did you have any other artists or DJs you looked up to when you first started producing?

Benny: There were some Italian guys I respect a lot, but one of the guys that really opened my mind was Erick Morillo. I remember when I went to Ibiza, because Morillo was two or three years younger than me and was already very famous in Europe, when he was like twenty five years old. When I went one of the first times to Ibiza, he was resident at Pacha, and technically he was the number one. Incredible selection of vinyl, and incredible technically, he used the filter before Pioneer even made one for that, used it differently with the vinyl. Crazy. He was one of the guys I remember.

Bobby: So you looked up to him in terms of his career at the time. When would you say your breakthrough was?

Benny: I think in 2002, 2003, when "Satisfaction" was released. I went to Ibiza, and I remember Carl Cox playing it out there, and for me that was it, I said, okay, something's happening. I remember promoters started calling me from France, because the track arrived there a year before it hit America. I remember thinking, okay, something's happening, because now I can go outside my country. When I arrived in France, for me, French electronic music was incredible, the feeling around club music and electronic music that the French have is very important, they consider it real music. In Italy at that time it was a little different, there was real music and music for fun, and club music was just for fun. In France they consider the music real.

Bobby: They've made a bunch of great artists come out of there too, Daft Punk, Justice, so that makes sense that it's so ingrained in the culture. I remember hearing "Satisfaction" for the first time back in, what did you say, it came out a year later in America?

Benny: 2002 in Europe, released in America around 2003, 2004.

Bobby: Do you know MTV Hits, the music video channel here? I remember seeing the music video before going to school, getting revved up to go to school. How did you come up with that music video, that was a crazy video, man.

Benny: It was really crazy. To be honest, for us it was a project, like when you're a DJ working with a musician, for us it was really electronic, and we made a video with just me and the Italian music director. When the song was released in England, someone from the record company said, "Okay, we need to change the video," and this guy came with this idea and I said, whoa, crazy idea, I respect the music video director. They asked me to be in the video, and I said, no, what can I do in this video, I don't want to be in it. But the idea was incredible. I don't remember the name of the guy, but I think it was the same director who made the video for Eric Prydz, "Call on Me."

Bobby: They love girls in those videos, man, those guys always put girls in the videos.

Satisfaction and the Skrillex Remix

Bobby: Your track "Cinema," what year did you release that, was that with Gary Go?

Benny: I don't remember, maybe it was 2011.

Bobby: We can look it up right now. Let's see. 2011.

Benny: 2011. Yeah.

Bobby: That's honestly one of the most legendary songs in dance music. How did you come up with that idea?

Benny: There was an Italian manager at the label, and he said, "Hey Benny, I met this guy, Gary Go, you need to work with him, he's coming to our studio." He talked with me and Alle, my producer at the time, my cousin, and said, "Guys, you need to work with this guy from England." We did a remix for him of one of his songs, and we said, okay, let's go. We sent him a bunch of beats, two or three, and he came back with this incredible song over our beat. We said, wow, this is incredible, the message and everything.

Bobby: So good.

Benny: Incredible song.

Bobby: And then how did the Skrillex remix happen, did he approach you or did he just remix it?

Benny: The record company, Ultra, the American label, asked Skrillex to do the remix. He was just an up and coming artist at the time.

Bobby: He wasn't big yet.

Benny: When the owner of the record company told me about Skrillex, I said, "Skrillex, who is Skrillex?" I'd never heard of him. I remember the day the remix arrived to us in Italy, I listened to it and, wow, at one point I said, for the club, this is better than the original, because of the energy he put in the drop. It was incredible. I think it was the perfect time for us and for him, because he was coming up big with this sound but without a song yet, this was maybe one of the first songs that came with that sound. I'm so happy, because sometimes I still see video of Skrillex playing it, he still plays it at almost every show.

Bobby: Almost every single show, I see clips of him playing that. I've never met him, but I love his music, big fan. That was around when he released Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites and a few other songs, that really put him on the map. Did he win a Grammy for that remix?

Benny: He won a Grammy for the remix. We also had one from before.

Bobby: Ah, okay.

Benny: Ciao, Sonny, I love him, to be honest, he's one of my favorites.

Bobby: Shout out to Skrillex, by the way, that's good stuff.

Beautiful People and Electroman

Bobby: How did your collaboration with Chris Brown on "Beautiful People" happen?

Benny: This is funny, because we did a remix for Ultra Records for an artist, I don't remember the name, but the manager or the label said, "It's not the direction we want to keep for this remix." We said, okay, the beat is our beat, we'll take the beat home. We sent the beat to Jean Baptiste, a great songwriter from LA, and he wrote the song over our beat. One day he sent us the song, and I listened and said, "Wow, what is this voice?" He said, "It's Chris." I said, "Chris who?" He said, "Chris Brown." He'd come by the studio. I said, "No, come on, this is crazy." We decided to release it, but at the beginning we weren't sure, we thought maybe the atmosphere was good but we needed a chorus that was more open. I tried it in the club and people went crazy, they said no, it's good like this. We asked Chris, and he said, "Okay, I want to do it, let's do it together."

Bobby: That's crazy.

Benny: It was funny, because after that he came up on the booth with me in Vegas and sang the song, with maybe thirty five people around him. It was super fun.

Bobby: What? Really, that's insane. I always see the clip of him at the MTV Awards dancing and flying around with all the guys from hip hop and urban music.

Benny: They were standing up, easy was there, Jay-Z, a bunch of legends. And in the video for "Beautiful People," Chris Brown said, "Okay, I want to do the video," but he filmed it himself with a phone in the studio, and if you watch it there's a lot of people from the urban music world in it.

Bobby: That's awesome. Is my English good?

Benny: Amazing, he's killing it. You understand me?

Bobby: He's literally killing it, yeah.

Benny: I'm so sorry guys, because I live in Italy, so I can speak English with my...

Bobby: No, you're doing a wonderful job, wonderful job. I've understood every single word you've said, and I hope you've understood most of mine. So cheers, Benny.

Benny: Cheers.

Bobby: Speaking of the hip hop and R&B realm, you've also got a song with T-Pain, "Electroman." How did that come about?

Benny: It was an experiment between him and an electro beat. I think he was joking, like, hey, I'm an Electroman, because he wanted to joke his way into the electro sound, but it was good, I was really happy.

Bobby: He's funny, he's a DJ now, a beast DJ. I met him on a plane a couple years ago, near Vegas I think.

Benny: He lives in Atlanta now.

Bobby: I went up there, he did a live stream, a DJ boot camp, and I went for it. He was making bass music with his brother and a bunch of other bass DJs, dubstep DJs. He loves dubstep, he's kind of a genius, very into the music. I saw him working like it was a studio setting, very passionate, tries really hard, and he said it was really hard to produce dance music compared to R&B, he was getting frustrated.

Benny: Yeah, that makes sense.

Alle Benassi and the Sound of the Club

Bobby: You collaborate a lot with your cousin in the studio, right? Is he your go to for making music?

Benny: Yeah, he's the guy. At the beginning, especially for us in Italy, it was different. When we started in our little town, there was a studio with one producer, and Alle was the musician of the studio. He needed the DJ sometimes for reference, and I started with him like that, bringing him reference music in the studio, and we worked together for maybe twenty years.

The goal of the studio, there was this big producer who made a lot of dance music, but more like pop songs near dance, not proper dance. Alle was one of the musicians in the studio, and during the weekends he'd come with me to the club, because he also plays saxophone, on the funky music I was playing, house and funk. I remember one night going home from the club, he said to me, "At the end of the story, the people in the club are happy with one good kick and one good bassline." I said, "This is the key, this is the point." We stopped, and started making songs from the floor up. We started to explore something more raw, with the bassline. One of our references was Funkatron by Robbie Rivera, you remember that? There was nothing to it, just a bassline, a great kick, and nothing else, and we said, wow, this is it, because on the club floor it was incredible. We started with that as our reference, and Alle was very good with the compressor, and he was also a big fan of Daft Punk and that kind of sound. We started it almost like a joke, saying, we want to make music for the club, but pushing the compressor more. That was the beginning.

Bobby: That's crazy.

Benny: He stopped, five years ago. He said to me, "I want to take a break, there's a lot of new young producers now." I said, okay, no problem, and he's taking a break, but now his break is five years.

Bobby: Do you think he'll come back?

Benny: I don't know. We talk sometimes about the music, we're partners on a lot of our songs, so we talk about business and everything, but I don't know what he's going to do now. He knows the world, he knows that.

Bobby: You live in Italy, you're an Italian artist. Who are some of your favorite Italian DJs right now?

Benny: I love Genesis, he's doing a very good career path, step by step, making songs for the good labels, throwing great parties with a proper sound. Also Meduza, they're very big right now, they do a great job with the song, they're the new Italian superstars. And if you follow the melodic techno and melodic house scene we have in Italy too, Honey Dijon and all the guys that work with Fideles, and Zamna Soundsystem, very great club music.

Bobby: A lot of great music coming out of Italy. I love the Meduza guys, I was with Matt last week.

Benny: Oh, you were with Matt, yeah, shout out to Matt.

Bobby: And Simone, too.

Benny: Yeah, absolutely, shout out to all the boys.

Feel the Bass and What's Next

Bobby: What are some of your favorite songs that you've released?

Benny: "Satisfaction" opened a window into the world for me, it changed my life. But "Beautiful People" is incredible too, I think because it's one of the points where EDM crossed over with urban pop. I love this song. I also have some club music that I like, like "House Music," remember that? I love it because it was different, with a big kick.

Bobby: I love both of those songs too. Benny, what do you have going on right now in your career for this year, 2026? What are you excited about?

Benny: I'm very excited, I have a new album coming out in May, only electro club music. I'm happy because electro is coming back. I don't want to say this is my time again, because to be honest I'm fifty eight years old, so I think this time is for the young people, but I feel very good now when I play music, because I can play the music that I like. I need that sometimes, you know what I mean, and this is my time again too, but... I grew up in a big club scene when I was young, I'd go to the discotheque, there was a big discotheque in our city with a crazy bass, and I grew up with that bass, I was really a fan of it.

Bobby: Do you have a name for the album yet?

Benny: It's called Feel the Bass.

Bobby: Feel the Bass.

Benny: I'm growing up... this is, I grew up in a big club, I told you that, I go to the discotheque, I need it.

Bobby: Do you have any other artists on the album with you?

Benny: Yeah, I have a lot of artists. I have Chris Nasty, who's with me today.

Bobby: We're looking right at him.

Benny: We made one of the songs on the album together, it's called "Superstar." I have a great young team in the studio with me now. I have a song with Felix Da Housecat, a song with another act, and a song with Laherte, another young Italian guy coming up, he made a great remix too. And I have a crazy song I love with Felix Da Housecat. I sent him a beat, we made a beat with a vocal that said "Chicago," and sometimes he'd send me audio drop messages and I loved his voice on them, I kept joking with him, "I love your voice, I love your message, can you do an a cappella for Benny," and he said he could, so we did it, and called it "Chicago Trip." It talks about the Chicago house music, it's very good.

Bobby: I like that.

Benny: I love Felix.

Bobby: Amazing. Well, listen Benny, I appreciate you coming in today and spending some time with us. You're an absolute legend, I grew up on your music, so this is an awesome moment for me too. Appreciate you, man.

Benny: Thank you.

Bobby: Much love, peace.

Benny: Yeah.